6

6

“We need to talk,” Aiden said. He opened the screen door for Sidney without looking at her.

“Hi Dad!” Cameron beamed, hoisting his backpack and baseball bag.

“Hey, buddy. Welcome back,” Aiden said. He smiled broadly and patted Cameron’s shoulder.

Sidney’s body seized. Anxiety flared over her nerves, knotting up every muscle her time on the yoga mat had unwound. Her glance flitted as her heart pounded loud and relentless in her ears, avoiding Aiden and the way he refused to look at her. He stood frozen, held the door ajar, and stared at the ground.

As many times as she had wanted to walk back into her former home, as many times as she had fantasized about returning to her former life, the threshold felt electric and menacing now. She pressed her teeth into her lips and forced herself to step past Aiden and into the house.

Her heart broke with the sound of the screen settling back into the frame. She had not set foot on these floorboards in months. Aiden had taken down all the family pictures she had hung in the entry hallway—the delivery room when Cameron was born, their wedding in the mountains, backpacking through Spain after college. All the memories erased and replaced with flat, gray paint, though Sidney could imagine the phantom shapes of the frames still on the walls.

She walked slowly down the barren hallway. She wanted to let her fingertips trace the vacant paint but kept her hands curled against her chest. Each step sent anxious waves up her legs. The sensations balled up in her stomach, forcing nausea up behind her teeth. Her head swam in a torrent of emotions.

To no surprise, he had not changed the family room. It always really was his space. The same black couch consumed the floor in front of the large flatscreen. The couch where he had held her hand as she nursed Cameron. The television where they had marathoned countless series after Cameron had gone to bed. The urge to vomit tightened around her throat. She made a hard turn into the kitchen to skirt the swell of memories.

“What the fuck are you doing, Sidney?” Aiden said coldly before she even reached a chair.

“What are you talking about, Aiden?” Sidney replied, dragging a chair out from the table and dropping into it.

“You posting naked, bloody pictures on the damn internet.”

“Wait, you don’t follow any of my accounts. You blocked me on everything.”

“Your shit is public, Sidney. Anyone can see that shit. I’ve heard about these damn pictures from multiple people. My parents still follow you.” Aiden stomped along the length of the counter but still did not look at her.

“What I post is none of your business, Aiden. None of your business.”

“Of course it’s my business. I still have to share a child with you. I have to deal with it when our mutual friends or his teachers or my parents see you covered in blood and naked on the goddamn internet.”

Heat prickled along Sidney’s scalp, spread along her skin, causing the anxiety to melt into something else. “That’s my problem.” Her voice solidified from its wobble.” Not your concern anymore. You don’t get to decide what I do now.”

“I never got to decide what you did, Sidney. As long as we share Cameron, this sort of shit is my business. Maybe you shouldn’t get Cameron anymore. Maybe it’s not good for him to be around you.”

Sidney’s heart stopped, and her blood ran scalding through her veins. Her fists clenched until her knuckles trembled white. Her mother’s voice echoed somewhere in the back of her mind.

“You can’t take my kid away over pictures,” Sidney yelled. “Some photography has nothing to do with my parenting.”

“But showing him horror movies does.” Aiden finally looked into her eyes, defiant, hateful.

Sidney choked for a moment. On his words, on the contempt in his face. “I have never shown him anything inappropriate.”

“I don’t think you’re fit to make that call. If you think it’s a good idea to pose naked in a bathtub of blood and then post it for everyone to see.”

The anger writhed through Sidney. Her thoughts stuttered under its pressure. The rage blanked her mind and replaced the rational with an insatiable desire to injure her ex-husband. “You are such a fucking prude, Aiden,” she managed.

“Oh, of course. Of course, I’m a prude. I’m not the one who went around fucking other people, so that makes me a prude.”

“I did not fuck other people, Aiden!”

“You fucked at least one,” he snapped, that hateful gaze burning brighter. “How do I know you didn’t fuck more of them? All of them? You’re just a desperate and insecure little bitch, trying to find someone to make you feel better about yourself. Posting pictures like this is just pathetic.”

Sidney clenched her teeth hard, hearing them grit against each other, and instinctively looked over her shoulder to ensure Cameron was not lurking within earshot. Like she used to do so many times as their marriage was collapsing. “Lower your voice,” she hissed. “We agreed we would not fight in front of Cam anymore.” Her blood frothed beneath her words.

“Oh, now you care about what we expose our son to,” he shouted back.

