My dad saw me limping down our quiet street, my baby on my hip—no car, no help. He frowned. “Why are you walking? I bought you an SUV.” I looked at him, took a breath… and finally whispered the truth he was never meant to hear.

Patricia smiled thinly. “Then that was a poor financial decision on her part.”

Before Dad could answer, Derek appeared in the hallway, toweling off his hair, then stopped short when he saw us. “What is going on?”

For one second, I saw him the way I used to when we first met, handsome in an unfinished kind of way, gentle around the edges, capable of warmth when life was easy. Then I saw the man I had actually been living with: someone who let his mother dominate every room because it relieved him of the burden of growing up.

Dad turned to him. “Your girlfriend was walking home with your child and groceries because your mother took the car she’s been paying for.”

Derek’s eyes flicked toward Patricia. That was answer enough.

“It wasn’t like that,” he muttered.

“Then tell me how it was,” Dad said.

Derek rubbed the towel across the back of his neck. “Mom just said we needed to be practical. She had errands. Lauren works from home most days anyway.”

I stared at him. “I asked for the car because Evan had a fever last night and I wanted to be able to get him to urgent care if I needed to.”

He exhaled like I had inconvenienced him by saying something true. “He was fine by morning.”