Chương 10
“I was frightened.”
“So was he.”
“I know that now.”
“You knew he was seven then.”
Victoria’s mouth trembled.
A woman at a nearby table glanced over.
Victoria lowered her voice.
“I made a mistake.”
Daniel’s expression changed.
“No.”
Victoria looked at him.
“A mistake is forgetting an appointment.”
His voice remained quiet.
“This was thousands of decisions. Every birthday. Every Christmas. Every time Olivia asked you why I left. Every time you looked at Noah and knew whose face you were looking at.”
Victoria went still.
Daniel leaned back.
“You don’t get one small word for all of that.”
For once, Victoria did not defend herself.
Olivia watched her mother fold the paper sleeve from her tea cup into smaller and smaller squares.
A habit Olivia recognized.
Her father used to fold receipts the same way.
Suddenly she remembered sitting in the back of their old station wagon when she was ten while her parents argued in the front.
Her father had lost money again.
Not much, he claimed.
Victoria said they could not keep living like that.
He told her everything was fine.
She told him she was tired of men deciding danger was acceptable because women were expected to survive it.
Olivia had not thought about that argument in twenty years.
Now she looked at her mother.
“What were you actually afraid of?”
Victoria stared at the folded paper.
“You becoming me.”
Olivia said nothing.
Victoria’s voice softened.
“Your father was not a bad man.”
“I know.”
“He was charming. He loved you. He loved me.”
“I know.”
“He also made promises he did not keep. He borrowed money. He hid things. He believed love should buy him unlimited chances.”
Daniel’s jaw tightened.
“I’m not her father.”
“No.”
Victoria looked at him.
“But I saw enough similarities to frighten me.”
“So you decided Olivia couldn’t choose.”
“Yes.”
The answer surprised all of them.
Victoria closed her eyes.
“Yes. That is what I did.”
Olivia felt no relief.
But something became clearer.
Not better.
Clearer.
Her mother had not spent eight years believing her choice was perfectly justified.
She had spent eight years reinforcing the walls around it because she was afraid to look at what she had built.
“I need the other test,” Olivia said.
Victoria nodded.
“And every document.”
“Yes.”
“No copies.”
“Yes.”
“No contacting Noah.”
Victoria’s face tightened.
“For how long?”
“I don’t know.”
“That is difficult for me.”
“I know.”
Victoria looked at Daniel.
“Do you agree?”
He glanced at Olivia.
“Yes.”
“You don’t even want to think about it?”
“I have thought about almost nothing else.”
Victoria looked wounded.
Olivia almost comforted her.
The impulse disgusted her.
Then she hated herself for being disgusted by it.
Humans could hold contradictory things without permission.
“You can write him a letter,” Olivia said.
Victoria looked up.
“Not to send. Not yet. Write what you want to say. We’ll decide later whether he should read it.”
Her mother nodded.
“Thank you.”
“This is not forgiveness.”
“I know.”
For the first time, Olivia believed she did.
At home that evening, Noah asked how the meeting went.
Olivia said, “Hard.”
Daniel said, “Nobody threw coffee.”
Noah looked interested.
“Were you going to?”
“No.”
“Mom?”
Olivia considered.
“No.”
“That took too long.”
Daniel laughed.
Later, after Noah slept, Olivia found Daniel sitting on the back steps.
She joined him.
The suburban street beyond the fence was quiet. Someone nearby was running a leaf blower despite the late hour, which Daniel found personally offensive.
“Who uses a leaf blower at nine thirty?” he muttered.
Olivia smiled.
“A criminal.”
“Thank you.”
They sat in silence.
After a while Olivia said, “I’m angry at you.”
“I know.”
“For stopping.”
“I know.”
“I know it isn’t fair.”
Daniel nodded.
“That doesn’t make it disappear.”
“No.”
She looked at him.
“I also think I stopped.”
He waited.
“I could have found you after Noah was born.”
“You thought I rejected him.”
“I know. But I could have tried one more time.”
“You had a newborn.”
“I had Google.”
Daniel smiled faintly.
“That’s brutal.”
“It’s true.”
“So?”
“So maybe I’m angry at you because being angry at myself is worse.”
Daniel looked down at his hands.
“I’ve been doing the same thing.”
“What part?”
“Thinking if I had shown up one more time, called from another phone, hired someone, whatever, I would have found you.”
“Would you?”
“I don’t know.”
“Then stop rewriting yourself into a superhero.”
He laughed softly.
“You first.”
She leaned her shoulder against his.
It was the first time they had touched without necessity since the night of the box.
Daniel did not move for a few seconds.
Then he leaned back.
The next weeks were not dramatic enough to satisfy anyone who believed revelations transformed people instantly.
Noah still had school.
Olivia still worked twelve-hour shifts.
Daniel still left coffee grounds on the counter despite claiming he did not.
There were soccer practices, permission slips, grocery lists, and one spectacular argument about whether Noah needed a new backpack.
There were also nightmares.
Twice Noah woke convinced Olivia had disappeared.
Once he hid Daniel’s car keys because he thought if Daniel could not drive, he could not leave.
The incident broke Daniel more than the DNA test had.
He found the keys under Noah’s pillow and sat on the edge of the bed for a long time.
“You don’t have to trap me here,” he said.
Noah stared at his knees.
“I know.”
“Do you?”
A shrug.
Daniel gave him the keys.
“You hold them.”
Noah looked confused.
“For how long?”
“Until breakfast.”
“What if you need them?”
“I won’t.”
Noah slept with the keys in his hand.
In the morning, he returned them.
The next night he did not hide them.
Olivia found a child therapist through a colleague.
Noah objected because he believed therapy involved lying on a couch while someone wrote down his dreams.
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The therapist had beanbags and a shelf of board games.
After the first visit Noah announced it was “less weird than expected.”
