Forgiveness, though? That implies a debt cleared.
I didn’t owe him that.
A year after the divorce was finalized, Brooke had her baby—a boy. I know because Nathan told me once during a handoff, not as a plea, just as information he knew might matter in the weird overlapping geography of our daughter’s life. Brooke had moved to Boston. They were not together. Henry left the firm and sold out his stake at a loss. The brothers spoke rarely, if at all.
One rainy Thursday in March, about eighteen months after court, Nathan lingered at my apartment door after dropping Nora off from a visit.
She had fallen asleep in his car seat, cheeks flushed from too much playground air. I was bent over unbuckling her when he said my name.
I looked up.
The hallway light caught rain on his coat shoulders. He looked older. Not ruined. Just less protected.
“Can I ask you something?” he said.
I almost said no.
Instead: “Depends.”
His jaw worked once.
“Will there ever be a point where you forgive me?”
The apartment was warm behind me. I could smell tomato soup on the stove. Nora made a tiny sleeping noise in the car seat, a puff of breath through half-open lips.
I straightened slowly.
“No,” I said.
He flinched, barely.