“You have a father,” she says, her voice hollowing out my gut. “Our children get James as a grandfather. You see your dad every week. He's a blowhard and has some seriously controlling tendencies, but he's here. He's around. He's engaged. Our kids will know him.” Those last two words come out hard, raw, and her voice shakes at the end. “I don't even know my own father.”
Her hand squeezes mine.
“I'm sorry.” A part of me wants to mention that our children only have one grandmother–her mother–but now isn’t the time for that. Amanda needs to say her piece.
I need to just listen.
This isn't something I can protect her from, is it? I was wrong.
And I should have realized it sooner.
“I don't even know how to process this, Andrew. It's bad enough my father crawls out of the woodwork after years of not hearing from him, but,” she gestures at her midsection, “now we have two babies coming soon, and my own husband isn't who I thought he was.”
A discordant note clangs through my brain.
“No.” I pull her to me, wrapping my arms around her. She doesn't fight the contact, but she doesn't look up at me, either. Her hands hang by her side. “Amanda, no. That's not where this needs to go.”
“It's not? Then where does it go, Andrew?” She finally looks up, and I hate what I see in her eyes.
Disappointment.
All of it for me.
“I–”
“Do you remember, when we were first dating, how you handed me that manila envelope with the research you did on my father? How horrified I was to know you went snooping into my past?”
“And you already knew where he was. And that he had three years to go.”
“Sure. I knew he was out but didn't know where he was. And here we are. Nothing changes, does it? You were intrusive and paternalistic then, and now you're still the same. Except I'm even more vulnerable.” Her hand pushes me away and she rubs her belly.
“That's not true.”
“Of course it is! My entire body is being stretched from the inside out–I'm growing two babies! Your babies! And you treat me like I'm some kind of child who can't handle the realities of her own life!”
“I do not.”
“You do! Why would you screen my contact with my own father?”
“Because I knew it would be painful.”
“This is more painful, Andrew.”
“I'll never do it again. Ever. You have my word.”
“Your word?” She lets out a scoffing sound that damn near breaks me.
“I promise that I will never, ever try to protect you without talking to you about it. Without making sure you are an equal partner in whatever worries I have about keeping you and your heart safe.”
“That's a start. But you did the same thing when we first met and here you are, doing it again.”
“I didn't make a promise to you then. I am now.”
She takes a moment to think about it, then concedes. “Fair point. You didn't promise then.” The hard look in her eyes loosens, but barely. “I've been so sad my father didn't answer my letters.”
“I'm sorry, honey. If it's my fault, I'll fix it.”
“How?”
“By talking to Leo.”
“No.”
“Fine. I won't.”
“No–I mean...” She sighs, then puts both hands on her belly, rubbing. All her attention is on the babies as seconds tick by, the beat of time making me feel pregnant, too.
“I'll do whatever you want.”
Suddenly, she looks up, tears making her eyes shine.
“He wants to see me?”
“Yes.”
“Does he know about them?”
“No.”
Squaring her shoulders, she stands as tall as she can while holding forty-five pounds of baby in her torso. “Well, then, he's about to find out.”
“Huh?'
“Do you have his number?”
“Yes.”
“Text him.”
“Now?”
“Yes.”
“You want to see him now?”
“I am thirty-eight weeks pregnant with twins, Andrew. It's now or never.”
“But–”
The glare I get tells me I'm in the doghouse, so don't argue.
So I don't.
Amanda says she'd like to see you, I type to Leo's number. I slip the phone in my breast pocket and look at her.
Ding!
We both jolt.
“Probably Gina,” I mutter, but when I look, it's Leo.
You free now? I'm in Nashua.
He types an address. I map it.
“He says he's free now,” I murmur, surprised.
“Then let's go.”
“Are you sure?”
“Andrew.”
“You're sure.” I text José, who replies immediately that the car will be ready in five.
She's bereft but determined, soft but firm. “He's my father. He wants to see me. How could I not?”
And then she slips her arms around my waist, leaning in, muttering into my chest. “And wanting to protect me is sweet, but if you go all alpha like that again and cut me out of my own decisions, I'll just end up hating you.”
“I would die if you hated me.”
And then she weeps into my shirt until José appears, the front door open, his face changing as he sees us.
He slips out quietly, ready when we are.
When you hear the words halfway house, what do you envision?
We pull up to a large, white home with black shutters, two doors off a porch indicating it's a duplex of some kind. I realize I expected something seedier.
This looks like a pleasant nursing home on a quiet side street.
Except there are five men in folding chairs, all smoking, all looking ragged and worn out.
“Andrew,” Amanda says, clutching my arm. We're in the Tesla Model X. On second thought, I didn't have José drive. This is too personal, too raw. We need to be alone.
I text Leo.
The oldest of the men on the porch, a guy in a Red Sox ball cap, checks his phone. Then he looks up and stares at our car.
“That's him,” she gasps.
I see the resemblance, but barely. Amanda's got big eyes, brown and warm, with a face that's confident but sweet. She used to change her hair color frequently, but with the pregnancy she's gone back to her natural color, a soft brown that suits her.
Leo's a gaunt man with gray hair,
