Better Off Alone

Chapter 2

(Rebecca's POV)

A minute or three later, I stop crying.

I wipe my face with the back of my hand—the cracked, dry hand that paid for his comfort—and pull the laptop onto my bed. The quarterly report still needs formatting. I highlight a column, drag it left, fix a decimal point. My hands do the work without me. They've gotten good at that — doing things without me. Ironing without me. Smiling without me. Surviving without me.

But tomorrow Jack turns five, and even though he told me I didn't need to be there. That his dad is enough, I intend to be there for my son's fifth birthday.

Sean would be annoyed. He'd ask why I didn't tell him. He'd say it was impulsive. He'd give me that look — the one that says what are you trying to prove.

I don't care.

I don't care. I don't care. I don't care.

I open a new tab and search for flights. There's a red-eye leaving LAX at 1:15 AM. Lands in Nashville at 7:02 AM. One seat left. The price makes me flinch, but I pull out my personal card — not the company card, not Sean's card, the one with my name on it — and I book it before I can talk myself out of it.

Confirmation email arrives. My hands are shaking a little.

I start packing. Throw things into my carry-on without folding them. I catch a glimpse of myself in the bathroom mirror and stop.

There she is. The woman who irons and smiles and waits. The woman who calls and gets hung up on. The woman whose own son says He's enough.

"You're going home," I tell her.

She doesn't smile. But she nods.

I zip the bag and head for the door.

Jack is my most precious thing in this world. The only thing in six years of this marriage that is fully, completely, without question mine. Sean can keep his coldness. He can keep his silence and his distance and his glass-wall stare.

But he cannot keep me from my son's birthday.

I step into the hallway and pull the door shut behind me. The lock clicks. The sound is small and sharp, like a period at the end of a sentence.

I walk toward the elevator.

The house is quiet when I get home.

I stand in the doorway with my carry-on behind me, one hand still on the handle, listening. No cartoons from the living room. No little feet on the hardwood. No coffee machine humming in the kitchen.

I check my phone. 8:16 AM. Sean's car isn't in the driveway. Maybe he took Jack out for birthday pancakes. Jack loves pancakes — the thick ones with chocolate chips that Sean always says have too much sugar but orders anyway because Jack gives him that look.

I step inside and close the door behind me.

The first thing I notice is the balloons. Dozens of them, clustered along the ceiling in the living room like fat, shiny grapes. Blue and silver. Jack's favorite colors. Streamers hang from the light fixtures in loose spirals, and someone has set up a banner across the far wall that reads HAPPY BIRTHDAY JACK in big block letters. Each letter is a different color, like a kid picked them out, and someone—Sean, probably, or maybe the nanny—draped fairy lights across the bookshelf so the whole room glows soft and golden.

My chest squeezes. Sean, who can barely remember where the dishes go, hung streamers and blew up balloons for their son. I imagine him standing on a chair, cursing under his breath, tape between his teeth.

I almost smile.

Then I see the painting.

It's taped to the wall in the center of everything, right under the banner, like it's the heart of the whole display. A big piece of poster paper, the kind they sell at craft stores for school projects. Jack drew on it with markers — thick, wobbly lines, the way five-year-olds draw. Jack made it. I know his style—the thick crayon lines, the too-big heads, the way he draws hands like starfish. He drew our family. Three people standing in a row, holding hands.

A tall man with dark hair. That's Sean. Even in stick-figure form, Jack gave him broad shoulders and a straight line for a mouth. No smile. That’s accurate. It makes me smile in spite of everything.

And there’s Jack, a small boy in the middle with a big round head and a grin that takes up half his face. He drew himself happy. And on the right, there's—

Me?

The woman in the picture has long hair and a wide smile. She's wearing a dress. Purple.

I tilt my head.

Purple?

I don't wear purple. I've never liked purple. My closet is full of navy, black, cream — safe colors, quiet colors, the kind that don't draw attention. I own one purple scarf that Connie gave me as a joke, and it's still in the back of a drawer with the tags on.

So why did Jack draw me in purple?

I stare at it for a long time, this happy little crayon family with their starfish hands. Something about it doesn't sit right, like a word on the tip of my tongue I can't quite reach. But I push the feeling down. Maybe he likes purple. It's probably his favorite color this week. Last month it was green.

I take a photo of it on my phone and zoom in. The woman's hair looks shorter than mine. And straighter. But that's just how kids draw.

It's fine.

The fridge is almost empty. Sean's been ordering takeout again. I can tell by the stack of paper bags crammed into the recycling bin. The man runs a billion-dollar company but cannot feed himself real food.

I check my texts. Still nothing from Sean. No where are you, no when are you coming home, nothing. They must be out in the park. Or the ice cream place Jack loves on Fifth.

That gives me time to prepare.

I grab my keys and head to the supermarket.

The drive takes twelve minutes. I go to the one on the east side with the bakery that makes those little frosted cookies Jack likes — the ones shaped like stars. I fill the cart fast. Pasta. Ground beef. Garlic. Butter. Lemons. Strawberries. Blueberries. Honey. I toss in a bag of chocolate chips, because it's his birthday and rules are stupid today.

I grab candles—six, plus one to grow on—and a small chocolate cake from the bakery section because I won't have time to bake from scratch.

I'll make it up with dinner.

Jack’s favorites. Garlic butter pasta with the crispy edges he goes crazy for. Mini meatballs. That fruit salad with the honey-lime dressing he once ate so much of that he threw up and then asked for more.

The cashier asks if I'm throwing a party. I say, "My son's turning five."

She says, "How fun! You must be so excited."

"You have no idea."

And I mean it. For the first time in days, something in my chest feels like it's breathing.

My son is going to sit at that table tonight and eat the meal his mother made for him, and it will be good, and it will be warm, and for one night, we'll be a family.