Chương 10
His apartment was clean. His job was stable. His partner, Renee, had no criminal history and expressed willingness to have Lily live with them. But Daniel had missed support payments, failed to maintain consistent contact, and exaggerated his efforts to visit. Phone records showed long gaps when Victoria had not blocked him at all.
When confronted, he blamed depression, work demands, travel costs, and the humiliation of fighting Victoria.
All of those things might have been true.
None had called Lily on her birthday.
Lily met with him by video. Claire sat outside the room while the child advocate supervised.
Afterward, Lily said, “His girlfriend has a dog.”
“What kind?”
“A brown one.”
“Did you like talking to him?”
“He asked if I want to live there.”
“What did you say?”
“I don’t know.”
Claire folded a dish towel.
“Do you?”
“I’ve never been to Oregon.”
“That’s true.”
“Dad said Mom kept us apart.”
“She did sometimes.”
“Did he try?”
“Sometimes.”
“Why does everyone only do things sometimes?”
Claire looked at the towel in her hands.
“Because sometimes is easier than always.”
Lily considered that.
“Do you do things always?”
“No.”
“You always check my homework.”
“I forgot Tuesday.”
“You remembered at bedtime.”
“That still counts as forgetting.”
Lily smiled faintly.
The bruise above her eyebrow had turned yellow and nearly disappeared. She still touched the place when anxious, pressing one finger against skin that no longer looked injured.
Claire returned to work part-time. Margaret stayed with Lily after school on clinic days, under the safety plan. Harold changed the locks at their house and removed Victoria’s name from the emergency contact list at Lily’s school.
Margaret struggled with the rules.
She answered Victoria’s calls in the bathroom. She delivered groceries to her townhouse and did not tell Harold. Once, Lily found a note inside a library book that Margaret had carried over from Victoria.
I love you every second. None of this is your fault. Remember who knows you best.
Claire gave the note to Marisol.
Margaret defended herself.
“It said none of this was Lily’s fault.”
“It also bypassed the contact restrictions.”
“She’s her mother.”
“You keep saying that as if it answers every question.”
Margaret sat at Claire’s table and folded the corner of a paper napkin.
“She calls me at night,” she said. “Sometimes she can’t breathe.”
“Then tell her to call her therapist.”
“She says the therapist writes everything down.”
“That’s the point.”
“You don’t understand what it is to hear your child falling apart.”
Claire looked toward the bedroom, where Lily was reading.
“I understand more now than I did.”
Margaret’s face tightened.
“That was cruel.”
“Yes.”
Claire waited for guilt to make her soften the truth. It came, but she let the silence remain.
Margaret smoothed the napkin.
“When Victoria was fourteen, she locked herself in the bathroom after Harold told her she couldn’t go to a party. She said she had swallowed pills. We called an ambulance. She hadn’t taken anything.”
Claire remembered the flashing lights, though no one had told her why they came. She had been nine and had watched through the stair railing while Victoria shouted that everyone wanted her dead.
“Why are you telling me this?”
“Because after that, I never knew which threat was real.”
“So you treated all of them as real.”
“At first.”
“And later?”
Margaret’s eyes filled.
“Later I treated none of them as real enough.”
The sentence connected years Claire had kept separate. Victoria’s threats, Harold’s silences, Margaret’s appeasement, Claire’s habit of leaving. Lily had inherited a family trained to survive each crisis by making the distressed person the center of the room.
“What did you think would happen if you told her no?” Claire asked.
Margaret looked down.
“That she would leave.”
“She did leave. She moved out.”
“That isn’t what I mean.”
Claire understood.
Margaret had not feared Victoria’s absence. She had feared being blamed for whatever Victoria did after walking away.
Lily began trauma-focused counseling with a therapist named Dr. Amin. Claire drove her every Thursday at four. Lily rarely discussed the sessions, and Claire did not ask for details. The therapist shared only what was necessary for safety and care.
Lily started sleeping through the night. Her stomachaches decreased. She stopped apologizing when Claire dropped a spoon or forgot an appointment.
Then, one Thursday in March, she refused to enter the therapist’s office.
“I’m done.”
Claire sat beside her in the waiting room.
“Done today or done forever?”
“Forever.”
“Okay.”
“You’re supposed to make me go.”
“I’m not going to drag you.”
“Mom would.”
“I know.”
Lily kicked the leg of the chair.
A receptionist answered the phone behind the desk, speaking softly about insurance authorization.
“Dr. Amin says I think things are my fault,” Lily said.
“Do you?”
“No.”
Claire waited.
Lily kicked the chair again.
“Maybe.”
“That sounds hard.”
“Don’t talk like her.”
“Like who?”
“The therapist.”
Claire smiled despite herself. “Fair.”
Lily looked offended by the smile, then almost smiled too.
“Mom says therapists make you hate your family.”
“When did she say that?”
“Before.”
Claire nodded.
“Do you hate your family?”
“Sometimes.”
“So do I.”
Lily stared at her.
Claire leaned closer. “We probably shouldn’t put that on a greeting card.”
A laugh escaped Lily. She covered her mouth, as if laughter might betray someone.
Dr. Amin opened the office door and waited.
Lily stood.
“I’m only going because Aunt Claire is bad at therapy.”
“I’ll make sure that goes in my evaluation,” Claire said.
In April, supervised visits resumed.
Victoria had attended every required session and written a letter of accountability approved by her treatment provider and the caseworker. She read it to Lily in the visiting room.
Claire watched through the observation window.
May you like
Victoria’s hands shook around the paper.
“I was angry about the juice,” she read. “I used the frying pan to scare you. I told myself I was teaching you to be careful, but I was frightening you because I wanted you to feel how upset I was. The bowl fell because I hit the table. You did not cause that by spilling your drink. Afterward, I tried to make the accident smaller so I would not have to feel what I had done.”
