I thanked him.
I meant it. I was so grateful. A month of single parenting. A month of driving back and forth to the hospital. A month of cooking and cleaning and laundry and school drop-offs and pickups.
And he’d made the house beautiful for me.
After a month away, I wanted nothing more than to sit in my own living room with my family.
Wesley picked up my suitcase and headed upstairs.
“I’ll unpack this for you,” he said. “You sit. Relax.”
Hannah watched until he was out of sight.
I watched her watch him.
Her eyes followed him all the way up the stairs. Every step. Until his feet disappeared around the landing.
Then she hurried to my side and took my hand.
“Mom,” she whispered. “You need to know what he was really doing while you were in the hospital.”
Wesley came back down the stairs.
Hannah let go of my hand. She stepped back.
“Do you want some tea, Mom?” she said. Too loud. Too bright.
“Tea sounds great, honey,” I said.
She went into the kitchen.
Wesley came over. He helped me into the recliner. He put the blanket over my legs. He kissed my forehead.
“I’m so glad you’re home,” he said.
“Me too,” I said.
I looked at his face.
At my husband of fifteen years. My steady husband. My dependable husband. Who packs our daughter’s lunches and cuts her sandwiches into triangles.
He looked tired.
More tired than I’d ever seen him. Dark circles under his eyes. Gray stubble on his jaw. He’d lost weight.
You need to know what he was really doing.
Hannah didn’t get a chance to tell me until that night.
Wesley was with me all afternoon. He made dinner. Chicken noodle soup. He sat with me in the living room. We watched a movie. Hannah sat on the floor next to my recliner with Biscuit in her lap.
She kept looking at her father.
And at me.
And at her father again.
At nine-thirty, Wesley stood up.
“I need to run out for a bit,” he said.
I looked up at him.
“Run out? Where?”
“Just an errand,” he said. “I’ll be back in a couple hours.”
“Wes, it’s nine-thirty at night. What errand?”
He didn’t quite look at me.
“Something I’ve been doing,” he said. “While you were in the hospital. I’ll tell you about it. I promise. Just not tonight. You need to rest.”
He kissed my forehead again.
He picked up his keys.
He left.
I sat in my recliner and listened to the car back out of the driveway.
Then I looked down at my daughter.
She was sitting on the floor. With Biscuit. Staring at the front door.
“Hannah,” I said quietly. “Come here.”
She climbed up onto the arm of my recliner. Carefully. On my right side.
She didn’t say anything for a long time.
Then she started crying.
“He does that every night,” she said. “Almost every night. Since the first week you were in the hospital.”
My stomach went cold.
“Every night?”
“After I go to bed,” Hannah said. “Nine-thirty. Ten. He thinks I’m asleep. He leaves. He doesn’t come back until two in the morning. Sometimes three.”
“He leaves you here? Alone?”
Hannah nodded.
“Hannah,” I said. “You’re twelve. He left you alone in the house? Every night?”
“I don’t think he thinks I know,” Hannah said. “He checks on me first. He looks in my room. I pretend I’m asleep. Then I hear the car.”
She wiped her nose on her purple sleeve.
“I couldn’t sleep,” she said. “I’d lie there until I heard him come home. Every night. I’d lie there and listen for the car.”
I put my arm around my daughter.
My ribs screamed. I didn’t care.
“Where does he go?” I asked.
Hannah took a shaky breath.
“I don’t know,” she said. “But there’s a woman.”
My whole body went still.
“What woman?”
“Her name is Carla,” Hannah said. “She texts him. All the time. I saw her name on his phone. On the lock screen. When it buzzes. Like ten times a day.”
I couldn’t breathe.
“What do the texts say?”
“I can’t see the whole thing,” Hannah said. “Just the first part. On the lock screen. Before he picks it up.”
She pulled her phone out of her hoodie pocket. Her hands were shaking.
“I took pictures,” she said. “Of his phone. When he left it on the counter. I didn’t know what else to do. I wanted you to see. I’m sorry. I know it’s wrong to snoop.”
She handed me her phone.
I scrolled through the photos.
Pictures of Wesley’s phone screen. Taken at weird angles. Blurry. On the kitchen counter. On the coffee table. On the bathroom sink.
Lock screen notifications.
CARLA: Thank you for tonight. I don’t know what we’d do without you.
CARLA: He’s asking for you again.
CARLA: Please don’t tell Molly yet. I’m not ready.
CARLA: I can never repay you for this.
CARLA: I love you for what you’re doing.
CARLA: Can you come tonight? It’s bad.
I love you for what you’re doing.
Please don’t tell Molly yet.
I set the phone down in my lap.
I stared at the front door.
“There’s more,” Hannah whispered.
“More?”
“She came here,” Hannah said. “Once. The second week. On a Saturday. After we visited you. Dad thought I was upstairs. I was on the stairs. Listening.”
“What happened?”
“She knocked on the door,” Hannah said. “A woman. Kind of young. Like thirty-five. Dark hair. She was crying when Dad opened the door. Really crying. Like she couldn’t stop.”
Hannah swallowed.
“And Dad hugged her,” she said. “In the doorway. For a long time. And she was crying into his shoulder. And he said, It’s going to be okay, Carla. I promise. I’m not going anywhere.”
I’m not going anywhere.
That’s what he said to me. In the ICU. When I woke up.
Hey, Mol. You’re okay. I’m not going anywhere.