Chương 10
Margaret’s eyes flicked toward Rachel.
Rachel held her gaze.
Margaret said, “At you. At Rachel. At myself.”
Daniel nodded.
“And?”
Margaret looked confused.
Rachel understood what he wanted.
“You lied.”
Margaret’s jaw tightened.
“Yes.”
“To a child.”
“Yes.”
“About his father.”
“Yes.”
Daniel leaned back.
Margaret said, “I have admitted it.”
“To us.”
“You want me to humiliate myself in front of him.”
Daniel’s face went still.
Rachel almost spoke.
Then she realized Margaret had handed them the answer.
Daniel said, “No.”
Margaret looked surprised.
“I want you to tell him the truth. If that feels like humiliation, you should think about why.”
They left without agreeing to a meeting.
In the parking garage, Rachel stood beside the car and let out a breath she felt she had been holding for seven years.
Daniel unlocked the doors.
She did not get in.
He looked at her.
“What?”
“I feel sorry for her.”
Daniel’s expression tightened.
“I know.”
“I hate that.”
“I know.”
Rachel looked at him.
He sighed.
“Sorry.”
“No. That one was appropriate.”
Daniel leaned against the car.
Rachel said, “She’s not a monster.”
“No.”
“That would be easier.”
“Yes.”
“She’s a person who did something monstrous and then kept doing smaller versions of it because stopping meant admitting the first one.”
Daniel looked at the concrete floor.
“Is that better?”
“No.”
They drove home.
Ethan was at Claire and Ryan’s apartment eating pizza.
Claire had volunteered to watch him.
When Rachel and Daniel arrived, Ethan was sitting cross-legged on the rug teaching Ryan a card game with rules that seemed to change whenever Ryan began winning.
Claire came from the kitchen carrying four glasses.
“How was it?”
Rachel glanced at Ethan.
Claire understood.
“Later.”
Ethan looked up.
“Did you see Grandma?”
Daniel took off his jacket.
“Yes.”
“Is she still mad?”
Daniel sat on the floor across from him.
“I don’t think mad is the right word.”
“What is?”
Daniel considered.
“Confused.”
Ethan frowned.
“Grandma’s sixty-six.”
Claire choked on her water.
Ethan looked at her.
“What?”
She coughed.
“Nothing.”
He turned back to Daniel.
“Shouldn’t she not be confused anymore?”
Daniel smiled despite himself.
“Unfortunately that’s not how being a grown-up works.”
Ethan dealt another card.
“Are you still my dad?”
Daniel’s smile disappeared.
“Yes.”
“Okay.”
He placed a card in the middle.
“Then your turn.”
The therapist told Rachel and Daniel not to keep asking Ethan whether he was okay.
“Children eventually learn the correct answer is yes,” she said.
Rachel disliked that immediately because she recognized herself in it.
So they stopped asking.
They watched instead.
Ethan slept with his stuffed dog again.
He asked Daniel to attend more school pickups.
He wanted photographs of himself as a baby.
One Saturday morning he pulled an old album from a shelf and sat beside Daniel on the couch.
“Were you here?”
Daniel looked at the picture.
Ethan was one day old.
Rachel looked pale and furious at the world. Daniel sat beside the hospital bed holding the baby incorrectly, his shoulders so stiff he looked afraid to breathe.
“Yes.”
“Did you know I was yours?”
Daniel paused.
Rachel, standing in the kitchen doorway, did not interfere.
“I knew I was going to take care of you.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
Daniel looked at him.
“No.”
Ethan studied the photograph.
“Were you scared?”
“Yes.”
“Did you want to run away?”
Daniel’s eyes flicked toward Rachel.
She stayed still.
He answered, “For about ten minutes.”
Ethan looked surprised.
“Really?”
“Maybe fifteen.”
“Why?”
“Because you were tiny, and you made a noise like a broken smoke alarm, and the nurse handed you to me like I was supposed to know what to do.”
Ethan smiled.
“What did you do?”
“I held you.”
“That’s all?”
“That was plenty.”
Ethan looked at the photograph again.
Daniel continued.
“Being scared isn’t the same as not wanting you.”
Ethan nodded slowly.
Then he turned the page.
Rachel went back to making coffee.
She did not cry.
She did forget the sugar and put salt in Daniel’s cup.
He drank enough to notice.
He stared at her.
She looked at the container in her hand.
“Don’t say anything.”
He poured the coffee out.
Six weeks after the wedding, Margaret sent a letter.
Not to Ethan.
To Rachel and Daniel.
The envelope contained no gift.
No money.
No legal threat.
The letter was three pages, handwritten.
Margaret admitted that she had known the test result.
She admitted she lied to both of them.
She admitted that fear of losing influence over Daniel had mattered more to her than she wanted to believe.
She admitted she had used uncertainty because uncertainty kept Rachel in a defensive position.
She admitted she had treated Ethan as conditional.
The letter contained two explanations Rachel hated and one sentence she respected.
I told myself I was protecting Daniel until protecting him became the name I gave to controlling him.
Daniel read that line several times.
Then he folded the letter.
Rachel asked, “What do you want to do?”
“I don’t know.”
“What does Ethan want?”
Daniel looked at her.
They had not asked.
That evening, after dinner, they sat with him.
Rachel kept it simple.
“Grandma wrote us a letter.”
Ethan stopped coloring.
“To me?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“She wanted to ask if she could talk to you.”
Ethan stared at the red marker in his hand.
“Do I have to?”
“No.”
“Will she come here?”
“Only if you want.”
He colored a small patch of the paper.
“Will she say Dad isn’t my dad again?”
Daniel answered.
“No.”
“How do you know?”
Daniel looked at Rachel.
Then back at Ethan.
“Because if she does, she will leave immediately, and she won’t get another chance.”
Ethan thought about that.
“What would she say?”
“We don’t know exactly.”
“Can she write it?”
Rachel asked, “Would you rather read it?”
“No. I don’t like her handwriting.”
Daniel looked away to hide a smile.
May you like
Rachel bit the inside of her cheek.
Ethan continued coloring.
