He Chose His Pregnant Mistress, So I Walked Away

I took Andy back to my mother's house. My mother looked at me, relieved. "So you two are finally getting divorced?" "After all these years, you've finally made up your mind to leave." She pulled Andy over to the couch and pressed a shortbread cookie into his hand. "Eat slowly." Then she went into the kitchen, came back with a mug of hot honey-lemon tea heavy on the ginger, and set it in front of me. "Drink this first." I drank it. The ginger burned my throat, and my head cleared. My mother sat down and lowered her voice. "You really don't want the house?" "No." "That's stupid." She smacked the table. "If you don't take it, who gets it for free?" "Mom." "Let me finish." She leaned in. "Whose names are on the deed?" "Both of ours." "Then half of it is yours. If you just give it up, people will laugh at you for being a fool." I gripped the mug. "It makes my skin crawl." "Skin crawls or not, you take it. If you won't take it, Andy will. He's a Carter. It's his by right." I didn't say anything. My mother went on. "What about the savings? Do you know how much he has?" "No." "Find out." She got up, dug through a drawer, and pulled out a business card. "Your Aunt Liu's son-in-law works at the bank. Go see him tomorrow." I took it. "One more thing." My mother sat back down. "Andy's school transfer." "Okay." "Don't put him in school around here. Your brother's wife has a mouth on her, she gossips all day. Transfer him somewhere farther." "I looked into it. That elementary school on the South Side seems okay." "Okay, my foot." My mother waved a hand. "Go to your cousin's. Her school district's good. I already called her." "She'll agree to that?" "She owes me." My mother said it flatly. "Andy can stay with her first. Get the divorce wrapped up, then we'll see." Andy looked up. "I'm not leaving Mom." My mother rubbed his head. "Nobody's making you. Your mom's moving there too." Andy looked at me. I nodded. "We'll live together." "But we're going to rent our own place. My cousin doesn't owe me anything." He lowered his head and went back to nibbling his cookie. There was a noise at the door. My brother, Kevin Hayes, pushed his way in and stopped short when he saw me. "Sis? What are you doing back here?" My mother glared at him. "Your sister's getting divorced." Kevin looked at me, then at Andy, and his face darkened. "That son of a bitch Nathan Carter." "Don't swear," my mother said. "Swearing doesn't help. Tomorrow you go to the bank with your sister." "Fine." He sat down and thought for a second. "Sis, what if he plays dirty and won't hand anything over?" "He wouldn't dare," my mother cut in. "Vanessa Price's belly is getting big. He's more desperate than anyone to get the paperwork done." Kevin snorted. "That woman's no good either." My mother waved him off. "Forget her. We're talking about your sister." I put down the mug. "I'll have him send me the agreement tomorrow." "Don't sign too fast," my mother warned. "Read it first, then bring it to me and I'll go over it with you. Don't just sign it on your own without saying anything." "I know." Andy finished his cookie and leaned against me, getting sleepy. My mother laid a blanket over his legs and lowered her voice. "One more thing." "Hm?" "If he comes crawling back begging you not to divorce him, don't go soft." I looked at Andy's sleeping face. "I won't." Nathan's call came in on my mother's phone. She answered, said "mm" twice, and handed it to me. "Talk." "Tomorrow, nine o'clock, the county clerk's office." "What about the agreement?" "I'll bring it. We'll sign there." "Send it to me first." He paused. "Olivia, don't start anything." "Send it." I hung up. Less than two minutes later, a file came through by text. I forwarded it to my mother. She put on her reading glasses and went through it line by line. "House goes to him, savings split in half, Andy goes to you, child support three thousand a month." "Three thousand." My mother snorted. "Like tossing change to a beggar." "It's enough." "Enough for what? You really have no idea how much he makes in a year?" She handed the phone back. "Change it. Five thousand." "He won't go for it." "If he won't, bring up the house. Your name's on the deed. If this really ends up in court, he doesn't get the whole house." The next day, Nathan got to the county clerk's office before I did. Crisp suit, every hair combed into place, like he'd come to close a business deal. Vanessa hadn't come. He handed me the agreement. "Sign." I picked up the pen. Beside me, my mother coughed. "Child support, five thousand." Nathan frowned. "It's already written in the agreement." "Change it now." "Olivia!" "My name's still on the deed." I looked up at him. "If you don't change it, we go to court. You've got all the time in the world to drag it out. Can your girlfriend's belly wait that long?" His face darkened. He pulled out his phone, changed the number, and had a new copy printed. I signed. He signed faster than I did. On the way out, he stopped me. "Where's Andy?" "At school." "Can I see him from now on?" "If the child support comes on time, yes." He opened his mouth, but nothing came out. I turned and walked away. My mother was waiting for me at the corner, holding a bag of groceries she'd just bought. "About renting a place, I asked your cousin to look around." "Okay." "That old complex across from the South Side elementary school. Sixth floor, two bedrooms, eighteen hundred a month." "Let's go see it." The place was old and the paint was peeling, but the windows faced south and let the sun in. Andy's room was small, just big enough for a bed and a desk. The landlord was an old lady. She saw how well-behaved Andy was and knocked a hundred off the rent. "This is it." I took out the deposit. My mother helped me clean, wiping the table down three times with a rag. "I'll buy Andy a new backpack." "No need. His old one still works." "First day at a new school, he gets a new one." She wouldn't hear otherwise. "Leave it to me." The night we moved in, Andy leaned on the windowsill and looked down. "Mom, there's someone selling candy apples downstairs." "We'll buy one tomorrow." He climbed into bed, hugging the old bear he'd brought from home. "Mom." "Is Dad going to come?" I turned off the light. "No." He didn't ask again. He rolled over with the bear tucked against his chest, and his breathing slowly deepened. I sat on the edge of the bed. My phone lit up. A transfer from Nathan. Five thousand. The memo line was blank. I tapped accept.