Sidney lost track of what she screamed at him. The argument was so habitual that the banter become muscle memory. They had had this same fight on repeat since Aiden discovered her infidelity, since their marriage had utterly exploded. Somewhere beneath her outrage, Sidney registered that Cameron could probably hear them fighting again, that he probably had heard them so many times he no longer cared, yet she could not temper her voice. She was sure it continued to echo in her old house long after the door slammed shut behind her.

She pulled her car screeching away from the curb and into a gas station down the street. She could not get to her phone fast enough.

Sidney: Fuck Aiden.

Kendra: What happened?

Sidney: Blowout

Sidney’s fingers trembled as she grasped at words to articulate for Kendra.

Sidney: I’ll explain in person.

I’m messaging Tony.

Kendra: Damn, it must have been bad.

Sidney breathed, pursing her lips in an O and exhaling firmly until the fury in her dwindled to a simmer, until she could read the glowing screen clearly again.

Sidney: What is with everyone and these fucking pictures?

Adam: What happened now?

Sidney: My ex just went off on me.

Adam: Are you OK?

Sidney: No. Not at all.

Adam: Are you safe?

Sidney: Yes.

Adam: What happened?

Sidney: He invited me in for the first time in months.

He said I shouldn’t have Cameron. Because I post these pictures.

He said I was desperate and insecure.

He accused me of fucking everyone.

Adam: Wow.

Sidney: He can’t take my kid over pictures. Over pictures with FAKE blood.

Hot and frustrated tears leaked from Sidney’s eyes. She hastily swiped them away, as if Adam could see them.

Adam: No, he can’t. Not even in the reddest state.

Sidney: Horror movie people have kids.

Adam: And it doesn’t make them bad parents.

Sidney: I am a bad parent.

Adam: You are not.

Sidney: I let him win. I screamed and screamed at him just like old times. When my kid could hear.

Adam: Your ex deserved it.

Sidney: But my baby doesn’t.

Sidney could not fight the fiery tears burning tracks down her cheeks. The anger overloaded her brain, scrambled her emotions. Somehow, crying made her even more angry, which only caused more sobs to shake out of her.

Sidney: I need you now.

Tony: Omw

Sidney forced her cries into whimpers and wiped her eyes until she could see enough to drive. She poured her rage into focus. She turned the car home toward distraction. She did not even think as she crossed town.

Tony must have been close. When she pulled into the driveway, she spotted Tony’s car already waiting on her curb, the sleek midrange sportscar of a man with no other, more pressing priorities.

Sidney burst into the front door in an unintended flurry. Tony and Kendra stood on opposite sides of the kitchen counter peninsula, both holding beers. They turned startled as Sidney flung the door shut behind her. Kendra’s body had been angled away from Tony, granting him only the side of her shoulder, but when she saw Sidney, she turned toward her and stepped past Tony. Tony stood as nonchalantly oblivious as always, beer hovering near his lips.

“Oh shit, honey,” Kendra said, knowing. She flexed her lips into a thin grimace but held back her words.

“Hey Sid, you OK?” Tony said.

Sidney shook her head before the words finally formed on her tongue.

“I don’t want to talk about it right now,” she said.

“Do you want a beer?” Kendra offered.

“Absolutely.”

Sidney moved into the kitchen and took the perspiring bottle from Kendra. Her arm near-trembled from the relentless adrenaline dancing on her nerves. She forced it to her lips and gulped desperately at the beer.

“Must have been one hell of a night,” Kendra said, watching. “You never chug.”

“Later,” Sidney said between gulps.

As she slammed her beer, Sidney noticed Tony’s eyes moving over her. He stared at her mouth, then let his gaze meander down her neck and over her body. Kendra noted the same behavior and gave Sidney a knowing glance.

“Well, I’m going to head upstairs to watch a movie with Savannah in her room before bedtime,” Kendra said as she dumped her beer bottle in the recycling. “You two have a good night. Sid, catch up in the morning?”

Sidney smiled at her gratefully, nodding.

“See you in the morning.” Sidney placed her own empty bottle on the counter beside her.

Tony set his bottle down and reached forward to take Sidney by the waist. The frothing tide of her anger tempered at the distraction of his touch. She snuck in a breath before he pressed a kiss to her mouth and closed her eyes to tumble fully into the motions.

“Must have been rough,” he mumbled against her neck. “Let’s see if I can make you feel better.”

“Exactly what I had in mind,” Sidney said, leading him to her room.