Oh dear goodness. Sadie rubbed her temples.
“He’s dense though, my Rome,” Babushka continued. “But ve all have our challenges and his babies vill be beautiful.”
“I’m in the middle of a divorce.” Tonya tucked her hair behind her ear. “I’m not dating. It confuses the kids.”
Fish. She meant fish.
“You have children?” Babushka’s fluffy eyebrows fell. “You should not get divorced unless he is very bad man. The children will suffer.”
The edges of Tonya’s lips tipped down. “He’s not bad. Not like that. He’s just distracted. A lot.”
Babushka tapped a lime-green painted fingernail against her lips. “You have your meeting vith Sadie, then you come talk to Babushka. Ve vill solve this problem.”
Actually, no. That was not what was going to happen.
Sadie took a moment to determine how she was going to get Tonya out of the room and, for the love of all things holy, convince Babushka to stop talking to her clients.
What she needed to do was stop. Triage the moment.
Evict Babuska. Then see to Tonya.
“Babushka, you should go.” Sadie used her no-nonsense tone.
“I vill stay.” Babushka used the exact same tone.
Sadie sighed, unsure how she would bodily remove the woman from the office, especially considering that she was one of the owners of the building.
“Please don’t answer the phone.” She did her absolute best not to sound desperate.
Babushka, who clearly heard what Sadie had said, pretended not to hear what Sadie had said.
Well, that eviction hadn’t gone well. Or at all.
“Let’s take a moment in my office?” Sadie suggested to Tonya, grabbing a file folder from the side of the reception desk. It contained the custody demands from Rex. His list was long, and it was just as ridiculous as Tonya’s original list.
Then she began walking, hoping Tonya would follow and they’d both escape the gravitational pull of Babushka’s interference.
Thank goodness, Tonya followed.
“This will only take a moment. Rex sent over his counter-requests to your list.” Sadie flipped open the file folder.
Tonya paled. “What does he want?”
“He’s asking for full fifty-fifty instead of every other weekend like we talked about.”
“That’s ridiculous. He’s always at work. Who is going to stay with them while he’s working?”
They were fish, so they’d probably be fine on their—
“If he’s going to be unreasonable, can we take it to court? Let the judge decide? That’s what my friend did when her ex was being unreasonable. The judge gave her full custody.”
“Was it a case involving fish as well?”
“Their kids. But it’s the same thing.”
Not at all, actually.
“I’m not certain the courts will take your side on this one. His other suggestion was to divide the fish evenly between the two of you.”
