Chapter 21: Her Own Name

The conference room at my lawyer's office had a long table, a pitcher of water and a box of tissues nobody wanted to be seen touching.

Megan sat on my left in her good coat.

She had come off a night shift, and she hadn't taken her badge off the lanyard.

Cory walked in at three minutes before nine, with his own lawyer behind him.

He wore a gray suit that had been tailored for a heavier man.

He sat across from me and folded his hands on the table.

"Good morning," he said.

"Good morning."

That was all, and I was glad.

My lawyer opened a folder and read the terms aloud in a flat voice.

The house on Oakmere Drive was mine, and Cory's half had been signed over in January.

His payment for the baby would go out on the first of every month.

He could see the baby in visits that I set, wherever I set them.

He had lost his job in March.

"I'm at a smaller firm now," he told the table. "They let me work the phones. It's less. It's honest."

"It's your business," I said.

"I know. I wanted you to hear it from me."

The lawyer slid the pages across the table, five of them, stapled in the corner.

I picked up the pen.

I had seen this paper once before in my life.

It had come up on my phone in Megan's living room, with a signature at the bottom that looked like mine and wasn't.

Now I turned to the last page, and my lawyer set her finger on the line.

My hand didn't shake.

I wrote it slowly, the way I had written it on contracts for six years.