Chapter 15
816 Words
(Rebecca's POV)
I take Connie's car.
The drive to Lisa's takes forty minutes. I spend it with the radio off, both hands on the wheel, thinking about Jack. The way his face looked at that birthday party, lit up like a lamp, blowing out candles with Hannah's arms around him.
My fingers tighten on the wheel.
I pull into Lisa's driveway at six fifty-five. Sean's car is already there. The porch light is on. The front door is open, warm light spilling out onto the steps.
I get out. Lock the car. Straighten the dress.
The front door frames them — Sean standing in the hallway, one hand on the doorframe. Jack beside him in a clean shirt, his hair combed to the side. Nancy must've combed his hair. Sean doesn't know how to part it right.
Jack sees me first.
"Mommy!"
He breaks away from Sean and sprints down the steps, arms wide, his shoes slapping the concrete. His body hits mine at full speed — tiny arms around my waist, face buried in my stomach, squeezing tight.
"Mommy, I missed you! Where were you? Why didn't you come home?"
My hands hover over his shoulders. My throat closes.
This is the boy who blew out his candles with Hannah. Who said Daddy is enough. Who drew a picture of his family and put another woman in my place.
If I hadn't seen that scene with my own eyes, I would be over the moon right now at his enthusiasm to see me.
But I did see it.
And this meeting, which should've been a sweet reunion, stabs me in the chest instead.
This is my son. The one who grew inside me for nine months. I held him for three hours straight the night he was born because I was afraid he would get hurt, or get sick if I put him down. I sang him to sleep every night until he was two, Sean said I was spoiling him and made me stop.
Thinking about leaving him makes my chest cave in.
But I can't break. I chose to walk away, and I should do so without looking back.
I put my hands on Jack's shoulders and gently push him away.
"Hi, Jack."
His face crumbles. Just for a second — a flicker of confusion and hurt crosses his features before he catches it. The way children catch themselves when they don't understand what they did wrong.
"Mommy? Are you mad at me?"
"No, baby. I'm not mad. Go inside."
He looks up at me. His eyes are big. His lower lip is doing the thing it does when he gets upset. But he doesn't argue. He just nods and walks back up the steps, slow, his shoulders pulled in.
My nails cut into my palms. I don't unclench my fists until he's out of sight.
Sean watches from the doorway. His face is doing something I can't read.
"Rebecca."
I walk up the steps. "Sean."
"A word. Before we go in."
I stop one step below him. We're almost eye to eye.
"Don't say anything to upset Lisa tonight," he says. "She doesn't need the stress."
My jaw tightens. "Like what?"
"You know what I'm talking about."
The divorce. He's talking about the divorce. The papers Nancy gave him, the ones he's apparently read and said nothing about. Not a call, not a text, not a single word in a week. He got them and went to the beach. He got them and took Hannah to an exhibition. He got them and now he's standing in his grandmother's doorway telling me not to upset anyone about it.
"You saw what I left with Nancy."
"Yes."
"And?"
Sean frowns. Like the question doesn't make sense. "And what?"
Something cold settles in my chest. Not pain. I'm past pain. It's like the lingering flicker of something I've been clinging onto without knowing completely going out.
"Nothing. It's good as long as you've seen it."
Sean shifts his weight. "Look, I know you're upset about something. If it's Hannah, she just lost her only family member. You shouldn’t be angry because of her. She's going through a lot, and I'm just trying to—"
"That's not my business anymore, Sean."
He stops. His mouth is slightly open. His eyes search my face for something. The Rebecca he knows — the one who would nod, who would soften, who would say of course, I understand, you're right.
But that understanding Rebecca isn't here anymore.
That Rebecca is gone.
"Hannah's situation is between you and Hannah. I have nothing to do with it."
"Rebecca—"
"We should go inside. Lisa's waiting."
I walk past him. My shoulder brushes his arm.
Inside, Lisa's house smells like pot roast and rosemary, and for one second — just one — it almost feels like somewhere I belong.
Almost.
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