“Would you trust me that soon the actual person will confront you? I feel like the talkin’ in this town has gone far enough.”
Evie believed her. It could’ve been stupid, but she did. “If I don’t get a sign in two weeks’ time I’m coming after you for $300.” She ended it with a laughing emoji.
Sandy loved the message and replied, “It’s a deal.” There was a smiley emoji at the end.
Evie smiled. Perhaps that was one bag of trash taken out. Maybe Sandy wasn’t so bad after all.
That night as she got ready for bed, she texted Caleb, “I hope you have all the luck in the world with your custody hearing. I’ll be rooting for you.”
On the other end, Caleb was staring out the window of his back porch. There wasn’t a drop of alcohol in him at all, only a long hardstare. His phone was in his jeans’ pocket, and it did buzz, but he didn’t notice it.
“Daddy? Dad?"
He suddenly felt a little hand touch his leg. He jerked and looked down. He saw his little girl Olivia looking up to him. He sighed deeply and fast before noticing Zack came in with his mom. Ashley was there inside his house. She brought them over to stay on a random Saturday because Caleb had plans to take them to the football game the next day.
He pulled his head back. “How did you get in here?”
She tilted her head. “They do have keys, you know.”
She pulled Olivia and asked her, “Can you go play in your room with your big brother?”
The little girl nodded.
The two children were scooted off to Zack’s room, and Ashley and Caleb looked at each other in silence.
Caleb firmly asked with his arms crossed, “What do you want?”
“Don’t get all tough with me. Chill.”
“I’m not getting tough with you, Ashley. This is awkward for me as much as it is for you. First, you accuse me of throwing a chair at you, then people in town think I cheated on you, which was never fucking true, and youknowit?—”
He had more to say, but Ashley quieted him rudely. “Look, do you want me to be nice or not? I wanted to discuss our separation agreement. I had my lawyer redraft our documents to state that I was okay with you dating Evie. I have them right here. That way, when the judge hears our case, it won’t matter if you’ve been dating her or doing whatever it is you’re doing with her.”
Caleb glanced at her with hesitation and disbelief before taking the documents and looking them over. He skimmed through. She wasn’t lying. For some odd reason, Ashley went through the extra trouble to tell him that things could be okay. He looked up at her from the papers. But it wasn’t just that. She had ruined his partial custody arrangements, and he wasn’t getting to see his kids as often. He wanted to yell at her and throw the papers at the wall. She had destroyed his life. But now…his heart was steady. He was trying to see the good things with it.
“Wait, are you saying…”
“I know this shit going on for over a year now has done a great deal to you and that innocent girl. I hated her guts at first, but that’s all behind me now.” She shook her head hard with her eyes closed, her emotions being wrought out. “I was angry.” Then she dropped the ball, “And I want you to have your custody arrangements back. I want you to have them back during the week. Every week. They miss you terribly. And it’s about them, not us.”
Caleb felt his whole heart shatter, and tears welled in his eyes. The love of a good father showed strong. It took all of his efforts not to crumble and hug her. His large and empty house would have that warm laughter and sense of family all over again. He stood upright to gain his composure.
Ashley looked down. “I won’t tell anyone if you cry.”
Hewashappy inside, because the divorce had been going on for longer than two years, and it was the worst time of his life. To have some sort of peace of mind, even if it meant for her to treat him better, it would have been the biggest blessing of all. However, he put himself back in military mode, as Ashley could be cunning and sometimes use his emotions against him. If he cried, she might yell and call him unstable, and everything would be ruined again. He lifted his dark eyes to her and held the papers up. “You think this is gonna erase everything?”
Ashley clenched.
He looked around and spoke curtly, “This whole damn town hates me now. People think I’m taking medication for God’s sake! Do you know what that feels like?”
“Well, you’resupposedto be.”
“I don’thaveto! It’s anti-depressants! But they don’t do no good if the whole town won’t shut their mouths!”
She lifted her hands. “Keep your voice down. You know Olivia doesn’t like it when you yell.”
He wasn’t actually yelling at all, but he was about to. His voice was just more serious in tone. His body crawled with fury, and confusion. One minute she was trying to legally encourage him to date, therefore settling partial custody rights of his kids, but then pulling these weird gaslighting moves. This was the exact thing Ashley always did to him. The blood within his muscles boiled over, spilling all out into his skin.
And then he breathed.
