“How’s your boyfriend taking you having the kids again this weekend? Or have you not introduced them yet?” Dominic asks as we carry dirty dishes to the kitchen. Karter and Jacob have disappeared into their bedroom, but we can hear them laughing, so their door must be open.
“He’s, uh...” I can’t find the words. I haven’t seen Brady in almost five days, and I feel like I have so little of him left there’s no part of him I want to share.
“I’m sorry about some of the things I said about him. I was stressed and thought you weren’t going to take Jacob’s issues seriously.”
“Right.” My temper flickers to life. Dominic has always been like this. Quick to pick a fight, quick to apologize, like a simple sorry will wash all the hurtful things he said away. I let him do it too many times, but the divorce papers mean I don’t have to stand for his manipulation or justify myself anymore.
“You should invite him over sometime. When you’re both ready. We can have dinner with Karim and the boys,” Dominic says.
I want to scream. A week ago Brady was an inappropriate choice, and now we’re planning family dinners? I have done everything Dominic has asked, and he doesn’t even acknowledge it.
“I don’t think we should send Jacob to that school.” I’m impressed with how calm I sound.
“Nash.” Dominic sighs heavily. “We’ve been over this.”
“No. No, actually we haven’t. You decided it, and then you told me what you wanted to do.”
He grips the edge of the sink. “Because you wouldn’t—”
“I’ve been here.”
“You were always working.”
Yes. I worked too much to be the husband he wanted, but this is about our kids, and it’s not all my fault. “Then you didn’t try hard enough to tell me. I’m not an astronaut. You didn’t have to send a message to the moon. Where were the emails? The voicemails?” Ridiculously, the image of Brady twirling in my chair, begging to fuck me, pops into my head. “If I worked too much, you should have come down to my office, locked the door, and forced me to listen to what you had to say. If you’re so worried about Jacob you’re willing to split the boys up, if you’re so overwhelmed by all of this, then you should have told me months ago.”
“But—” Dominic says, but I’m gaining momentum.
“The second you thought about having him assessed, you should have told me. You had no right to withhold that information.”
“I—” He struggles for words.
“You and I should not be married. Me working too hard was the excuse we used to end our marriage, but it would have happened sooner or later. But I am not a bad father, no matter what you tell yourself, and I will not hurt this family more by tearing our boys apart before we know we have done literally everything we can to keep them in school together.”
I’ve definitely caught Dominic off guard, because all he says is, “But Karim says—”
“He is their doctor. He is not a teacher, he is not a psychologist. And he is not their father.” He is a boyfriend, just like Brady is—was?—a boyfriend, and in some ways Brady is more qualified to help. “Have you talked to Jacob’s teachers?”
“Of course.” Dominic straightens. “I told them we were having the assessment done.”
He’s still using “we” like I was part of that discussion, but unlike before, when I felt I had let them all down, now I’m angry at how much he’s done in my name. “Have you talked to them since?”
Dominic scoffs. “They’re a public school. We’d have to do so much on our own. What would they—”
“Brady went to public school, and he needed extra help.” I feel bad bringing him, and especially his challenges, into this, but I need backup, even if he’s not in the room. “They got him tutors, they got someone to help him in class. Do you know Karter has been helping Jacob pretend like he’s reading?”
“He’s seven. How could—”
“He’s his brother.” My voice cracks, but after the scene at Sugar Beach, I’m allowed a little emotion. “He knows him better than anyone else. And we can’t do this to them, no matter how much you think it’s the right decision. It isn’t, Dominic, and I won’t sign off on it. Not now, maybe not ever. I won’t pay for tuition or anything else until I’m confident we exhausted all the other options that mean our sons can go to school together.”
“Fine.” He flings his hands in the air, spraying soapy water. “If you think you can do a better job, go ahead. Call their school. Set up the meetings. You can do the extra homework and vet the tutors.”
“If you want me to do the homework, we’ll have to renegotiate that custody agreement so I have them on more school nights.”
He gapes, and I don’t want to turn this into a power struggle, but I’m doing the right thing for my kids.
Dominic’s eyes narrow. “Fine. Have it your way.”
I don’t delude myself into thinking this is our last fight, but I’ll take it.
