Chapter 27 #2
The word child reframes everything. It pulls the focus off what I’ve lost and onto what’s coming, just as I’ve been trying to do. “I don’t want my son to learn that love means taking over,” I agree.
“Then show him something different,” she says.
I nod, the truth of it settling in as a responsibility.
After a few minutes, the lake disappears behind us as we turn toward the hospital.
Shortly after that, I pull up in front of a cottage.
It sits a block back from the lake, close enough that you can see the water, but far enough away that the yard feels private.
I’d driven past it lots of times before I finally noticed it was there once I looked up some real estate listings.
It’s unassuming in a way that makes it easy to miss.
“What do you think?” I ask Mom. “Addie lives in an apartment, and I like the yard here. I have to get out of Uncle Mitch’s sometime soon.”
“Have you seen the inside?”
I shake my head. “There’s a sign, though.” I point to the wooden For Rent placard. “Maybe someone can come over and let us in.”
I call the number on the sign, and in a matter of minutes, the agent is here. She unlocks the door and steps aside. My mother and I move through the space slowly, like we’re guests rather than a prospective tenant.
Three bedrooms, a small living room with a wide window, and a kitchen that opens onto the yard instead of closing itself off—it’s nothing luxurious. But it’s something that seems it could be more than temporary.
My mother walks over to the window, fingers brushing the sill. “This feels homey,” she says.
I nod. Homey is the right word. Not finished. Not perfect. Just…present. With lots of potential. It’s staged enough to give me an idea of what would work in the space. The yard is enclosed by a white picket fence. There’s grass, and a patch of dirt where something could be planted later.
“This is close to the water,” my mother says. “You could walk.”
“I know,” I agree. I picture a stroller on that path, the playground a few blocks away. I catch myself doing this, but I don’t stop.
The agent tells me they’ve tried to sell the house but decided to rent it instead.
It’s been vacant three months, so the rent might be negotiable.
Then she gives us a moment, stepping into the kitchen under the pretense of checking the light.
My mother sits on the edge of the couch, surveying the room the way she always does, likely imagining how it might be lived in.
“You don’t need Addie’s permission to choose stability,” she says. “Right now you should make the choices that feel right for yourself.”
Yes. That’s what I’m trying to do. It makes me feel good that my mother sees this as the right approach too. I just hope others will. “I don’t want this to be a gesture,” I tell her. “I don’t want Addison to think I’m trying to pressure her.”
“Then don’t frame it that way,” Mom says. “This isn’t about her agreeing to a future with you. This is showing her that you want a safe place for your son, even if he’s not here all the time. I’m assuming you’re going to ask for shared custody.”
I’ve been hoping it wouldn’t come to that, but whatever happens with Addie, from the moment I knew this baby was mine, I’ve never doubted that I wanted to be part of his life. “Yes, of course.”
I look around again. The spare room. The second bedroom. The way the light reaches all the way across the floor.
“It’s about making the right choices for your son,” she says.
I nod, and I can see it, the future unfolding. I don’t have much furniture, but I have a bed and some things for the kitchen. I’ll need things for a nursery.
“This will let Addison make her own choices without wondering whether you’ll disappear if she doesn’t choose you back.”
That point registers, because it’s true. I’ve been waiting for a sign that would tell me which direction I was allowed to move in. I’m overcompensating, giving up my own agency as I try not to offend Addison. That’s not right for anyone.
“I’m going to stay here in Paradise,” I say. “Even if Addie doesn’t want a future with me, I’m not going anywhere.”
My mother’s expression softens, pride and concern existing side by side. “That’s different from staying for her.”
“Yes,” I agree. “It is.”
The agent returns, clearing her throat politely. “Would you like to take the application?”
I don’t hesitate. “Yes.”
I fill out the form on the spot, feeling the weight of this choice. It’s decisive in a way my other choices haven’t been. It feels good.
Outside, the backyard fence catches the light, white against green. Ordinary. Reliable.
My mother slips her arm through mine as we walk back to the car. “Repair doesn’t happen all at once,” she says. “Sometimes, it starts with choosing where you stand.”
I glance back at the cottage one more time before getting in the car. It’s not a promise to anyone else, but a line I’m finally willing to hold. For me, and for my child.
It doesn’t undo the mistake I made with Addie.
It doesn’t make me safer to love. It doesn’t earn me a place in her life.
And yet, it matters because it’s something I want, that I’ll feel good about, and it takes me a step closer to being the parent I know I want to be, regardless of whether I have a relationship with my co-parent or not.
Change doesn’t only count if it produces a visible result—an apology accepted, a relationship repaired, a problem solved cleanly enough that I can point to it and say, I did that. It’s better now.
This is different. This is choosing something based on what’s important to me without knowing how it will be received, without attaching it to an outside outcome. Without holding it up as evidence of good intentions. This is me doing what’s right for that reason alone.
I think about the ways I’ve tried to make myself indispensable, how often I’ve confused being needed with being loved, how easily I reach for action when I’m afraid of waiting.
My son will know where I live. He’ll know that I show up and know that I don’t disappear when things get uncomfortable or uncertain.
Whether that will ever be enough for Addie is something I can’t control.
I don’t know what she’ll choose. I don’t know if she’ll ever trust me again in the ways that matter most. I don’t know whether love can survive being mishandled.
What I do know is that love doesn’t grant authority. Fear doesn’t justify control. And showing up isn’t something you negotiate. It’s something you sustain.
I open the car door for my mother and slide into the driver’s seat. I’m choosing where I stand. Whether Addie ever stands here with me is no longer mine to decide. It never was.