A month later, Vanessa Price was waiting for me outside my building. Her belly was bigger than the last time I'd seen her, but her face had gotten thinner, her chin sharp enough to cut. "Olivia." I had my grocery bags in hand and didn't stop walking. She stepped sideways into my path. "Stop right there." "If you've got something to say, say it." "He says your name in his sleep." I looked at her. There were dark circles under her eyes, and her nails were digging into her palms. "In the middle of the night. He says it, rolls over, and goes right back to sleep. I asked him whose name that was, and he said things people say in their sleep don't count." "What does that have to do with me?" "Don't play dumb." Her voice went shrill. "If you hadn't dragged your feet on making a clean break, would he still be thinking about you?" "We're long divorced." I stepped around her. "We've got the paperwork to prove it." She grabbed my arm and raised her other hand. I caught her wrist and slapped her backhanded. It made a sharp crack. She clutched her face, eyes wide. "You!" "That one's to build up some good karma for the baby you're carrying." I switched the groceries to my other hand. "So the kid learns not to grow up to be the other woman." She lunged at me, and behind us came the screech of brakes. Nathan Carter got out of the car, his suit knocked crooked from running, and grabbed Vanessa. "What the hell are you doing?" "She hit me!" Vanessa pointed at me, her voice shaking. "Look, she hit me!" Nathan looked at me. I shook out my hand. "She swung first." He turned and yelled at Vanessa, "What are you doing running all the way over here in your condition?" "I came to ask her something!" "Ask her what?" He started pushing her toward the car. "Go home!" Vanessa clung to the car door and wouldn't let go. "Nathan, you're protecting her? You think I don't know you say her name in your sleep?" He froze for a second. Just that one second. Vanessa laughed, and it looked worse than crying. "I knew it." "Stop making a scene." His voice dropped. "Get in the car." She didn't move. He looked at her, then at me, and opened his mouth. "Olivia?" "Shut up." He stared at me, stunned. "What are you saying my name for?" I took a step forward. "You think you've earned the right?" "I know I was wrong." "You say my name in your sleep because you've got a guilty conscience." I kept my eyes on him. "You're scared your son will call some other man Dad someday. You feel guilty about all the rotten things you've done these past years. You say my name because you're afraid I'll do well without you, and next to me you'll look like a joke." Vanessa had stopped crying. She leaned against the car door and watched him. Nathan's face went pale, then red, then pale again. "Haven't I been good to you all these years?" "All these years, whenever it rained, you ran to her place first. You'd buy me a scarf and buy her a designer bag the next day. When I was giving birth, you were out drinking at some dinner. When she caught a cold, you sat up with her all night." I stopped to catch my breath. "And now you stand here, say you regret it, and I'm supposed to come back to you? Who do you think you are?" His throat worked. "What about Andy?" "Don't bring Andy into this." I set the grocery bags down hard on the ground. "You come see him twice a month and you're late every single time. Sure, your child support shows up on time, but that's the least you owe." Vanessa suddenly spoke up. "He's been going to the South Side a lot lately." I glanced at her. "I thought he was meeting clients." The corner of her mouth twitched. "Turns out he was going to see his son." Nathan whipped his head around. "Shut up." "No, I won't." She put a hand on her lower back and straightened up. "Olivia, we were both blind. You were blind for ten years. I was blind for three." "You're a little better off than me." I picked up my groceries. "At least you saw him for what he is before you had his baby." She looked down at her belly and didn't say a word.

