“Oh God. How could you do this to me? How could you? Oh my God, this isn’t really happening!”
“Isabelle.” I reached for her again, and she recoiled.
“Don’t touch me. Don’t touch me. What kind of motherare you?” she spat, stepping back into her pink-and-white bedroom. Ripping my heart.
“Izz, you’re making a much bigger deal out of this than it is—”
“Don’t come in here,” she said, slamming the door. Locking it. “Don’t come in here.”
I sat there. Outside of her closed door, for an hour. Listening to her sob and destroy things. And there was nothing I could do. Keep calm and carry on.
“I’m sorry, Izz. I’m sorry,” I kept repeating. But to her, it meant nothing. I’d waited until it was too late. And as Hayes had predicted, it was ugly.
She did not talk to me for a week.
On Monday, she went to school, looking as if she’d gone twelve rounds in a boxing match, she was that swollen. I insisted she stay home, but she refused: she did not want to be around me. I don’t know what she told her friends.
On Tuesday after school, she packed a bag and waited for Daniel to pick her up. When I pleaded with her again, and apologized again, she turned to me very coldly and asked, “Did you have sex with him?” And when I could not answer her, she started to cry.
She would not return until Sunday, when Daniel insisted on bringing her back. She had up to that point not responded to any of my calls or texts, but had no other option because Daniel was leaving town again. He dropped her off that afternoon, and when I attempted to hug her, she let me, although she did not hug back.
“I missed you,” I said, inhaling her. Her shampoo, her sunscreen.
She nodded, and then made her way into the house.
Daniel was in the driveway, pulling bags out of the trunk of the BMW. I moved to help him.
“Hey.”
“Hey,” he said.
“Thanks for bringing her.”
He shook his head, irritated. “It’s been a very fucked-up week.”
“I know.”
He shut the trunk then and finally looked at me. “I warned you. I fucking warned you. Jesus Christ, Sol, what were you thinking?”
I did not respond.
“Seriously.What the hell were you thinking?He’s akid. Have you lost your mind?”
My temples throbbed. For days my head had hurt, and my thoughts had been dark and slow and muddled, like being stuck inside a Turner painting.
“You know what, I’m not going to have this conversation with you. Not now. Possibly not ever.”
“No. Youare. Because our daughter is a complete and total mess right now, and I fucking warned you this would happen, and this is not just about you…”
It killed me to hear this, to know that he was right.
“She’s been listening to Taylor Swift’s new album on repeat and saying that she finally understands her pain,” he continued. “I don’t even know what that means…”
“She’s hurting, Daniel. Her heart’s broken.”
“Because of this Hayes kid? Or because ofyou?”
That stung.
