Chapter 8 - I Refused to Go Home
Mom called Sunday night.
Not texted.
Called.
“Brooke, I need you home.”
I stood in Dad’s hallway so Ethan wouldn’t hear.
“Is Gary there?”
A pause.
“No.”
I knew immediately she was lying.
Gary’s truck was visible through the front window of our house on the location-sharing app Grandma had insisted Mom install the previous winter after her car broke down.
I had never used it to check on her before.
Now I did.
“I’m not coming while he’s there.”
“He lives here too.”
“Then I’m not coming.”
Her voice sharpened.
“You don’t get to decide that.”
“I’m seventeen. Try dragging me.”
“Brooke.”
“No.”
There was a long silence.
Then Mom changed tactics.
“You are making this much worse for Ethan.”
I almost missed the importance of that sentence because it made me angry.
“How?”
“Your father will use you.”
“Use me for what?”
“You know exactly what.”
“No. Say it.”
She didn’t.
So I did.
“Custody?”
Another silence.
Then her voice cracked.
“Do you understand what happens if your father gets more time?”
There it was.
Not what happens to Ethan.
What happens if Dad gets more time.
“What?”
“He’ll push for the house. He’ll say the kids need stability with him. He’ll turn everything into evidence.”
“That’s not how property works.”
“You’re seventeen. Don’t lecture me about divorce.”
I nearly hung up.
Then Mom said something strange.
“We were almost through this.”
“Through what?”
She breathed into the phone.
Nothing.
“Mom?”
“We were almost at the point where the counselor understood.”
My anger disappeared.
“Understood what?”
“That Ethan can’t handle overnights there.”
I leaned against the wall.
“What happens after she ‘understands’?”
Mom didn’t answer.
I thought about Grandma mentioning Cincinnati.
About Gary’s company.
About the parenting schedule.
About Ethan practicing what to tell the counselor.
“Were you trying to move?”
Mom said, “Come home.”
That was all.
But her refusal answered enough.
I told her I would stay with Dad until Gary was out of the house and until Ethan had spoken with someone without her or Gary coaching him.
Mom’s response was immediate.
“No.”
Not angry.
Panicked.
May you like
And suddenly I knew the decision I had just made mattered far more than where I slept.
For the first time, Mom had lost control of the version of Ethan’s story that other adults were going to hear.
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