Seven Years Waiting for a Fake Marriage novel · Chapter 18 of 24

Chapter 18: Saturdays

I read the conditions off an index card, on a bench at the gate of the park, with my father standing twenty feet away.

Lorna sat at the other end of the bench with her hands between her knees.

"One," I said. "Saturdays, ten to two. Here, or somewhere with other people in it."

"Yes."

"Two. My father or my mother is always in sight."

"Yes."

"Three. You don't ask him to call you anything. If he says Mom, he says it. If he stops, he stops."

Her mouth moved.

"Yes," she said.

"Four. You don't make a promise you can't keep in front of him. Not one."

"Yes."

"Five." I turned the card over, though nothing was written on the back. "I haven't forgiven you, and you don't ask me to. Not on a Saturday. Not on any day."

She nodded.

She did not cry, and she did not argue, and for the first time since the dormitory I thought she might be listening.

"That's all," I said.

"It's more than I expected."

"It's less than you owe."

"I know."

Sam came up the path with my mother holding his other hand.

He wore the blue coat, and he had his drawing book under his arm.

He stopped a few steps from the bench.

"Hi," he said to Lorna.

"Hi, Sam."

"You're allowed to be here on Saturdays."

"Elliot says so."

He studied her, then me, and then he walked over and sat between us with the book on his knees.

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