CHAPTER 6 — NOT WITHOUT ASKING ME
Tessa called two days later.
I nearly didn’t answer.
“Hi,” she said.
Her voice was weak.
“Maren?”
“Yes.”
“This is Tessa.”
“I know.”
Silence.
“I owe you an apology.”
That surprised me.
“You were unconscious.”
“Not for that.”
I sat down.
Theo slept against my shoulder.
“For contacting Reid without telling you.”
“That wasn’t your responsibility.”
“I knew he hadn’t told you yet.”
My jaw tightened.
“He told you that?”
“He said you were close to your due date. He kept saying he wanted to wait until he had everything confirmed.”
“Convenient.”
Tessa sighed.
“I told him to tell you.”
I looked toward the living room.
Reid was folding laundry.
He glanced up.
I turned away.
“I’m not calling to defend him,” Tessa said.
“Good.”
“He never betrayed you.”
My throat tightened.
“But he should have told you the day I called.”
I said nothing.
“I didn’t contact him because I wanted to disrupt your life.”
“Why did you wait four years?”
Tessa went quiet.
“Because I was angry.”
“At Reid?”
“At everyone.”
She breathed in.
“Miles died before June’s first birthday.”
That surprised me.
I had assumed Miles never knew about her.
“He knew?”
“Yes.”
My grip tightened around the phone.
“Did Reid know Miles knew?”
“No.”
“Why didn’t Miles tell his family?”
“Because he and Reid weren’t speaking. And because Miles kept saying he wanted to fix things before he introduced June.”
That sounded painfully like Reid.
Waiting for the right moment.
Waiting until things were cleaner.
Life refusing to cooperate.
“After he died,” Tessa continued, “I thought I could do everything alone.”
“And now?”
“Now June asks questions I can’t answer.”
“What questions?”
“What his laugh sounded like in person. Whether he hated broccoli. Whether he was scared of thunderstorms.”
My chest tightened.
“I can show her pictures.”
Tessa’s voice trembled.
“But I can’t give her memories I don’t have.”
I looked toward Reid again.
He had stopped folding.
He was watching me.
“I thought she deserved his family.”
Tessa paused.
“I just didn’t expect to end up in emergency surgery three weeks later.”
Despite myself, I almost laughed.
Neither of us did.
Then Tessa said,
“Reid shouldn’t have missed your son’s birth.”
My eyes burned.
“But I’m grateful he stayed with June.”
Both things.
Again.
Two truths at once.
“I don’t know what I’m supposed to do with that,” I admitted.
“You don’t have to do anything with it.”
Tessa sounded tired.
“Just don’t blame June.”
“I don’t.”
And I realized it was true.
I didn’t.
After the call, Reid entered the room.
“She okay?”
“Yes.”
“What did she say?”
“That you’re an idiot.”
One corner of his mouth moved.
“Fair.”
“And that she told you to tell me.”
His almost-smile vanished.
“Yes.”
“So this was never about protecting me.”
“No.”
“Why didn’t you trust me?”
He sat across from me.
“I did.”
“No. If you trusted me, you would have told me.”
He considered that.
“You’re right.”
I appreciated that he had stopped trying to win.
“I was scared,” he said.
“Of what?”
“That you’d think I was trying to bring another family into our lives right before Theo was born.”
“You were.”
“Eventually.”
“Then maybe I deserved a vote.”
“Yes.”
I leaned back.
“That’s the part I can’t get past.”
“Missing the birth?”
“That too.”
I looked down at Theo.
“But you made all these decisions alone. You met Tessa. You verified June. You became an emergency contact. You kept thinking you could tell me later.”
Reid nodded.
“I don’t ever want you to do that again.”
“I won’t.”
“No more deciding what truth I can handle.”
“I promise.”
“No more protecting me by hiding something difficult.”
“I promise.”
I looked at him.
“Don’t promise unless you mean it.”
“I mean it.”
For the first time since Theo’s birth, I believed him.
Not because he had earned back everything.
Because he finally understood what he had broken.
Not just a hospital memory.
Trust.
