They Excluded Me From the Family, So I Built a New One novel · Chapter 7 of 24
Chapter 7: Served at the Kitchen Table
I drove to Cambridge on Saturday morning with Libby in the passenger seat and the folder on the back seat.
The house on the corner had been ours for six years, and I had kept every receipt for the roof.
Desmond's sedan was in the driveway.
"He'll be waiting," Libby said.
"I know."
"Do you want me to come in?"
"I want you right behind me."
He was at the kitchen table in yesterday's shirt.
He hadn't shaved, and a coffee mug in front of him had gone cold.
When he saw me his face crumpled, and for one second I almost believed it.
"Sue. Thank God."
He stood so fast his chair scraped.
"I've been up all night. I called Kenzie, she won't talk to me. Rosalie's furious. I made a terrible mistake, and I know it."
"Sit down, Desmond."
He sat.
I put a stack of papers in front of him and laid a pen on top.
"What is that?"
"A petition for divorce. My attorney filed it this morning, and you've been served."
He didn't touch it.
"You can't be serious."
"I'm completely serious."
"It was a group chat. Everyone says things in a chat."
"For nineteen months."
"It was venting! You work all the time, I wanted somewhere to talk about it. That's all."
"About how to keep me out of the photographs?"
"I never meant it that way."
"You wrote it in a chat called Not Sue."
He rubbed his face with both hands.
Libby leaned in the doorway with her arms crossed and said nothing.
I had asked her to say nothing, and she was doing it better than I expected.
"Please," Desmond said at last. "Give me a chance. I'll apologize to Kenzie's in-laws myself. We'll go to counseling, we'll sell this house and buy something bigger."
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