My eyes flutter closed as I try to suck air back into my lungs. What have I done? How did I fall into the exact situation I have been warning everyone of all along? With his family’s influence, surely, they could grant him visitation. Right? What if he came back to the court and showed that I was gallivanting around Michigan with some younger man and introducing Winnie basically on day one? Could he petition for actual custody? Could he get visitation every month? Every weekend? Would he?
I have spent years fearing this would be the outcome. When the baby didn’t fix the problems we had, I could have left. I knew that, but the fear of him growing a pair of balls and actually fighting for custody was always a possibility and how could I have ever consider splitting my daughter’s time with him? For years, I tolerated him and the shit he put me through because at least I had her. I didn’t have to exchange her like damaged goods in a gas station parking lot every other weekend. I didn’t have to explain why Mommy can’t be with her on Christmas. He couldtake everything else from me, but he couldn’t take her. She was, and is, all I have.
He wasn’t going to fight me. Only last fall did it occur to me that he didn’t want custody. I saw the way Rhett’s family loved each other. The way their family loved the Auclairs, and I knew Ethan didn’t have that in him. He wouldn’t be capable of it. Foolishly, I started to believe that I was safe, that things had changed, that I had changed.
I stand, and I don’t know where I’m going, but Seb stands too, looking at me so with much pity, I might drown in it. I might drown in this feeling bubbling in my veins.
“I’m so sorry.” He steps forward and wraps his arms around my shoulder like I imagine a brother would.
“This isn’t how it was supposed to go.”
“I’ll be your lawyer,” he says into the top of my head. “He will only get what you’re willing to give him.”
“Hey,” Paul says, popping his head out the back door. “Winnie is asking about dinner, I was thinking we could head to the diner?”
I nod absently and follow him and Sebastian inside.
“Fish-Tanner looks funny,” Winnie calls from the kitchen. “His tail is a different shape.”
“Maybe he’s just been working out since you’ve been gone,” Paul says.
I only make it a few steps into my room before I am rushing to the bathroom. My white knuckled grip on the porcelain sink is the only thing keeping me up as tears blur my vision. The dread settles in the place that had butterflies just hours ago.
I can’t stay. Not yet at least. I can’t stay until I know Ethan is done fighting me. I pull my phone from my pocket and call Dollie. But she doesn’t answer, so I leave a rambling voicemail, telling her that something came up and that I won’t be staying this fall after all. Then I turn on the shower to mask my crying.
How unfair. How unfair that Ethan got to cheat on me and yetI’mthe one who has to live on eggshells. That I have to live in fear that he could swoop in at any moment and take the one thing I have found purpose in. All the while he spent years sneaking around with Maggie, avoiding the one thing I treasure more than anything.
Then I hear a little voice call through the door. Asking if I’m okay.
“Yeah baby,” I tell her. “Go show Uncle Seb your fish, okay?”
“Can I come in?” She knocks her little fist against the door.
“No bug, go on. I just have a stuffy nose.”
Her feet pad away, and I crash onto the closed toilet and hug myself. I had been wrong about it being complicated. It was never complicated. Tanner had been right. It was simple. It was really fucking clear and simple that I was never going to live my own life.
“Han,” Paul calls through the door.
“I’m fine,” I spit out, but when he cracks the door open, I find myself glad that I didn’t lock it.
“No, you aren’t.” He comes over to me, rips a piece of toilet paper and hands it to me. He shuts off the shower and sits on the edge of the bath in front of me. “You were glowing two days ago. Now you look like you just saw a ghost. What’s going on?”
“Ethan wants visitation rights.” I pull my shoulders even further in. “Sebastian said he may even want actual custody and might try and take me back to court. He can’t do that. Can he? How can he do that?”
“I don’t know,” Paul whispers.
“I was going to stay here,” I choke out, pressing the heels of my hands into my eyes.
“Here?”
“I was going to stay and give things with Tanner a real chance and be with Lauren, but?—”
“You still can.” He leans over and pulls my hands away from my face. “This doesn’t have to mean you need to pack up and run home.”
“Of course it does.” My voice is harsher than I mean for it to be. Paul doesn’t deserve harsh words, but I can’t seem to get control of my mouth. Or my mind. “I was always going to have to go back. To you and Mom and to Ethan. I am never going to be rid of him. Not truly.”
“If you need me to take him out.” Paul raises his eyebrows, and a little laugh escapes me.
