Chương 4
“Yes, you were.”
“I wasn’t.”
“I should’ve taken a picture. I should’ve left everything where it was. I should’ve gotten you immediately. I should’ve—”
“Stop.”
“I washed the evidence.”
“You were scared.”
“I was stupid.”
“You were holding a four-month-old baby after someone grabbed you.”
“She’s your mother.”
“I know who she is.”
“Do you?”
The question stayed between them.
This time Ethan did not defend himself.
He looked at the bracelet.
Then at the wet phone.
Then at Claire.
“Don’t touch anything else.”
A bitter smile moved across her mouth.
“That I can do.”
He took his own phone from his pocket.
Claire’s body tightened.
He noticed.
“I’m not calling anyone yet.”
“What are you doing?”
“Taking pictures.”
He photographed the broken bracelet where it lay, the sink, Claire’s wrist, the bruise around her eye, the wet phone.
When he raised the phone toward her face, Claire turned slightly away.
“Sorry,” he said.
She looked back.
He lowered the phone.
The apology irritated her.
The irritation irritated her too.
“Take it.”
He did.
The shutter sound felt indecent.
Noah had fallen asleep.
The entire evening had cracked open and he had fallen asleep.
Claire looked down at him and felt a tenderness so fierce it almost frightened her.
Then the front door opened again.
Ethan turned instantly.
Marianne’s heels did not return.
A moment later the door closed.
Someone had apparently been waiting for a ride or retrieving a coat.
The house became truly quiet.
Ethan set his phone down.
“Everyone’s gone.”
“Good.”
“Do you want me to lock the door?”
“It’s your house too.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
Claire looked at him.
He was learning quickly tonight.
It annoyed her that she noticed.
“Yes.”
He walked away.
She heard the dead bolt slide into place.
When he returned, he had lost some of the coldness that had held him upright since he entered the kitchen.
What remained was worse.
Guilt.
Claire recognized it because she had been living with her own version for months.
He stood several feet away.
“My mother told me you were having a hard time.”
Claire almost laughed.
“I was.”
“I know.”
“No, I mean I actually was. I am. Having a hard time doesn’t make her right.”
“I know.”
“I cried in the pantry last week because we were out of oatmeal.”
Ethan blinked.
“What?”
“We had cereal.”
“I remember.”
“I don’t even like oatmeal that much.”
Despite everything, his mouth twitched.
Claire looked down at Noah.
“I stood there staring at an empty cardboard cylinder like someone had died.”
Ethan said nothing.
“I’m tired. Sometimes I hate breastfeeding. Sometimes I love it. Sometimes he cries and I want five minutes where nobody needs my body for anything. Sometimes I look at him and I can’t understand how he exists.”
She took a breath.
“Those things can all be true without making me dangerous.”
“Yes.”
“Your mother knew that.”
His gaze lowered.
“She knew exactly how to use the parts that were true.”
“Yes.”
“And you gave her some of them.”
He nodded.
“Yes.”
Claire’s eyes filled.
She hated that this, not the assault, was what almost made her cry.
“Why?”
“Because she asked how we were doing.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
Ethan looked at the navy cabinets instead of her.
“I complained.”
Claire’s throat tightened.
“About me.”
“About everything.”
“Which means me.”
“No. It means no sleep, work, bottles, the stupid sterilizer that beeps every time—”
“You complained to your mother about me.”
He exhaled.
“Yes.”
The word hurt more because he finally stopped decorating it.
Claire looked away.
“I told her I felt useless sometimes,” he said. “You could calm him down faster than I could. You knew what every sound meant. I didn’t.”
“You think I knew?”
“I thought you did.”
“I was guessing.”
“I know that now.”
She laughed once, softly.
“Congratulations.”
He accepted it.
“I told her you wouldn’t leave Noah with anyone. She said that wasn’t healthy.”
Claire looked at him sharply.
“And what did you say?”
“I said you were his mother and he was four months old.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“I also said I wished you’d trust me enough to take a night feeding without coming downstairs to check.”
Claire’s anger changed.
That one was fair.
She hated that too.
“I did that twice.”
“Four times.”
“No.”
“Four.”
She opened her mouth.
Then stopped.
“Maybe four.”
The ordinary disagreement, sitting there inside the disaster, was so absurd that neither of them knew what to do with it.
Ethan rubbed his forehead.
“She made it sound different later.”
“Of course she did.”
“I should have seen it.”
Claire adjusted the loose strand near her temple.
“You should have believed me.”
He looked at her.
“I should have.”
There was no defense.
No explanation.
No sentence beginning with but.
That was not forgiveness.
It was only the first thing that made forgiveness possible someday.
Claire looked toward the phone.
“The monitor clip.”
Ethan nodded.
“Can we save it somewhere else?”
“Yes.”
She hesitated.
“I don’t want you editing it.”
“I won’t.”
“I don’t want you sending it to your mother.”
“I won’t.”
“I don’t want it going to your family.”
He paused.
Claire saw the pause.
“You want to send it.”
“I want them to know she lied.”
“That isn’t the same as helping me.”
He looked at the black phone screen.
“No.”
“If you send that recording tonight, everybody spends tomorrow deciding whether I sound scared enough.”
Ethan’s mouth tightened.
“That’s not fair.”
“Nothing about this will be fair.”
She said it without drama.
That seemed to reach him more deeply than shouting would have.
Ethan copied the monitor file to his phone and then to a private storage folder without changing it. Claire watched every step.
Neither spoke.
When it was done, he set both phones down.
“Do you want to go to urgent care?”
“I want to put Noah to bed.”
“Claire.”
“He’s tired.”
“So are you.”
May you like
“I know.”
“Your eye is swelling.”
