8. Talia #2
His eyes narrow slightly. Good. Let him be angry. Anger is easier than this quiet ache between us.
“You think I’m going to disappoint him,” he says.
“I think everyone disappoints children eventually.”
“That’s bleak.”
“That’s parenting.”
He looks away toward the window, and for one second his profile is all sharp lines and restraint.
“I missed his first word,” he says quietly.
I stop breathing.
He keeps his eyes on the city. “His first steps. His first birthday. The first time he drew a plane, asked why the sky is blue, or decided broccoli was an enemy of aviation. I missed all of it, Talia.”
My hand tightens around the back of the chair.
“I know.”
His laugh is quiet and without humor. “Do you?”
The words should make me defensive. And they do, but beneath that, they make me tired.
“Yes,” I say. “I know what you missed. I was there for every second of it.”
His gaze returns to mine, and the room goes painfully still.
“I was there alone,” I continue, before caution can stop me.
“For the fevers. The daycare forms. The preschool interviews. The nights he cried, and I couldn’t figure out why.
The mornings I had to leave him with a sitter while he begged me not to go.
The first steps, yes. The first words. The first drawings.
All of it. I know exactly what you missed because I carried the full weight of it. ”
Declan's expression changes.
The hurt is still there, but it’s no longer standing alone. Understanding begins to move through the anger, and somehow, that’s far worse.
“I’m not saying that to punish you,” I say more quietly. “I’m saying it because you talk about six years like they were taken from you. And maybe they were. But they were not empty years. They were not waiting years. They were his life.”
His throat moves.
I lower my voice. “So if you come into it now, you come into it carefully. Not because I’m trying to control you. Because Flynn deserves careful.”
For a long moment, Declan says nothing. Then he nods once. “All right.”
I stare at him. “All right?”
“All right,” he repeats. “No direct contact without your agreement. No unscheduled visits. No promises I can’t keep. Privacy until we decide what Flynn is ready for.”
The relief that moves through me is so sudden, I don’t trust it.
“And professional boundaries?” I ask.
His eyes hold mine.
“Professional boundaries,” he says.
His tone is careful. The kind of careful that makes me wonder whether his agreement is simply another form of strategy. I should leave then. The conversation is over, the boundaries have been established, and I have accomplished exactly what I came here to do.
So naturally, I don't move. Declan notices.
“Talia.”
“No.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You were about to.”
“I was going to say thank you.”
That stops me.
“For what?”
“For telling me the rules instead of disappearing behind them.”
The words reach a place in me I would rather keep untouched. My fingers tighten on the folder.
“You may regret that gratitude.”
“Possibly.” His mouth curves faintly. “I have a history of poor judgment around you.”
Something shifts between us. I couldn't have explained it if someone asked, and nothing visible has changed. Yet I become abruptly aware of the silence, the distance, and the fact that neither of us seems particularly eager to break either one.
The space between us feels suddenly smaller, even though neither of us has moved. I can smell his coffee cooling on the desk, can hear the faint hum of the building around us, can feel my own pulse in my throat.
This is exactly why rules are necessary.
Because one almost-smile from Declan Ward should not be able to make an office feel like a hotel room memory.
“I should go,” I say.
“Yes.”
He says it like an agreement, but I don’t move.
For one foolish second, I remember his hands at my waist and the warmth of his mouth against my shoulder.
I remember morning light and rumpled sheets and the strange ache in my chest when I dressed quietly in the gray-blue dawn.
I remember looking back once before I left and thinking that if he woke up, I might not be brave enough to walk away.
Then I did anyway.
I pick up the folder. “This afternoon’s session starts at two.”
“I’ll be here.”
“It’s your office.”
“Still worth confirming.”
I shouldn’t smile, even though I almost do. Then I leave before almost becomes anything else.
***
By the time I get home that evening, Flynn is sitting cross-legged in the middle of the living room rug with crayons spread around him like wreckage after a very small art explosion.
The apartment smells faintly of laundry detergent, tomato sauce, and the lemon cleaner Mrs. Smith insists works better than anything from a store.
A load of towels sits folded on the couch because I had been ambitious enough to wash them and unrealistic enough to believe I would also put them away.
My heels come off beside the door. My bag lands on the kitchen chair.
For the first time all day, the quiet is mine.
Or close to mine.
“Hi, Mom,” Flynn says without looking up.
“Hi, pilot.”
“I’m making a new plane.”
“I see that.”
“It’s for night.”
“Night planes are important.”
“They need extra lights.”
“Obviously.”
He nods, pleased that I have grasped the basics.
I pour myself water and stand in the kitchen for a moment, watching him over the rim of the glass. There he is. My whole life in dinosaur pajama pants and one mismatched sock.
He has marker on his fingers, hair sticking up at the back, and the same serious concentration he wore at the Crossridge café. My heart squeezes with such sharp affection that I have to look down.
This is my safe place.
The small townhome. The worn rug. The airplane drawings taped slightly crooked on the walls. The bedtime routine, the chipped blue mug in the sink and the stack of library books on the counter.
I built this. Piece by piece, and choice by choice. And now Declan’s name exists inside it, whether I invite him in or not.
“Mom?”
“Hm?”
“Can the man with the watch come over?”
The glass stops halfway to the counter, and for a second, I don’t understand the words. Or maybe I understand them too well.
“What man?”
Flynn glances up with the casual impatience of a child forced to explain something obvious.
“The man from your work.”
My throat tightens.
“Declan?”
“Is that his name?”
“Yes.”
“The one with the nice watch.”
Of all the things Flynn noticed during the emotional collapse of my carefully managed life, he remembered the watch.
“He has a nice watch?”
Flynn nods seriously. “It looked shiny but not too shiny.”
“A very specific review.”
“And he knew about angry passengers.”
I close my eyes briefly. This is fine. This is normal.
Children ask questions. Children notice adults. Children invite near-strangers over because they retrieved a toy airplane and understood the importance of snacks. It doesn’t mean anything, and at the same time, it means everything.
“Why do you want him to come over?”
Flynn shrugs and returns to coloring. “He can see my planes.”
“You have a lot of planes.”
“He didn’t see all of them.”
“No,” I say softly. “He didn’t.”
The words ache more than they should.
Flynn hums under his breath, coloring one wing with careful orange lines. “He was sad.”
My hand tightens around the glass. “What?”
“The man with the watch.” Flynn does not look up. “He looked sad.”
The townhome seems to grow quieter around us.
I set the glass down carefully. “Sometimes adults look sad even when they’re not.”
He considers this with the seriousness of a boy who hasn’t yet learned how often adults lie badly.
“You looked sad, too.”
I can’t answer right away.
Flynn finally lifts his head. His eyes, Declan’s eyes, study me with sleepy honesty.
“Did I?”
He nods.
“Both of you.”
Something inside me twists, and I cross the room and sit beside him on the rug, careful not to crush the newest drawing.
“Sometimes grown-up things are complicated.”
“Because of work?”
“Sometimes.”
“Because of rules?”
My laugh comes out too soft. “Usually.”
“Can he come over if he follows the rules?”
God help me.
I look around our home again, at the life I have protected so fiercely that I don’t know how to tell the difference between a boundary and a locked door anymore.
“He’s not coming here,” I whisper.
Flynn has already curled sideways on the rug, one cheek resting on his arm, crayon still loose in his fingers. His eyelids are heavy, his voice softened by sleep when he answers.
“You always say that.”