“What do you want, Luke?” she said with irritation as she put the dress over her arm and moved to the next rack.
“Where is Jake?”
“Did you not hear anything I said when you came to my house?”
“Sure, but that doesn’t answer my question,” I said, pointedly. “Where is my son?”
“That is none of your business,” she said, with a snide smile. “Jake is fine; that is all you need to know. In fact, it is more than I am legally obliged to tell you since you have no physical custody, so you are most welcome. Just consider it me going above and beyond to include you.”
At that moment I really wanted to scream, I wanted to tell her how much of a complete and total bitch she was, but that wouldn’t be kosher, and it wouldn’t support the fact that I am not an abuser. So, instead of blowing up on her and creating a scene in the dress shop where she would most likely call the cops because she liked the attention, I decided that I needed to try a bit of diplomacy again. I had tried it for years, but then I got tired of always being the sensible one, so I let loose. During our marriage it was a constant discussion between us, trying to come to some middle ground instead of always fighting with each other. It never worked in our marriage, but I figured I owed it to someone I’d spent nearly a decade sleeping next to in bed. If nothing else it showed that I was attempting to resolve the issue without screaming, yelling, or being catty, which was Sarah’s thing; she was the catty bitch most of the time. I knew it probably was a waste of effort, but I didn’t want to give her any more reasons to call me out and twist what I was saying in court.
“Look,” I said, focusing on speaking calmly. “I came to talk to you civilly.”
“Yeah right,” she scoffed.
“I’m serious,” I said. “Can’t we work this custody agreement out between the two of us? Maybe something like half of the week with me, and then the other half of the week with you. Or we can alternate weeks if that will make things easier. We live so close to each other that getting him to school won’t be an issue for either of us. And I know you don’t work, and have always been a stay-at-home mom, so I promise there will be no reduction of my support or alimony payments to you, regardless of the fact that he is with me for half the time. You are getting your freedom, your money, help with Jake, and Jake and I get to see each other. It’s a win-win situation.”
I stared at her as she listened to what I was saying. She moved the clothes on the rack but after a few minutes, I started to realize that she was not thinking over what I was offering, she was completely, flat out, ignoring me. She wasn’t even willing to have the conversation about me having time with my son, which showed me she did not give two shits about how all this had impacted Jake; she only cared about herself. She wanted to have the upper hand, and if she only had fifty percent custody of him, regardless of the money, she didn’t have something to control my life with anymore. It was always about control with her, even when we were married. I felt bad for my son when he got older because she was totally going to be one of those psycho mothers.
“Sarah,” I said with frustration. “Please, stop acting like this. Please just hear me out and at least consider this agreement. Jake has been through so much and dragging him through another court battle is not what is in his best interest, nor is it what I really want to do.”
She put the dresses in her arms back on the rack and moved down an aisle. I sighed and followed her, feeling desperate to get through to her. She was going to continue to ignore me, but that didn’t mean I wouldn’t get out what needed to be said.
“I really miss him,” I said quietly, trying to show my sensitive side. “He is the most important thing in my life; he always has been. You can’t deny that when we were still married, everything I did was for you and him, no matter how much we disliked each other. I haven’t done anything to warrant you taking my son from me like this. Sarah, will you stop please, and just listen to what I am saying? I deserve to be part of Jake’s life.”
I watched as Sarah scoffed and rolled her eyes, moving through the aisles. She shook her head and began to chuckle to herself, being that catty bitch I was waiting for. I clenched my jaw and stared at her.
“What you deserve is to be hit by a car. It’s your fault our marriage failed. You don’t deserve to be a father.” She laughed.
I clenched my fists trying to stop myself from lashing out at her. She was enjoying making her son suffer, and that alone made my skin crawl. If only I had a recording of this conversation to show the judge how she was using our child to get back at me and didn’t care about him one bit. How she was purposely hurting him in order to get back at me for our marriage not surviving. As it was, I didn’t have that kind of video, nor could I take it, but what I could do was control my irritation and make her look like the bad guy. It wasn’t actually hard to do, because while she thought she was being funny and coy, anyone who had ever heard her talk that way to me found it repulsive and disgusting, which was why she didn’t have very many friends.
