Chương 10
Sometimes kind ones.
Sometimes not.
The public story had divided itself into versions.
In one version, Grace was a victim of a controlling matriarch.
In another, she was an adulterous opportunist who had almost destroyed a dynasty.
In another, Nathan was heroic.
In another, Nathan was pathetic.
People who knew none of them wrote long confident paragraphs about all four.
Grace stopped reading.
Then started again.
Then deleted the apps.
Then opened them in a browser.
Nathan caught her one night.
“Give me the phone.”
She held it against her chest.
“You said you wouldn’t do that.”
“I’m evolving backward.”
She handed it to him anyway.
He put it on the dresser.
“Come downstairs.”
“It’s three-twenty.”
“I know.”
“Why?”
“I want cereal.”
Grace stared at him.
“You woke me up for cereal?”
“You were awake.”
“That is not the same thing.”
They went downstairs.
Nathan poured two bowls of cornflakes.
Grace ate three bites.
Then she said, “Do you think I ruined your life?”
Nathan kept chewing.
She waited.
He swallowed.
“Sometimes.”
Grace stopped.
Nathan looked at her.
“You asked.”
She set down her spoon.
“Okay.”
“Sometimes I think you ruined the life I thought I was going to have.”
Grace’s eyes burned.
He continued.
“And sometimes I think that life was making both of us miserable.”
She looked at the cereal.
“That doesn’t feel better.”
“I know.”
“Do you regret staying?”
“No.”
He answered that one immediately.
Grace looked up.
Nathan pointed his spoon at her.
“Don’t make that into something prettier than it is. I still get angry. I still think about Mark. I still hate that I don’t get to be the biological father.”
Grace nodded.
“But,” he said, “I also spent twenty minutes yesterday arguing with a furniture store because the dresser they delivered smells weird and I don’t want my daughter’s clothes in it.”
Despite herself, Grace smiled.
“It does smell weird.”
“Thank you.”
“It smells like glue.”
“Exactly.”
“That’s your evidence?”
“That’s where I am.”
Grace looked at him for a long time.
Then she reached across the table and stole a cornflake from his bowl.
He slapped her hand lightly.
Life, irritatingly, kept becoming ordinary around the edges.
Mark met them in person a month before the expected delivery date.
They chose a neutral café.
Nathan hated the idea.
Grace hated that Nathan hated it.
Mark arrived early.
He looked older than Grace remembered, though only a year had passed.
He stood when they approached.
Nathan did not offer his hand.
Mark noticed and sat.
“Fair enough.”
Grace almost smiled.
The conversation was awkward from the beginning and never became less so.
Mark wanted independent confirmation after the birth.
Nathan understood.
Grace felt insulted anyway.
Mark wanted to discuss future rights and responsibilities with attorneys.
Nathan hated every word.
Grace understood anyway.
At one point Mark said, “I’m not trying to take anyone’s place.”
Nathan replied, “You have a place whether I like it or not.”
Mark looked at him.
“Do you want me to apologize?”
Nathan stared back.
“No.”
“Good. Because I’m sorry about the situation, but I’m not going to apologize for believing your marriage was over when Grace told me it was.”
Grace closed her eyes.
Nathan’s face reddened.
“That wasn’t necessary.”
“It was true.”
“So are lots of things I’m not saying.”
Grace opened her eyes.
“Both of you stop.”
They did.
That surprised her enough that she nearly laughed.
Mark looked at her.
“What do you want?”
Grace rubbed her palms together beneath the table.
“I want my daughter to grow up without feeling like the circumstances of her conception were something she has to repair for the adults around her.”
Neither man spoke.
Grace continued.
“I don’t know what that means legally. I don’t know what that means emotionally. But that’s the only thing I’m certain about.”
Mark nodded.
Nathan looked out the window.
After a while he said, “Me too.”
Mark’s shoulders lowered.
They did not solve parenthood over coffee.
They exchanged attorneys’ information.
Mark paid for his own drink.
Nathan noticed.
On the walk to the car, he said, “I still hate him.”
Grace took his hand.
“I know.”
“Do you?”
“Yes.”
He looked at her.
“Nice.”
Three months after the fall, Grace testified at a pretrial evidentiary hearing.
The courtroom was smaller than she expected.
Evelyn sat at the defense table in a charcoal suit.
No pearls.
That disturbed Grace more than seeing them would have.
For six weeks after the fall, she had dreamed about Evelyn’s earrings.
Not the gate.
Not the drop.
The pearls.
They had barely moved when Evelyn withdrew her arm.
Grace took the witness stand.
Her hands shook.
She placed them flat on her thighs.
The prosecutor asked what happened.
Grace told the truth.
Not beautifully.
She lost track of a sentence and asked to start again.
She forgot whether Evelyn had used her right hand or left until the prosecutor showed her a still image.
She admitted she had not seen the release itself move.
She repeated the words Evelyn had spoken.
Then came the defense.
Mr. Feldman was polite.
That made Maya’s description of him suddenly clear.
“Mrs. Miller, you were under significant emotional distress on the evening of this incident, correct?”
“Yes.”
“You had received difficult personal information.”
“Yes.”
“You had disclosed that information to your husband.”
“Yes.”
“And to Mrs. Blackwood.”
“Yes.”
“That information concerned the paternity of your unborn child.”
“Yes.”
The courtroom became very quiet.
Feldman waited.
Grace understood the tactic.
Let the word sit.
Let the room become interested in the wrong thing.
He continued.
“You had been unfaithful to your husband.”
Nathan shifted behind the prosecutor.
Grace looked at Feldman.
“We were separated.”
“That was not my question.”
“My husband had moved out and told me our marriage was over.”
“Had you filed for divorce?”
“No.”
“So you were legally married.”
“Yes.”
“And you had sexual relations with another man.”
“Yes.”
May you like
Grace could feel heat in her face.
Feldman walked a few steps.
