Emmett asked to come to Greenwich the following afternoon.
He sent the request in a message rather than calling.
“I'd like to see you and Lily. I know I handled things badly. Please let me come by.”
I read it while sitting in the nursery.
Lily was awake, staring at the mobile above her crib.
A small wooden bird turned slowly whenever the air moved near the window.
I wanted her father to see her.
I wanted them to have a relationship that didn't begin with this hurt.
But I didn't want to mistake his wanting to see her for an understanding of what had happened.
I took the phone downstairs.
My father was in the kitchen, speaking quietly with Bennett.
“Emmett wants to come over,” I said.
My father ended the conversation and looked at me.
“What do you want?”
“I want him to see Lily.”
“Then you can let him.”
“I don't want him to think that means everything is fixed.”
“Tell him that.”
I breathed out slowly.
It sounded simple when my father said it.
I wrote to Emmett that he could visit at three, but I wasn't promising to return home or pretending that we had resolved anything.
His reply came quickly.
“Understood.”
At three o'clock, Harrison opened the front door.
Emmett stood outside in a dark coat, holding a paper bag from a bakery near our house.
For a moment, he looked past Harrison into the hall.
Then he noticed the high ceiling, the old staircase, and the framed photographs along the wall.
His expression changed.
He had been in my childhood home once before, years earlier, when we were dating.
We had come for lunch.
He had seen the gardens and the broad front steps, but we had spent most of the afternoon outside.
He had never been inside the rooms where my family lived its ordinary life.
“Hello, Emmett,” Harrison said.
“Hello.”
Harrison took his coat.
Emmett looked at him.
“I didn't realize you worked here.”
Harrison's expression remained polite.
“I've worked with the family for a long time.”
Emmett glanced toward the staircase again.
I came into the hall carrying Lily.
His face softened when he saw her.
“Hi, sweetheart.”
He reached toward her, then stopped.
“Can I hold her?”
I handed Lily over carefully.
He settled her against his chest, one hand supporting her head.
For a few moments, neither of us spoke.
Lily made a small sound and opened her mouth against his shirt.
Emmett looked down at her.
“She looks bigger.”
“She isn't,” I said. “She's six days old.”
He flinched slightly.
“I know.”
I led him to the sitting room.
He placed the bakery bag on the table.
“I brought you something.”
“Thank you.”
“I didn't know what you'd want.”
“That's all right.”
We sat with Lily between us.
Emmett kept looking around the room.
He noticed the family photographs, the shelves, the heavy curtains, and the wide windows.
Finally, he asked, “How long have you been staying here?”
“Since the night I left.”
“I know that. I mean, did your father have all this ready?”
“The room was ready.”
He looked toward the hall.
“And the driver?”
“Harrison has worked for my father for years.”
“I didn't know your father had a driver.”
“You've said that before.”
He looked down at Lily.
“I guess there's a lot I don't know.”
I could hear the temptation in his voice to make that the main problem.
It wasn't.
“You don't have to know everything about my father's life to understand why I left our house,” I said.
“I know.”
“Do you?”
He lifted his eyes.
“I know I shouldn't have left you home.”
“Why did you?”
He opened his mouth, then closed it.
“My mother was leaving the next day. Maya had arranged dinner. It seemed important to her.”
“And I wasn't important?”
“That's not what I meant.”
“Then tell me what you meant.”
He shifted Lily slightly.
“I thought you'd be happier resting at home. You'd just had the baby.”
“You didn't ask what I wanted.”
“I thought you were exhausted.”
“I was exhausted. I was also your wife.”
He stared at the floor.
“I know.”
“You took my car. The baby's things were in it. You didn't ask if I had everything I needed. You didn't even make sure I had a way to get to the doctor if I needed one.”
“I didn't think about that.”
“I know you didn't.”
The words came out more quietly than I expected.
That seemed to affect him more than if I had raised my voice.
He looked at Lily, then back at me.
“My mother said you were being dramatic.”
“I know.”
“She said you'd understand once you calmed down.”
“She texted me that you deserved one peaceful night away from me.”
His face changed.
“I saw the message.”
“No. You heard about it. Did you read it?”
He shook his head.
I took out my phone and showed him the text.
He read it once.
Then he read it again.
For the first time since he arrived, he looked genuinely ashamed.
“She sent that to you?”
“Yes.”
“I didn't know she'd said it like that.”
“Would it have been all right if she'd said it more politely?”
“No.”
“Would it have been all right if she'd only thought it?”
He looked at me.
“No.”
I waited.
He rubbed his thumb along the edge of Lily's blanket.
“I should have told her to stop.”
“You should have remembered that I was your wife before you worried about disappointing your mother.”
He didn't answer.
Outside, a gardener moved a wheelbarrow along the far edge of the lawn.
The sound came through the window, then faded.
Emmett finally said, “I thought you would stay.”
“Why?”
“Because you always do.”
I felt something inside me settle.
There it was.
Not a grand confession.
Not an explanation that could excuse everything.
Just the truth he had been avoiding.
He had believed I would absorb the hurt and stay where he left me because that was what I had done before.
I looked at him for a long moment.
“I don't want to be the person you can hurt because you're sure I'll forgive you.”
His eyes filled, though he tried to blink it away.
“I don't want that either.”
“Then you need to stop treating my forgiveness as something you can count on before you've even apologized.”
He nodded.
This time, he didn't rush to defend himself.
We talked for nearly an hour.
He told me that his mother had called him twice after dinner and insisted I was trying to embarrass the family.
He admitted he had listened because it was easier than disagreeing with her.
He also admitted that he had been worried about how the evening would go if I came.
“What did you think would happen?” I asked.
He stared at the carpet.
“She might make a comment. You might answer her. Maya might get involved.”
“So you decided I shouldn't be there.”
“Yes.”
“Instead of asking your mother to behave?”
“Yes.”
The honesty hurt.
It also gave me something real to work with.
I didn't need him to pretend he had made a mistake by accident.
I needed him to understand that he had made a choice.
When he prepared to leave, he stood in the hall with his coat over one arm.
“Can I come again?”
“You can ask.”
He nodded.
“I'd like to see Lily.”
“You're her father. I want you to see her, too.”
He looked relieved, but I continued.
“That doesn't mean I'm ready to come home.”
“I understand.”
“I hope you do.”
He handed Lily back to me and kissed the top of her head.
Then he left.
I watched through the front window as Harrison opened the car door for him.
Emmett paused beside the car and looked back at the house.
I didn't know what he was thinking.
I didn't try to guess.
That evening, my father found me folding Lily's clothes in the nursery.
“How did it go?”
“He listened more than he talked.”
“That's something.”
“He said he thought I would stay because I always do.”
My father leaned against the doorframe.
“Was he wrong?”
I folded a tiny white onesie.
“He was right about what I used to do.”
“And now?”
I looked at Lily sleeping in her crib.
“Now I don't know.”
My father nodded.
“That's an honest answer.”
I placed the onesie in the drawer.
For the first time since leaving home, I felt that I might be able to make a decision without making it out of fear.
Click here to continue reading: PART 11: The Name on Emmett’s Phone Finally Made Sense When He Learned What My Family Had Never Asked Him to Understand
My Husband Put On His Dinner Jacket While I Stood in the Kitchen With Our Six-Day-Old Daughter
Part 10 of 12
