All Chapters of They Wanted Me Gone, So I Became Unforgettable: Chapter 71 - Chapter 80

Anastasia’s POV:Gerard met the children on a Sunday that smelled like cut grass and Lucas had been quietly dreading for three weeks.Not dreading in the way of something he did not want. Dreading in the way of something he wanted so much that the possibility of it going wrong had become its own specific weight. I had watched him manage it the way he managed things that cost him something, with the particular stillness of a man holding himself together in a public space and hoping nobody looked too closely.I had looked closely.I always did.We met at a park on the north end of the city because parks were neutral and children could run if they needed to and the open air meant nobody felt trapped and I had suggested it and Lucas had said yes immediately in the tone that meant he was relieved someone had made the decision.Gerard was already there when we arrived.He was sitting on a bench near the entrance with his hands on his knees and he stood when he saw us and for a moment before

Anastasia’s POV:Victoria called me laughing.Not the Victoria laugh I had been used to in the early years, the one that was controlled and arrived at appropriate moments and contained itself properly. This was an actual laugh, surprised out of her, the kind that happened when something caught you before you could manage it.“What did she say to you?” I said.“She called me on the house phone,” Victoria said. “She asked Diane for the number and Diane gave it to her because apparently Diane has also given up trying to anticipate Zoe.”“What did she say?” I said.“She told me,” Victoria said, and I could hear her still catching her breath, “that she had been thinking about it and she had decided that I should come to the groundbreaking when the community center opens because I’m part of the family that built it.”I sat down.“She said that,” I said.“She said and I’m quoting precisely because I wrote it down immediately, “you are the grandmother and the grandmother should be there when

Anastasia’s POV:The community center opened on a morning that was cold and clear and the kind of bright that made everything look deliberate.We arrived early.Lucas drove and the children were in the back seat and Zoe was wearing the grey coat Victoria had bought her because Zoe had told Victoria she needed a coat for important occasions and Victoria had taken this seriously and produced something that was both warm and exactly what Zoe would have chosen herself.Noah was wearing his suit.He had decided this was a suit occasion and nobody had argued because Noah in his suit with both straps on his backpack was one of the most earnest things I had ever seen and I was not going to take that from him.The building looked exactly as I had drawn it.That was the thing that still surprised me every time, not that it existed, but that it looked exactly like what I had imagined. The east wall windows catching the morning light. The old stone detail along the entrance. The garden at the sid

Anastasia’s POV:Dean called at two in the morning.Lucas answered before I registered the phone ringing and I heard his voice say yes and okay and we are coming and then he was already out of bed and I sat up and he looked at me and said she’s in labor and I was dressed before he finished the sentence.Mrs. Hartley had given us a key for exactly this situation and we left the house with the children asleep and the lights off and I sat in the car and texted Simone because I needed to and she responded three minutes later with a voice note that was mostly breathing and one sentence that said I’m not scared I’m ready and I played it twice and held my phone.The hospital was quiet the way hospitals were quiet at that hour, the particular hush of a building that was never fully asleep but had turned down its daytime urgency.Dean was in the corridor outside the delivery suite.He looked at us when we came in and his face was doing several things at once, the open unmanaged face he had wor

Anastasia’s POV:Rosa resigned.She came into my office and closed the door behind her, which she never did, and she sat down across from my desk and looked at me with the expression of someone who had made a decision and was not going back on it and also understood what it was going to cost the person across from her.“I’m leaving,” she said.I put my pencil down.“When?” I said.“End of the month,” she said. “I know that’s not much notice and I have already started the transition documentation and I will work as long as you need me after the official date to hand over properly.”I looked at her.“Where are you going?” I said.“I’m starting my own firm,” she said. “Small. Just me and one other person to start. Residential work. Nothing that competes with what we do here.”I sat with that.Rosa. Who had moved my three o’clock without being asked the day Noah started school. Who had translated client feeling into actual specification without being told how. Who had told the Morrison cl