I started therapy four weeks later.
Dr. Morton’s office was in Midtown—all soft lighting and comfortable chairs designed to make you feel safe enough to fall apart. I sat on her couch and told her I was fine, just here because someone suggested it might help with stress.
She listened with this patient expression that said she’d heard this exact lie a thousand times before.
“Tell me about your daughter,” she said.
So I did. Told her about the accident, about Lily’s silence, about Sarah who’d somehow reached her when no one else could. About how I’d finally started to believe we might be okay.
“And then?” Dr. Morton prompted.
“And then I found out Sarah’s father was the drunk driver who killed my wife.”
“I see.” She wrote something in her notebook. “How did that make you feel?” she asked, as if the answer wasn’t obvious, as if saying it aloud wouldn’t split something open.
The question was so simple it was almost insulting. “How do you think it made me feel?”
“I’d like to hear it from you.”
“Betrayed. Angry. Like I’d been played for a fool.” The words came faster now. “She knew and didn’t tell me. Let me trust her, let me—” I stopped.
“Let you what?”
“Nothing.”
“Mr. Valdez?—”
“Let me care about her.” The confession slipped out before I could stop it. “I’d started to care about her and the whole time she was lying.”
Dr. Morton nodded like this was exactly what she’d expected to hear. “Did Sarah’s father make the choice to drink and drive?”
“Obviously.”
“Did Sarah make that choice?”
“No, but?—”
“Did Sarah cause the accident?”
“No.”
“Then why are you punishing her for it?” Her voice was gentle, but the question landed like a blow.
The question sat between us and I didn’t have a good answer.
The sessions continued. Once a week, every Thursday at two, I’d sit on Dr. Morton’s couch and slowly, painfully, start to unpack two years of grief I’d been carrying.
“Do you blame Lily for wanting to dance that day?” she asked during our fourth session.
“Of course not. She was six years old. She loved ballet.”
“Do you blame your wife for driving her?”
“No. Joana was just taking our daughter to class.”
“Then who do you blame?”
“The drunk driver. The man who chose to get behind the wheel knowing he was intoxicated.”
