Chapter 7: The Conversation Claire Didn't Expect
I was in my room packing a bag when I heard Claire come back downstairs.
I didn't rush.
I folded a shirt, put in my book, found my charger behind the desk.
I moved slowly and listened.
Her voice carried up the stairs more than she probably intended.
"You're letting her take him," Claire said.
"Just like that."
"For a few days," Dad said.
"Do you understand what that looks like?
To my children?
To anyone who sees Ruth walking out of here with Ethan like I've done something wrong?"
"Something was done wrong, Claire."
"One birthday.
One difficult afternoon that got out of hand, and suddenly Ruth is here, and you're sending your son away, and I'm being treated like —"
"It wasn't one afternoon."
Silence.
"I've been thinking about the call from his school," Dad said.
"Last spring.
When they said Ethan had been absent three times and asked if everything was all right at home.
You told me you'd spoken to them.
You told me it was sorted."
"It was sorted."
"He wasn't absent.
He was there every day.
I checked this morning."
Another silence.
Longer.
"They must have had the records wrong," Claire said.
"I also called the school about the Year Six trip.
The one Ethan missed.
They told me the permission slip was never returned.
They said they sent a reminder and got no response."
"I was managing three children and a household —"
"Mason's slip came back the same day it went out.
I checked that too."
I heard a chair move.
Then Claire's voice, lower now, more careful.
"I don't know what Ruth has been telling you, but she has never liked me.
From the beginning.
She made that clear.
Whatever she's said —"
"Ruth didn't tell me about the school records," Dad said.
"I found those myself.
This morning.
Before she arrived."
The quiet that followed was different from the others.
It had a different weight.
"I want to understand something," Dad said.
"And I need you to answer me honestly.
Did you make decisions in this house that were designed to put Ethan at a disadvantage?"
"That is an outrageous thing to say."
"Did you?"
"I have given three years of my life to this family.
I have cooked and cleaned and managed and organized and held everything together while you worked twelve-hour days, and this is —"
"Claire."
"— this is what I get.
One bad afternoon and suddenly I'm on trial in my own kitchen."
"It wasn't one afternoon," Dad said again.
His voice hadn't changed.
"And I think you know that."
I heard footsteps — Claire's, moving toward the hallway.
"I'm not doing this right now," she said.
"Not with Ruth sitting there.
Not like this."
"When, then?"
"When you've calmed down.
When you're thinking clearly.
When you're not being influenced by a woman who has wanted me out of this house since the day I arrived."
"Ruth didn't show me the video, Claire.
Lily did."
The footsteps stopped.
"Lily is ten," Claire said.
"She doesn't understand what she filmed or why."
"She understood enough to keep it."
Another long pause.
"I think," Claire said, very quietly, "that you need to be very careful about the decisions you make in the next few days.
For everyone's sake."
"Is that a threat?"
She didn't answer.
I heard the back door open and close.
I zipped my bag and sat on the edge of the bed and looked at the room.
The bent photograph was still in the kitchen drawer downstairs.
The rain jacket that was a size too small was still hanging by the door.
I picked up my bag.
Aunt Ruth was waiting at the bottom of the stairs.
"Ready?" she said.
"Yes," I said.
May you like
She put her hand briefly on the back of my head, the way my mother used to, and I had to look at the floor for a moment.
"Let's go," she said.
