I hired a 16-year-old babysitter, and on her first day, she arrived late, disheveled, and wearing two different shoes. I thought, “This girl is going to burn my house down.” I was wrong about almost everything.
When I heard Ray’s voice, I felt the apartment shrink around me. Lucy stood right across from me, pale, her fingers clutching the strap of her purse.What did you say?” I asked.On the other end of the line, a silence heavy with years stretched out. “Don’t sign anything tomorrow, Patricia. Not until you know the whole truth.”I laughed, but not because it was funny. “The truth? Three months without answering my texts. Three months without seeing your daughters except on video calls whenever you happened to remember.””It wasn’t like that.”

Lucy lowered her gaze. And that was when I understood the worst part: she already knew.Patty…” she whispered.I raised my hand to stop her. “Ray, if you have something to say, say it now.””I’m downstairs.”I froze. Through the window of my cousin’s apartment — third floor, no elevator, clotheslines between buildings, scent of chicken soup from a neighboring kitchen — I saw Ray on the sidewalk. Thinner. Days of beard. Holding his phone tight. Not the confident man who once told me we couldn’t carry other people’s problems. A man whose home had crumbled inside him.”Come up,” I said. I hung up.Lucy sat on the edge of the bed. Matthew was asleep on the couch under a Spider-Man blanket. My daughters were in the next room, all three together like when they were little and fear forced them back into the same nest.”How long have you known?” I asked.Six months.”Six months. “And you didn’t tell me?””He asked me for time.””He asked you for time? And you gave it to him?”