I followed him.
I caught up in the foyer as he grabbed his keys from the entry table.
“Andrew—”
“Don’t,” he said.
He didn’t raise his voice. He didn’t even look at me.
That hurt more than shouting ever could.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered.
“I know.”
He opened the door.
“I just found out my mother lied to me for thirty-four years and my father looked at me like I was a legal problem,” he said. Rain blew in around him. “I don’t have room to be a husband tonight.”
Then he stepped into the storm and disappeared.
He didn’t come home.
The next two days were a blur of unanswered calls, half-slept hours, and a nausea so intense I couldn’t tell what belonged to pregnancy and what belonged to grief.
Andrew finally texted Saturday afternoon:
I’m safe. Staying at the condo downtown. Need time.
That was all.
Robert did not call me.
Eleanor did.
She sounded unlike herself. Hollow. Stripped down.
“Robert has moved into the guest wing,” she said without greeting. “His attorney is coming Monday.”
I closed my eyes. “Where is Andrew?”
“I assume where men go when they’ve been made to question their own names.”
I gripped the phone harder. “You did this.”
“Yes,” she said. “I did.”
It should have satisfied me to hear her admit it so plainly.
It didn’t.
“What about Jack?” I asked.
A pause. “He knows Andrew knows.”
“Did Andrew meet him?”
“No. Not yet.”
I sat on the edge of the bed and pressed a hand over my stomach.
Leave a Comment