“At Dad?”
This time she looked at me. “At both of you.”
That stung, though I knew she didn’t mean it cruelly.
“Why me?” I asked softly.
“Because you keep saying maybe it’s for the best. And it’s not.”
Then she lowered her eyes again, and the conversation was over.
The hearing was scheduled six weeks later.
That morning, Emma came downstairs already dressed, her hair neatly tied back, carrying her small navy backpack.
“You’re staying with Aunt Claire today,” I reminded her.
She shook her head. “I’m coming with you.”
“No, honey. Court isn’t a place for kids.”
“I need to be there.”
Her tone stopped me. It wasn’t dramatic. It wasn’t pleading. It was certain.
I crouched in front of her. “Emma, this is adult business.”
Her mouth tightened. “That’s the problem. Adults keep saying that.”
I should have pressed her. I should have asked more questions. But I was exhausted, raw, and running on nerves. In the end, I let her come, telling myself she would sit quietly in the back for an hour and then go with Claire afterward.
For illustrative purposes only
The courthouse was colder than I expected.
Everything echoed—heels on tile, low voices, the rustle of paper. Daniel was already there with his lawyer, wearing a charcoal suit I had bought him for a company dinner two years earlier. I hated that I noticed that. I hated that some part of me still catalogued the details of his life as if I belonged in it.
He glanced at Emma and frowned. “She shouldn’t be here.”
“She insisted.”
“Unbelievable,” he muttered.
I looked at him then, really looked. At the crisp collar, the freshly shaved jaw, the practiced restraint in his posture. He looked like a man attending a meeting, not the dismantling of his family.
When the hearing began, the judge reviewed the filing, the proposed custody arrangement, the house, the savings, all the neat little compartments where broken lives are sorted by legal language. I answered questions when asked. So did Daniel. My voice sounded far away, as if someone else were speaking through me.
Emma sat in the second row, hands folded over her backpack, eyes fixed ahead.
Then, just as the judge began discussing visitation schedules, I heard the scrape of a chair.
Emma stood.
At first I thought she needed the restroom, or felt sick, or had simply reached the end of what a child could endure in silence.
But she walked forward.
“Emma,” I whispered sharply. “Sit down.”
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