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“We have a solid case, Nolan,” Frank Lawman says to me again, smoothing his hand over his expensive tie.
Darius insists that this guy is the best lawyer in the country. But I don’t know Frank from a rock on the street. How can I entrust my little girl’s fate to him?
“Let’s just hope the judge sees things the way you do,” I mutter, my teeth gritted and my jaw tight.
“And if your ex-wife doesn’t show up, then things will get wrapped up even faster.”
“Right,” I say, casting a glance toward the courthouse doors.
Lilian hasn’t made her grand appearance yet. I’m really counting on her being a no-show today. If she skips this court hearing, all my problems go away.
The lawyer releases a heavy sigh when his phone starts to ring. “I’ve got to take this call,” he says, waving his ringing device in the air. I nod and he hustles off to find some privacy.
I get up and start pacing the hallway, my nerves getting the best of me. Inez looks on, her forehead knotted with worry and I hate that I’m the one making her feel this way. I’m pulling on a handful of my hair when I hear someone call my name. “Nolan!”
I glance over my shoulder and find my ex-wife fluttering down the hallway like the flighty character that she is.
My breakfast flips over in my stomach.
Fuck. I’d really been counting on Lilian forgetting today’s court hearing. I was hoping to win custody by default judgment or something. But here she is, ready to stir shit up like she always does.
She’s flushed and a little breathless, her bangles and beads clanging as she approaches me. She’s not here with a lawyer. I don’t know if that’s a good thing or if it means that the judge will go easier on her.
When we’re toe-to-toe, Lilian looks up at me with a determined grimace. “We need to talk.”
“We should be communicating through my lawyer,” I say, not caring that I sound harsh.
She blatantly rolls her eyes at me and slips her hand into the little satchel strapped across her chest. “You know lawyers make me itchy,” she declares.
“Lawyers make you what?” I scrub a hand across my forehead, wondering how I ever married this woman.
She slaps a crumpled brown paper bag into my hand. One of those brown paper bags they serve muffins in at the coffee shop.
“What the hell is—?” My question dies in my throat as I squint down at the scrap of paper, struggling to read Lilian’s scribbly handwriting.
I declare that I hereby renounce my parental rights and responsibilities for my daughter, Stella Amelia Brighton.
Her scratchy signature is scribbled at the bottom alongside today’s date.
My head snaps up, my eyes going wide like frisbees when I stare at my ex-wife. “You’re not shitting me, are you?” I demand. “This is serious, Lilian.”
“I’m giving up my parental rights, Nolan. I’m giving you custody of Stella. Isn’t that what you want?”
My throat is suddenly so dry that I can’t make a sound. My head wags from left to right as I struggle for what to say. I can feel Inez watching from the sidelines, ready to swoop in.
Meanwhile, the more Lilian speaks, the more annoyed and resentful she sounds. “I can’t do this motherhood thing, Nolan. I’ve made peace with it. The family life is not for me. I need to be free. Liberated. Unattached. Once and for all.” She scowls and wiggles her shoulders, like she’s shrugging off a heavy cloak.
I reach a hand out to Inez and she bolts to her feet, coming to my side. I interlace our fingers, needing to ground myself and make sure that I’m not hallucinating this whole conversation.
Lilian’s attention bounces between Inez and me. “Don’t look at me with those judgmental eyes. Motherhood is hard. I won’t let guilt keep me from living the way I want to live.” She pulls in a deep breath and she motions to Inez. “She said it herself in her TV interview—we need to normalize following our intuition even when it goes against society’s expectations. That’s what I’m doing.”
“That’s not what I meant…” Inez mutters under her breath.
“I know,” I mutter back.
Only Lilian would paraphrase the empowering words from Inez’s TV interview to justify abandoning her own child. What a selfish woman.
Lilian carries on. “Look—my heart says I should be focusing on myself right now, so that’s what I’m going to do and you don’t get to make me feel bad about that.” She shakes her head as she spins to leave. “Anyway, this is our final goodby—”