“Why do you continue to be so hostile towards me? We have been divorced for quite a while now,” I said calmly. “You got out of the marriage and kept everything just like you wanted. Jake isn’t a pawn, but that’s how you’re treating him. You’re hurting our son by putting him in the middle of all of this. I deserve to know why you find it acceptable to treat the father of your son this way and refuse to allow me basic rights as a parent. Why you think you’re so cute and so superior that you could act like this?”
“Because it’s fun,” she said, with a shrug of her shoulders
and a smirk.
With that, she pushed her way past me and out the door, leaving me standing in the boutique pissed as hell, with the girl behind the counter trying to look like she hadn’t heard the whole thing. I took in a long deep breath and calmed my nerves, knowing getting upset wasn’t going to fix the situation. My lawyer was right; I needed to stay the course and just go with the strategy that she came up with and that I had already mentally committed to. I just had to try one last time to get Sarah to change her mind before I went and found myself a replacement wife and got in over my head once again.
I walked back outside and crossed the street, getting into my truck and shaking my head all the while. I watched as Sarah walked into another shop before I started my car and pulled away. Driving down the road toward my place, I stopped at the red light at the intersection in front of me. I looked over to my left into the park and stopped, seeing a familiar face. It was the babysitter from the other night when I went to drop the check off to Sarah. How crazy is it that they would be at this park instead of the one right across the street from my old house? It made me a little nervous thinking about approaching her since I wasn’t sure what Sarah had told her, but I couldn’t pass by without stopping.
Quinn was perched on the park bench, looking down at something, and having what appeared to be an animated conversation. Her pretty hair was blowing gently in the wind around her, and I couldn’t help but notice how attractive she was. Immediately when that thought crossed my mind, I pushed it away, realizing that the last thing I needed to be caught doing was hitting on the woman my ex-wife had hired to care for our son. Still, it was hard not to notice how her body curved down just perfectly and her big round lips pursed naturally. I looked down next to her and saw Jake, figuring he was around there somewhere since he wasn’t with Sarah. He looked a bit worried, and that was upsetting. I realized it was Jake that Quinn was having the conversation with.
I pulled the truck into the parking lot next to the park and put it in neutral, still trying to decide if approaching them was the right thing to do or not. He was my son, so how could I pass by without even stopping to see him? I put the truck in park and turned it off, grabbing my jacket and stepping out into the parking lot. Neither one of them had noticed me yet, but as I grew closer to Jake, I realized this was the perfect opportunity to see him, hug him, and love him without Sarah standing between the two of us, no matter what Quinn did or didn’t believe. Sarah’s wild lies about me seemed so over the top, it was plausible that Quinn could see through them. Either way, I hoped she wouldn’t call and report back to my ex. As I entered the park they moved over to the nearby swings, and to my surprise, Quinn hopped on a swing, while Jake stood by, still looking concerned.
Chapter Eight
Quinn
“So, this is the deal,” I said, looking at Jake’s worried expression. “You are simply going to sit down on the seat, grab onto the chains, and I’ll give you a push. It is that simple. Then, once you are comfortable, you can start pumping your legs.”
“Pumping my legs? That sounds scary,” Jake said, with a horrified look.
“No,” I laughed. “It’s just you folding and unfolding your legs which gives you momentum to go faster and higher. Basically, by doing that, you are able to control how fast and how high you go without anyone having to push you.”
I was desperately trying to convince Jake to try and use the big boy swing. He was getting way too big for the swing with the built-in harness, and I didn’t want him to lose interest in the playground just because of that. The swings were his favorite thing, and frankly, I was pretty shocked that his mother hadn’t shown him the big kid swings a year ago. Either way, it was the perfect time to show him the regular ones so that he could start feeling more comfortable playing without someone right next to him the whole time. All in all, he was a pretty independent kid, but there was something that was holding him back, and I had a sneaking suspicion it had to do with his father. I reached out my hand and walked with him over to the swing set. He stared at it for several seconds and then back at me.
“I’m scared,” he said. “I don’t want to do it. I’ll just play on the slides.”