Divorced, Yet He Can't Let Me Go novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: Bea's Kitchen

Winslow comes to Bea's door demanding June and cuts off Georgina's cards, and Georgina shuts the door on his bandaged hand.

The first thing I learned about leaving was that my cards stopped working the same afternoon.

I stood at a pharmacy counter on Munjoy Hill with a tin of baby formula and a tube of burn cream.

The cashier ran my card, and the machine beeped twice.

"Declined," she said.

I tried the second card, and then the third.

Behind me, a man sighed and shifted his basket.

"It's the joint account," Bea said, and she slid her own card across the counter without looking at me.

"He did this in three days," I said.

"He did this while he was lying to the fire department," Bea said. "The man is efficient."

We walked home with the bag between us.

Bea's apartment is the top floor of a narrow house, and she had cleared a corner of her bedroom for June's travel crib.

I changed my daughter on Bea's bed and she kicked my bandaged arm and laughed.

It was the first time I had laughed in four days, and it made my ribs hurt.

Bea went to put the kettle on.

I stayed on the bed with June, and I thought about the lighter, the red can and Lorna's face turned up toward me on the stairs.

Somebody knocked on the front door downstairs.

It was three hard knocks, spaced out, and I knew them.

Winslow knocked on every door he owned that way.

"I'll get it," Bea said, and she dried her hands.

"I'll do it."

I lifted June onto my hip and went down the narrow stairs.

I opened the door the width of the chain.

He stood on the porch in his dark coat with his bandaged hands held in front of him.

He looked tired.

I hated that I noticed.

"Georgina, let me in."

"No."

"I want to see my daughter."

"You can see her when a judge says so."

He looked past me and found June, and for a second his whole face changed.

Then it closed again.

"You took her out of the hospital without telling me where you were going."

"You were busy with your statement."

"I was protecting this family."

"You were protecting Lorna."

"Lorna is part of this family!" He said it too loudly, and a light came on in the house across the street.

He lowered his voice.

"Georgina. Come home."

"Home burned down."

"Mother has the guest house. There's room for you and June."

"Is Lorna there?"

He didn't answer.

"She's staying with Mother too," he said finally. "She's not well. She hasn't slept since the fire."

I almost laughed.

"She hasn't slept," I said.

"Don't do that."

"Do what?"

"Be cruel about her. She lost Daniel and now she's lost her home."

"We lost our home. She burned it."

His mouth went flat.

"That's enough."

"Did you freeze my cards?"

He didn't flinch.

"I froze the accounts the morning you left. The firm's money isn't going to fund a lawyer who tells you I'm a monster. Come home, and they'll work again."

That was the whole offer.

It was a leash.

I could hear June breathing against my neck, and the kettle starting to scream upstairs.

"Then I'll earn my own money," I said.

"Doing what? Drawing rabbits?"

"Yes."

"Georgina." He rubbed his forehead with the heel of one gauze hand and winced. "You can't hear a car coming on your left. You can't take the baby on a bus alone. You need me and you know it."

"I heard you knock," I said.

"I'm on your right."

"You're always on my right when you want to be heard."

I saw that go in.

He put his hand on the door above the chain.

"Open it."

"Take your hand off my door."

"Open it, Georgina."

I pushed the door shut.

I felt it hit something soft, and I heard him hiss.

I hadn't meant to hit his hand.

My fingers froze on the wood, and I let the door open an inch.

He pulled his hand back and held it against his coat.

A small dark spot had come through the gauze on the back of his knuckle.

"I told you," he said, very quietly. "Car door."

"I know what you told me."

"Then you know I can't fight you like this."

"Good," I said, and I shut it for real.

I stood in the dark hall with my daughter in my arms and listened to his boots on the steps.

I only heard them on the right side.

I waited until the engine started and the lights swept across the ceiling.

Upstairs, Bea was standing at the window with the kettle forgotten in her hand.

"You closed a door on him," she said.

"I didn't mean to."

"I know. He looked at you like you'd cut him open."

"He laughed at me yesterday."

"I know," Bea said. "I'm just telling you what I saw."

The courier came at eight the next morning.

He handed me a thick envelope with a law firm's name embossed in the corner.

I read it on the stairs with June chewing my braid.

Mr. Wentworth does not consent to the dissolution. Mr. Wentworth will seek primary residence of the minor child.

Mr. Wentworth intends to call Mrs. Lorna Wentworth as an eyewitness to the events of the night in question.

I read the last line three times.

Lorna was going to tell a judge what she saw.

I folded the letter and put it in my pocket, and I went to find my sister's laptop.

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