He walked to the door. He didn’t look at our son. He didn’t look at me.
And then he was gone, and I was alone with a baby whose father had just decided, in the space of one glance, that I was a liar.
****
Diana closed the front door behind me and took the car seat from my arms without a word. My son was three days old, and I was standing in my sister’s hallway with a diaper bag, a hospital bracelet still on my wrist, and a phone full of messages Aaron refused to open.
“He won’t pick up.”
The girls were already upstairs. Lily had asked twice when Dad was coming to get us. I hadn’t known what to tell her.
“Sit down,” Diana ordered. “You look like you’re about to fall over.”
Grace had packed the banner they’d made for the baby and brought it with her. It was folded on the stairs now, one corner bent, WELCOME HOME HENRY written across it in four different colors.
“Should I save it for when Dad comes?” she’d asked.
“Elena, stop calling him.”
I’d told her yes because I couldn’t make myself explain why we weren’t going home at all.
“He won’t pick up. Look.”
I held out the screen. Three missed calls from me. One reply from Aaron:
‘I’ll have my lawyer contact you about the separation.’
Diana read it twice.
“You’re not guilty. Act like it.”
