My jaw drops. “Oh, honey…” I bite my lip hard. I didn’t think he knew. “I’m so sorry. I should have left straight away. I shouldn’t have stayed. If I’d left, maybe he wouldn’t have…” My voice trails off, and I swallow hard.
“It’s not your fault,” he says, echoing my words.
Awww… this kid is so wise.
“Will you get divorced?” he asks. “Tom’s parents broke up, and he said they were getting divorced.” Tom is one of his friends at his current school.
I take a deep breath. “Yes. I don’t want to stay married to Dad. I’m really sorry if that makes you sad. I wish things were different.”
“How do you get divorced?”
“I have to see a lawyer. It takes two years for it to happen.”
“That’s a long time.”
“It is.”
“Why?”
“To make sure it’s over, I suppose. I don’t know. Anyway, we have a few options. We could go and live with Grandma and Grandpa. But their house is very small, and it’s on the other side of the city from the vets where I work at the moment. We could try to find somewhere to rent in Auckland, just the two of us. It means you’d be able to stay at your school. And I’d stay at the vets.”
“You don’t like it there.”
“I know, but jobs aren’t easy to come by. I don’t know if I earn enough to be able to pay the rent on another place, though.”
“If you worked at PAWS, would you be able to pay the rent?”
I nod. “My salary would be twice as much as what I’m getting now. I should be able to afford to pay for somewhere in Sunrise Bay. Look, I think we both like it here, with the Ark, and with the idea of PAWS. But it would mean a lot of changes. Moving schools. Finding a new home. So I need you to tell me if that’s too scary. Would you rather stay in Auckland?”
“No,” he says immediately. “I want to live here.”
Emotion wells inside me. “Are you sure?”
He nods, then gets up and throws his arms around my neck, and we hug each other for a long time.
“Will you live with Cullen?” he asks eventually, sitting on my lap.
“Not yet. We haven’t known each other long, and we have to make sure we make each other happy. But maybe one day. Would you like that?”
He nods, fiddling with his dinosaur. “I like him.”
“You don’t mind if I… you know… see him? Like a boyfriend, I mean?”
“No. I’d like to be with Ghost all the time.”
“Of course you would. And you’d also be able to play with some of the animals at PAWS, and visit the Ark whenever you wanted.”
A movement out of the corner of my eye makes me look up. Cullen is leaning against the doorjamb, his hands in his pockets. I don’t know how long he’s been there, or how much of that he heard, but he’s smiling.
I kiss the top of Max’s head. “So… it’s settled then? We’re moving to Sunrise Bay?”
“Yes!” He jumps up and runs over to hug Cullen’s knees. Then he dashes past him to find Ghost.
Cullen chuckles and comes over to offer me a hand and help me up. “Everything okay?”
I nod and slide my arms around him. “We haven’t talked about what his dad did properly before. I wasn’t sure how he’d react to the idea of moving, but he was all for it. He said he doesn’t want to go back home.”
“How do you feel about that?”
