He nodded once.
Then he walked out into the cold.
Winning did not feel triumphant the way revenge stories promise. It didn’t come with fireworks or music or the instant cleansing of pain. It felt stranger than that.
It felt like leaving a building where the air had been bad for so long I had stopped noticing, stepping outside, and realizing my lungs had been trying to tell me something for years.
But court orders end one kind of war.
They do not tell you who you become after.
That part began quietly.
With midnight feedings.
With invoices from my new attorney-approved accounts.
With a job interview scheduled for six weeks later.
And with a voicemail from Nathan I did not return, in which he said my name like it still belonged to his mouth.
Part 10
The first paycheck I earned after Nora was born made me cry harder than my wedding ever did.