When I walked out of her office an hour later, I felt scared, but also clear-headed for the first time since I’d said I do 2 years ago. My husband refused to look for a new place or pack any of his belongings. He acted like the 30-day notice was just me being dramatic, and I’d change my mind any day now.
He was staying at his friend John’s house, but he kept showing up at random times trying to talk sense into me. On day 12, I was making lunch when I heard a key in the lock. My blood went cold before I remembered I’d changed them. The door handle rattled. Then my husband’s face appeared in the kitchen window. Lily was sitting at the table doing homework.
She froze when she saw him. He tapped on the glass and gestured for me to let him in. I shook my head. He started talking through the window about how teenagers need tough love and structure, and I was doing Lily a disservice by coddling her. His voice was muffled, but I could hear every word. I walked over and physically positioned myself between the window and Lily. I told him to leave immediately.
Something in my voice must have gotten through because he actually stopped talking. He stared at me for a long moment and then walked back to his car without another word. My mother called me that evening. She said my husband had contacted her claiming I’d had some kind of breakdown and kicked him out for no reason.
She suggested marriage counseling. She reminded me how hard it was to be a single parent and how lonely I’d been before I met him. I felt the old guilt rising up in my chest, the fear that maybe I was overreacting, the worry that I was making a terrible mistake. Then I remembered Lily’s crumpled face when he told her to leave. I told my mother she didn’t have all the information and I needed her to trust my judgment on this. She went quiet.
Then she said she hoped I knew what I was doing and hung up. The conversation left me feeling shaky and uncertain. I called Rachel and told her what happened. She reminded me that my mother hadn’t seen what I’d seen and she didn’t know how Lily had been suffering. That helped more than I expected. Victoria had assigned a parallegal named Liam to help with my case.