“Not you,” he says quickly with a shake of his head.
“Phew, I thought we were about to be back at square one,” I say with a laugh, though it’s mostly for show because the truth is, I’m concerned. “Want to talk about it?” The humor is out ofmy words now, gentleness and sincerity taking their place, and I watch as he lets out a breath of air that seems like it comes from the depths of his soul before he sets the axe down, leaning on it before looking to me.
“It’s Kim.”
“Kim?”
“She was supposed to come tomorrow and spend some time with Emma. She’d been promising it for two weeks, since Emma didn’t see her for Christmas.”
Discomfort churns in my stomach at the words, even though I don’t know exactly where it’s going. Old, too-familiar wounds ache, and I hesitate with my following words.
“And…?”
“She texted me sometime late last night to tell me she got into a car accident and she can’t come.”
My eyes go wide. That isnotwhere I thought this was going, especially not with the way he was grumbling just moments before.
“Oh, my god, Jesse?—”
“She doesn’t know Madden keeps tabs on her on her social media. He saw her stories, and she’s currently in Aspen with some new boyfriend doing ski shots.”
I blink once, twice, before fire burns through me, leaving understanding in its wake: she told Jesse she’d been in an accident as an excuse for why she can’t be with Emma tomorrow.
“Oh my god,” I whisper, frustration and self-righteous anger brewing. “That fucking bitch.”
He shrugs as if to say, “See what I mean?”
“Does she know?” Emma mentioned her mother had gifted her a cellphone for Christmas, which, personally, wouldn’t be my first choice for an eleven-year-old, but what do I know, and that she had been occasionally texting her mom with it. Sheasked for my number, but I told her I needed to run it past her dad first, and I haven’t gotten around to it yet.
Another deeply exhausted sound leaves Jesse’s lips before he runs a hand down his face. He’s wearing a Three Kings beanie this morning instead of his normal baseball hat, a forest green color that brings out the small bits of green in his eyes. “No. Like always, I get to be the one to break the news to her.” There’s a reluctant acceptance in his words that tears at me.
“Does this happen often?”
He nods. “It used to be worse when she was four or five, before I stopped telling her when Kim was coming. Around then, I realized that more often than not, something would come up, and she’d have to cancel plans to see Emma. Reasonably, each time a visit was canceled last minute, Emma would lose it. That’s when I stopped telling her about the visits. If she comes, then it’s a fun surprise. If she doesn’t, it’s no big deal.”
It’s more evidence of what I already know: Jesse is a great dad. A lot of parents would use the constant disappointments to their advantage, letting it turn their kids against the other parent, but not Jesse. He lets Emma constantly think the best of Kim and makes the few visits she actually manages to have feel like a magical surprise.
“But now she has a phone,” I say in understanding, and Jesse nods, misery written on his face.
“Now she has a phone, and she’s been texting Emma for a week about their day together—all these plans to go out for lunch and to get their hair done and to go shopping.” She’s mentioned it to me once or twice, but I never really thought twice about it. “Now I get to be the bearer of bad newsanddeal with the emotional turmoil that will follow.”
I can see it happening, too—how disappointed she will be, and the closest one, the one bringing her the bad news, will be the one who gets the brunt of it. Poor Jesse. For a moment, Iwonder just how often this happens, Kim bailing, but thinking about that won’t help us, so I decide to move forward.
“Okay, well…” I take a breath and start to pace, my mind moving a mile a minute. “What were your plans for tomorrow?” When I look at Jesse, he’s staring at me skeptically, but shakes his head.
“Nothing. I didn’t make any plans just in case.”
I nod, pulling out my phone and opening up my group chat. “Well, Wren comes home today, and while I’m sure she’ll be shot tomorrow, I’m sure she’d love to see Emma.”
“I don’t want to—” he starts, but I ignore him, beginning to type.
“And I bet if I call Nat, she can fit her in for an appointment.”
“Appointment?”
“Brunch with the girls, then her hair, maybe? Do something fun for back to school.” I turn to him then with a hopeful look on my face. Nat’s a hairstylist, and I’m confident I can convince her to fit us in tomorrow. “How do you feel about tinsel?”
“On a tree?” he asks, and it’s the perfect amount of comic relief to have me laughing and shaking my head, beating back the anger for just a moment.