Nathan stood there like a post. I walked around him. "Olivia," he called after me. I turned around. "Are you... doing okay?" I gave a short laugh. "Better than I was with you." I went upstairs and opened the door. Andy was bent over the table doing his homework, and he looked up at the sound. "Mommy, somebody was fighting downstairs." "Just the produce sellers." "Oh." He went back to writing. I put the groceries in the kitchen and texted my mom: "Vanessa came by." She answered in seconds: "Did she get the better of you?" "No." "Good. Ignore those two. Let them go at each other like dogs." I put down the phone and started chopping. Downstairs, a car started up, honked twice, and drove off. Andy ran over. "Mommy, what's for dinner?" "Spaghetti with tomato sauce." "With sausage?" "With sausage." That made him happy, and he went back to the table to keep working. I finished beating the eggs and poured oil into the pan. Outside, the sky was gray, but it wasn't raining. "Mommy, why doesn't Daddy want us anymore?" I set the pasta on the table. "It's Mommy who doesn't want Daddy anymore." "Daddy did something wrong, and that's why Mommy doesn't want him." Andy was quiet for a moment. "Then Daddy's a big bad guy." The next day, after I dropped Andy off at school, I started looking for work. I printed ten copies of my résumé and took them to the job fair on the South Side. I went from booth to booth. Plenty of places were hiring office clerks, and each one offered less than the last. At a building-materials company, the HR woman glanced at me. "How old?" "Thirty-three." "Married? Kids?" "Divorced. I have custody." She set my résumé off to the side. "We'll be in touch." I took it back and went straight to the next one. The company at the corner had a small sign that read "Horizon Logistics." A man in his thirties sat behind the table, shirtsleeves rolled to his forearms, head down over a takeout box. I put my résumé on the table. He looked up, still chewing, and quickly swallowed. "Sit, sit, sit." He flipped through a couple of pages. "You've done admin before?" "Five years." "Can you do spreadsheets?" "Yes." "Can you start tomorrow?" I paused. "No second interview?" He grinned. "This is the second interview. I'm so short-staffed it's ridiculous. If you can come in, you're saving my life." "What's the pay?" "Forty-five hundred a month, five thousand once you're past probation, full benefits." He pulled out his phone. "Give me your number, I'll text you the address." "You're not going to ask why I got divorced?" He paused. "Why would I ask that? I'm not marrying you. I'm working with you." I saved his number in my phone as "Lucas Reed." On my first day, Lucas carried an old computer over and set it on my desk. "Make do for now. I'll get you a new one next month." "As long as it turns on." He stood beside me watching while I opened a spreadsheet and set up a ledger. After two minutes he said, "Okay. You're better at this than me." At lunch he brought over two takeout boxes and put one on my desk. "From the place downstairs. The pot roast's good." "How much?" "First one's on me. After that, buy your own." I ate. He sat across from me going through invoices, cursing out a supplier the whole time, and every complaint had a point. At the end of the month, doing the books, I found two shipping charges that didn't add up. Lucas leaned over to look, his elbow propped on the back of my chair. "I handled that one." He scratched his head. "Missed it." "Can we get it back?" "Let's see." He called them. He was loud, and he talked the guy on the other end in circles until he agreed to make it right. When he hung up, he gave me a thumbs-up. "You've got a sharp eye." "Five years of this." He laughed. "I found a real treasure." Andy got out of school early, so I brought him to the office to do his homework. Lucas found him a little stool and dug up half a pack of cookies. "Eat." Andy looked at me. Only after I nodded did he take them. "Thank you, Uncle Lucas." Lucas ruffled his hair. "Good manners." One night I worked late, and Andy fell asleep with his head on the desk. Lucas took off his jacket and laid it over him, gently. "Your son's a good kid." "Mm." "Takes after you." I didn't answer. He didn't say anything more either, just turned and went to switch off the lights. After work he gave us a ride partway on his electric scooter, since it was on his way. Andy stood up front, I sat in the back, and the wind blew up my sleeves. "It's getting colder tomorrow. Put an extra layer on the kid." "I know." At my building, he put a foot down and waited until we'd gone up before he left. Andy leaned on my shoulder. "Mommy, Uncle Lucas is nice." "He's all right." "Nicer than Daddy." I patted his back. "Don't go comparing." The next day at the office, there was a kid's down jacket on my desk with the tags still on. Lucas was on the phone in the back room and didn't come out. I cut off the tags and put it on Andy. It fit. Nathan called me in the middle of the night. "Liv, I miss you..." "What, things not going your way now?" "Sorry, things are going great for me. I don't have time for you right now." I hung up fast. Half asleep, Andy caught my wrist. "Mommy, don't talk to Daddy. Daddy's bad." My heart aching for him, I stroked the soft wisps of his hair.