Page 70 of Insidious

“No defensiveness,” she says. “If your wife expresses anger, hurt, or confusion, you don’t correct it. You don’t justify. You listen. And you speak when she lets you.”

I stare at her.

“That’s it?”

“That’s the hardest part,” she says with an ironic smile. “Admitting you are wrong. I find men, more so than women, have a harder time admitting fault and saying sorry.”

She is right.

But what she doesn’t understand is that I will go to any lengths to get my Luna back. Failure is not an option.

Chapter 19

Isaac

I stand at the familiar doorstep for a second longer than I should.

My hand hovers, not knocking, not leaving. I feel Luna move behind me. Amelie gurgles in her baby carrier.

I know why I’m stalling. This is necessary, and I should have done this a long time ago. Still, knowing why my mum is the way she is, I can’t help but hesitate. Losing a child like that … Now that I have Amelie, I get it.

Instead of knocking and walking in like I normally do, my thumb presses the doorbell before I can think too hard about it.

I listen to it chime somewhere inside and exhale slowly, trying to loosen stiff shoulders while my eyes flick automatically to the neighbour’s driveway.

No sign of her car next door. Good. I don’t want to see Chloe.

I don’t want to run into her, don’t want the awkwardness, the explanations, the look she has down pat—hurt, defensive, understanding. She has perfected the art of playing the victim.

I’ve blocked her everywhere. Phone. Messenger. WhatsApp.

I don’t pick up unknown numbers. She has tried that as well.

Too little, too late, from my side, but still.

My social media now consists of the occasional pathetic scroll through Luna’s old posts; pictures, updates, glimpses of a life I was already halfway to losing before I realised it.

The door creaks open.

“Mum.”

She looks drastically different. The last few weeks have stripped off a layer. There is more grey in her hair, and her clothes are hanging off her. My heart squeezes. Mum has always been formidable. Her days managing wards in a busy NHS hospital meant some of it trickled down into our lives. And losing Sophie when she was only ten made her … harder somehow.

Now, there’s a faint slackness around her mouth. Fine lines that weren’t here before.

“Isaac,” she says, before noticing Luna behind me. Awkwardness seeps in, and Mum is at loss for what to say for the first time in forever. But with perfect timing, Amelie lets out a monumental fart, which has us breaking into startled laughter.

Mum smiles as she steps aside. “Come in.”

I walk past her into the house that still smells exactly the same.

Beeswax. Coffee. Something baking in the oven for lunch.

Nothing has changed.

And yet, everything has.

My father is in the living room, reading his newspaper. He looks up when I walk in and gives a small nod.