Chapter 4: The Version Ryan Told
I put Lily to bed early.
She didn't ask many questions.
She asked one: "Mom, is that man going to come back?"
I smoothed her hair back from her forehead.
"I don't know yet, sweetheart."
"He seemed sad," she said.
"Get some sleep."
I sat on the edge of her bed until her breathing slowed.
Then I went downstairs.
Ryan was in the kitchen.
He'd made coffee, which meant he was preparing to talk, which meant he'd already decided what version he was going to tell me.
I sat down across from him and waited.
"I need you to understand what it was like nine years ago," he started.
"I need you to tell me the truth."
"That's what I'm trying to do."
"Then start with Daniel.
Not with context.
Not with how hard it was.
Start with Daniel."
Ryan wrapped both hands around his mug.
"You were seeing him when we met.
You know that.
You ended it when we got serious."
"I ended it because I chose you."
"You were pregnant six weeks after we started dating."
I looked at him.
"And you assumed."
"I asked you.
You said it was mine."
"Because I believed it was."
"I know." He set the mug down.
"But when Lily was about two, she started looking — I don't know.
I noticed things.
The way her eyes sat.
The shape of her hands." He stopped.
"I told my mother."
There it was.
"You told Carol."
"She said I should get a test done quietly.
She said if it came back negative, we'd deal with it privately.
She said there was no reason to blow up the family over something we weren't even sure about."
"And when it came back positive?
When Daniel was confirmed?"
Ryan was quiet for a moment.
"Mom said the test could be challenged.
She said Daniel had no relationship with Lily, no legal claim that would hold, and that the kindest thing for everyone — especially Lily — was to keep things as they were."
"The kindest thing for everyone," I repeated.
"Emily—"
"Carol decided.
And you let her."
"I was scared."
"Of what?
Of me finding out the truth about my own child's father?
Of Lily knowing where she actually came from?" I stood up.
"Or of losing control of a situation your mother had decided to manage for you?"
"That's not fair."
"Ryan." I put both hands flat on the table.
"Daniel sent you fourteen messages.
You never told me.
You received a court filing.
You never told me.
Your mother shoved our daughter's face into a birthday cake today and laughed.
And you told me to relax." I straightened.
"Which part of that is fair?"
He didn't have an answer.
He looked like a man who had rehearsed a conversation and arrived to find the other person had changed the script entirely.
"Where is he staying?" I asked.
"Who?"
"Daniel."
Ryan's jaw tightened.
"Why does that matter?"
"Because he drove here from somewhere to tell me the truth you wouldn't.
And I'd like to know who I'm dealing with before September fourteenth."
"You're not seriously considering—"
"I'm seriously considering everything." I picked up my phone from the counter.
"I'm going to sleep in the guest room tonight.
I need you to not talk to your mother until I've had time to think."
"Emily, if you call a lawyer—"
I stopped at the doorway.
"I already texted one," I said.
"She's a friend.
She's going to call me in the morning."
Ryan's coffee mug sat on the table, still steaming.
May you like
He didn't reach for it.
I didn't look back.
