005

I couldn't sign.

I sat in Patricia's office on Monday morning with the preliminary divorce documents open in front of me and my pen in my hand and I could not make my hand move. Patricia didn't rush me. She poured me a glass of water and said there was no deadline. She said that often the hardest part was the first signature and that everything after that was process.

I knew it was process. I was an attorney. I understood process. That was not what was stopping me.

"Talk to me," Patricia said.

"I'm three months pregnant," I said. "And the thought of doing this alone—"

"You won't be doing it alone. You'll have counsel. You'll have support."

"That's not what I mean." I put the pen down. "I mean the thought of raising this baby in two separate homes from the beginning. Of never having had it work."

"And if you stay?"

I didn't answer that.

"Love isn't the question," Patricia said. "I'm not asking if you love him. The question is whether this marriage is safe for you and for your child."

Safe. I turned that word over. I thought about room 1208. I thought about the checkout receipt for two.

I went back to work. I buried myself in case files and pretended I was a woman who had everything under control. I was good at that. I had been doing it for months.

That afternoon my assistant buzzed me.

"A Simone Carter for you. She says it's personal."

I almost said no. Then I thought: no. I want to hear what she says.

"Put her through."

"I wondered if you'd take my call," Simone said.

"I almost didn't." I leaned back in my chair. "What do you want?"

"To talk. Woman to woman. I think you deserve that."

"I think you texting my private phone without permission already used up the goodwill that phrase typically earns."

"Caleb told me you were upset. I wanted to explain."

"He told you about our private conversation."

"We speak about everything," she said. And the absence of any defensiveness in her voice was more damning than anything aggressive could have been. She wasn't boasting. She was stating a fact, the way you state facts about the weather. "I'm not saying it to hurt you. I'm saying it because you're clearly smart enough to deserve honesty."

"So be honest."

A pause. Then: "He called me the night of your anniversary. Not because I reached out. He called me. He said he was feeling trapped. His word."

I kept my face completely neutral. The attorney training was useful in unexpected ways.

"He is not a bad person," Simone continued. "I want to be clear about that. But he is not in this marriage the way you are. He hasn't been for a long time."

"And you are?" I said. "In it with him?"

Silence. Then: "I'm suggesting you stop waiting for something he is not capable of giving you right now."

I thanked her for the call. I hung up. I set the phone face-down and sat with my hands steepled under my chin for a long time.

I believed her. Every word. That was the worst part — not the information itself but the fact that none of it surprised me. It confirmed what I had known somewhere below the surface for months, the thing I had been refusing to look at directly.

Caleb came home that evening with peonies. My favorite. He held them out with an uncertain half-smile.

"I've been thinking about what you said," he told me. "About choosing. I'm choosing you. Obviously. I'll pull back from Simone. I'll create some distance."

I took the flowers. I looked at his face. He meant it — I could see that he genuinely meant it in this moment, with this gesture.

But Simone's voice was still in my ear. He called me. He said he was feeling trapped.

"Thank you," I said.

I put the flowers in a vase. I kissed him on the cheek. I made dinner and we sat across from each other and talked about ordinary things, and for a few hours it almost felt like the marriage I thought I had. Almost.

He was asleep by midnight. I was awake on my back, hand on my stomach, staring at the ceiling and counting.

My phone lit up. Unknown number. A voicemail, not a text. I put in my earbuds and pressed play.

Caleb's voice. Low, easy, the voice he used when he was relaxed. A conversation he didn't know was being recorded.

He was talking to Simone. He was telling her that the flowers had been a good idea, just like she said. He said she was right — he just needed to buy himself some time until things with the lawyers settled down.

Buy himself some time.

Then Simone's voice: "Did she believe it?"

And Caleb: "She always does."

I lay completely still beside him. My husband. The father of my child. The man who had just told his ex-girlfriend that his apology tonight was a tactic, and that I always believe him, and that he only needed to manage the situation until the legal process slowed down.

I pulled out the earbud. I put the phone on the nightstand.

And I did not sleep again.