“It is a formal notice.”
“I have the keys.”
“And Mrs. Brooks has requested their return.”
Victoria crossed her arms. “Do you know who my son is?”
Aaron looked at her with polite disinterest. “No, ma’am.”
The answer landed harder than anyone’s raised voice could have. Dominic’s sister looked away, and even his father seemed embarrassed.
Dominic held the keys tightly. “My belongings are in the car.”
“You may remove your personal property,” Aaron said. “Then the vehicle will be collected.”
“Mom has plans tomorrow,” Victoria snapped.
“Not with Mrs. Brooks’s SUV.”
By then, several people had slowed down to watch. Dominic noticed them, and I knew that was the part he hated most. Not the loss of the car. Not the fact that he had abandoned me outside a hospital.
The humiliation.
He finally dropped the keys into Aaron’s open hand.
My phone began ringing almost immediately. Dominic called once, twice, then again and again, but I was sitting in my father’s sedan with Leo asleep in a properly secured car seat. For the first time since leaving the hospital, I was surrounded by people who had thought about what I needed without being asked.
Dad sat across from me in a white shirt and dark trousers, looking less like the general people saw in photographs and more like the father who had once waited outside my college dorm to make sure I got home safely.
“You are shaking,” he said.
“I’m fine.”
“No,” he replied. “You are not.”
That single sentence broke through everything I had been holding together. I looked down at my hands and began to cry, quietly at first, then hard enough that I could barely speak.
“I thought he loved me,” I said.
Dad did not rush to defend me or insult Dominic. He only leaned forward and said, “You deserved better than having to question that five days after giving birth.”
We arrived at a townhouse my father kept through a family trust. A postpartum nurse was waiting with medication, food, clean clothes, and a bassinet already prepared for Leo.
Everything Dominic had failed to consider had been handled within an hour.
My phone rang again. This time, I answered.
“Where are you?” Dominic demanded.
“Somewhere safe.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means Leo and I will not be coming home tonight.”
He laughed without humor. “You are making a scene over a bus ride.”
“No,” I said. “The bus ride made me see the whole marriage clearly.”
His voice sharpened. “You had money. What was the problem?”
“Twelve dollars, Dominic.”
“The fare costs less than that.”
I closed my eyes. There it was—the answer I needed. Not concern about my recovery. Not regret for leaving his newborn son in my arms outside a hospital.
Only arithmetic.
“My attorney will contact you tomorrow,” I said.
