Chapter 8 - “DID YOU NOT WANT ME?”
Noah’s question stayed between us.
“Is he my dad?”
Ethan did not answer first.
He looked at me.
Even then, he waited.
I nodded.
“Yes, sweetheart.”
Noah stared at Ethan.
“You’re my dad?”
Ethan lowered himself to one knee.
“Yes.”
Noah’s expression did not change the way adults imagine children’s faces should change during life-altering moments.
He simply thought.
Then:
“How come I didn’t know?”
Ethan swallowed.
“Because I didn’t know you were here.”
Noah frowned.
“You didn’t know me?”
“No.”
“Mom knew.”
“Yes.”
“Grandpa knows.”
“He only found out recently.”
Noah looked at me.
“Did you hide me?”
My heart cracked.
“No.”
I put both hands gently on his shoulders.
“I tried very hard to tell your dad about you.”
Noah looked at Ethan again.
“Did you not want me?”
Ethan’s face broke.
He looked away for one second, gathered himself, then faced his son.
“Noah.”
His voice shook.
“If I had known you existed, I would have come looking for you.”
“Why didn’t you look?”
Ethan closed his eyes briefly.
“Because I believed something that wasn’t true.”
Noah considered this.
“What?”
“That your mom didn’t want me to find her.”
I held my breath.
Noah looked at me.
“You wanted him?”
Seven years of pain could have made me answer badly.
I chose carefully.
“I wanted him to know about you.”
That was the truth Noah needed.
He nodded.
Then he kicked at a small pebble.
“Are you getting married?”
Ethan and I both answered at once.
“No.”
Noah looked relieved.
“Okay.”
I almost laughed.
“So what happens?”
Ethan looked at me again.
I let him answer.
“If your mom says it’s okay, I’d like to spend time with you.”
Noah pointed toward Richard’s car.
“Like Grandpa?”
“Maybe.”
“Do you know dinosaurs?”
“Not enough.”
Noah sighed.
“You gotta learn a lot.”
“I figured.”
That was the beginning.
Not a hug.
Not music.
Not instant forgiveness.
A six-year-old informing his father that he was behind on dinosaurs.
I could live with that.
Richard waited by the car.
When Noah ran to him, Richard looked at me.
“You told him.”
“Yes.”
Ethan stood behind us.
Richard asked Noah, “You okay, buddy?”
Noah climbed into the car.
“Mr. Ethan is my dad.”
Richard’s eyes filled.
“I know.”
Noah buckled his seat belt.
“He doesn’t know stegosaurus plates are bones.”
Richard looked at Ethan.
“Unforgivable.”
For the first time in two days, Ethan laughed.
It disappeared quickly.
But Noah heard it.
That mattered.
The following weeks did not become magically easy.
Ethan came to the bakery the first Saturday.
No gifts.
No driver carrying boxes.
Just Ethan.
Noah was decorating cupcakes behind the counter.
“You came.”
Ethan smiled.
“I said I would.”
Noah handed him an apron.
“You need this.”
Ethan put it on.
It was pink.
He did not complain.
I watched from across the kitchen.
That was how trust started.
Not apologies.
Attendance.
Tuesday, Ethan came to school pickup.
Saturday, the natural history museum.
Wednesday, he sat through Noah’s school music program where twelve first-graders played instruments badly for twenty-eight minutes.
He clapped like they had performed at Carnegie Hall.
He never asked Noah to call him Dad.
One afternoon, Noah did anyway.
Accidentally.
“Dad, hold this.”
Ethan froze with a paper dinosaur in his hand.
Noah did not notice.
I did.
Ethan looked at me.
His eyes were wet.
I looked away to give him the dignity of pretending they weren’t.
Richard was trying too.
He no longer arrived at my bakery with plans.
He asked.
Sometimes I said yes.
Sometimes no.
He accepted both.
Victoria disappeared from our lives for nearly a month.
Then she walked into the bakery alone.
I almost asked her to leave.
She held out the gold bracelet.
Again.
“I had the clasp repaired.”
“I told you I don’t want it.”
“I know.”
She set it on the counter.
“Then give it to Noah someday. Or throw it away.”
I looked at her.
Victoria took a breath.
“My father is entering full-time care.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Thank you.”
She glanced around the bakery.
“I spent a long time believing loyalty meant protecting someone from the consequences of what they did.”
I said nothing.
“My father taught me that.”
She looked ashamed.
“So did the Blackwoods.”
“Yes.”
“I loved Ethan.”
“I know.”
“That doesn’t make what I hid acceptable.”
“No.”
Her mouth tightened.
“I didn’t come for forgiveness.”
“Good.”
A tiny smile appeared.
“Ethan said you’d say that.”
It surprised a laugh out of me.
Victoria’s expression softened.
Then she became serious.
“There is one thing you still don’t know.”
My stomach tightened.
“What?”
“My father remembered something yesterday.”
She removed a small card from her purse.
Not documents.
Not a confession.
A photograph.
Marian Blackwood stood outside the Lakes plant.
Graham Hale beside her.
Behind them, hundreds of employees gathered beneath the factory clock.
The date stamped on the photograph was March 15.
The morning after the money moved.
Victoria turned the picture over.
My name was written on the back in Marian’s handwriting.
ANNA BENNETT — RESOLVED.
I stared.
“Resolved?”
Victoria nodded.
“My father became extremely upset when he saw it.”
“What did he say?”
“Not much.”
She swallowed.
“But he kept repeating one word.”
“What?”
“Monday.”
I remembered Richard saying Marian believed Ethan would leave Blackwood before Monday if he learned about the baby.
Victoria continued.
“My father is more alert now. He wants to see all of you.”
“For what?”
“He says there’s one part Richard still has wrong.”
My pulse quickened.
“What part?”
Victoria looked directly at me.
“Marian didn’t frame you only because she was afraid Ethan would leave.”
May you like
She glanced at the photograph.
“She believed something would happen on Monday that would destroy the entire Blackwood family if Ethan chose you.”
