Chapter 9
The divorce became final in October.
Nia and I went to the courthouse separately. We stood beside our lawyers, answered the necessary questions, and signed the last papers.
Outside, Nia asked if I wanted to get coffee.
I almost said no. Then I realized we both had time before school pickup, and there were things I wanted to say without Ava listening.
We went to the café where she had shown me the statement with my forged signature. I noticed that as soon as we sat down. Nia noticed too.
“I should have chosen somewhere else,” she said.
“It’s okay. We know what happened here.”
She wrapped her hands around her cup. “I’ve been thinking about the day you came over with flowers.”
“So have I.”
“I remember seeing you in the doorway. You looked hopeful.” She paused. “I’d spent weeks pretending I couldn’t tell you the truth because you would be angry. Then you came to ask how I was.”
“I was angry later.”
“You had every reason to be.”
I didn’t need her to suffer through the memory again. I did need her to know what it had cost me.
“I kept trying to work out what I could have said to make you stay,” I told her. “Counseling helped me see that you had already made choices I didn’t know about.”
“I’m sorry you carried that.”
We finished our coffee and discussed Ava’s school break. It felt strange to move from our marriage to a calendar. It was also what our daughter needed us to do.
That afternoon, Ava asked why we looked tired.
“We finished the divorce paperwork today,” Nia told her.
Ava set down her snack. “So it’s real now?”
“Yes,” I said.
She nodded slowly. “Can I be sad even though I’m used to both houses?”
“Of course.”
She came over and hugged me. Then she hugged Nia. We stayed at the kitchen table until she was ready to talk about school.
In November, Ava’s class held a family project. Each student could make a display about people important to them. Ava asked for photographs of both homes, Denise, Julian, and our old dog, who had died when she was six.
She built her display on the floor of my apartment. Nia came over with printed pictures from the house. Ava put the photographs in whatever order she liked, then stepped back.
“Does it look confusing?” she asked.
“I know everyone in it,” I said.
“But my friends might ask why you live apart.”
“You can tell them as much or as little as you want,” Nia said.
Ava considered that. “I’ll tell them I have two homes. That’s easy.”
At the school presentation, she spoke clearly about the people who taught her things. Denise had taught her to bake. Julian had taught her to skate. Nia had taught her how to grow tomatoes. I had taught her to fix her bicycle chain.
I stood beside Nia as Ava pointed to the photographs.
Near the end, Ava held up the picture she had taken at her birthday party. Nia and I were laughing across the cake.
“That’s my mom and dad,” she said. “They both come when I need them.”
I looked down for a moment. Nia touched my arm, then let her hand fall.
After the presentation, Ava asked if we could keep the display. We found a place for it in her room at each house by making a second copy. She helped us put the photographs in order again.
That night, Julian came over for dinner. He saw the display on the shelf and asked Ava about it. She gave him a long account of every picture, including the one where he was falling at the skating rink.
“I thought that one was private,” he said.
“It’s history,” Ava replied.
When she went to bed, Julian asked how I felt.
“I still think about what happened,” I admitted. “But I don’t wait for the next secret every time my phone rings.”
“That sounds like progress.”
I looked toward Ava’s room. “She told her class we both come when she needs us.”
“She’s right.”
I hoped she would keep being right. The promise required ordinary work: arriving on time, sharing school news, answering questions, and admitting mistakes quickly. Nia and I had learned that the hard way.
At bedtime, Ava called me into her room. She was holding the paper crown I had saved from her first concert.
“You kept it all this time?” she asked.
“Of course.”
“Even when everything was bad?”
“Especially then. You asked me to keep it safe.”
She placed it on the shelf beside her family display.
May you like
“I like knowing where it is,” she said.
I kissed her forehead and turned out the light. From the doorway, I could still see the crown in the glow of her night-lamp.
