I can’t take it from her. I can’t muster the strength to release my hold on my son long enough to pull the thing from her fingers.
Delilah, knowing that I’m unable, places the letter beside me on the bed before leaning in close enough to kiss the top of the baby’s head. She gives my shoulder a squeeze before taking a step back.
“I didn’t read it, but I want you to prepare yourself. Lawson got a letter as well, and I don’t think yours is going to be much different.”
She keeps talking, but her words are drowned out by the pounding of my pulse. It sounds like a marching band in my head, and the noise is loud enough to force my eyes closed. When I open them again, she’s gone, my bedroom door once again closed, sealing me off from everyone else.
It’s bad news. It has to be. Maybe he isn’t hurt. Maybe he isn’t in trouble, but the news is bad. If Lawson got a letter and it had the power to make Delilah cry, then opening mine is the last thing I want to do.
I stare down at the thing for hours. The baby wakes, ready to be changed and eat, but I continue to stare down at the letter.
My son has been my only focus since he was born, that attention being an attempt to keep from thinking of Drew. With my eyes on the crinkled envelope still in the same spot Delilah left it on my bed, I don’t know how I manage to change the baby’s diaper and get him situated at my breast without taking my eyes off of it.
Mid-morning fades into early afternoon, and I find myself still in bed, still waiting for the thing to disappear. It doesn’t and I know it won’t. It’s just sitting there, and I know what’s inside of it is going to be painful. The longer it sits, the worse I feel, as if the information inside will change me so fundamentally that it has been seeping toxic fumes into the room.
My legs are weak from sitting cross-legged all day, and I nearly stumble when I climb out of bed to place the baby in the crib on the other side of the room. I’m livid at the power taken from me, that letter nearly making me fall and hurt my son.
Maybe it’s acceptance. Maybe it’s the protective nature that has been growing every minute since I found out I was pregnant, but I’m livid by the time I cross the room and scoop the letter up from the bed. Only my name is on the front as if it was sent in a single package including Lawson’s letter. There’s no return address or inmate number, nothing to indicate on the outside who the letter is from.
For a single second, the length of time it takes my eyelashes to flutter, I imagine it being something else, something less poisonous, a letter from my college kicking me out, a ticket from a traffic light camera although I haven’t gone anywhere in weeks. Anything but what it actually is.
It’s a fool’s wish, just the breath someone takes on the prayer that their worst nightmare isn’t looking them in the face before getting the horrible news.
Ignoring the paper cut I get from sliding my finger under the flat, I yank the letter from the envelope, letting it fall to the floor at my feet.
Isabella,
I’m sorry.
The first night I met you, I saw a gorgeous girl sitting alone in a diner.
Your lips, the way you indulged in your meal without a single concern for those around you turned me on.
That’s what it was. Arousal.
I wanted you, so I made sure to have you before you left.
It was a mistake.
Had I known it was going to end with you getting pregnant, I never would’ve done it.
I don’t want a kid. Even if I did, no child deserves to have the black cloud of a felony convicted father around him.
I don’t want a woman in my life because we share a connection I never wanted.
I don’t want contact with you.
No letters.
No visits.
No updates.
Nothing.
I don’t want you waiting for me nor sitting awake at night wondering if I’m safe or when I’ll come home.
Farmington isn’t home. It never was, and it won’t be where I return when I get out.
You’ll never see me again.
I’ll never be a father to your baby. You need to find a man that wants to be a dad. It’ll never be me.
I shouldn’t have led you on, shouldn’t have made you care for me.
Because I never cared for you.
You’re better off never thinking of me again.
I’m sorry I ever met you. If I had just walked away that night, none of this would’ve happened.
If I had just walked away that night, I wouldn’t have killed that man. I wouldn’t have mistaken that girl for you.
My life is ruined.
Just forget about me.
I plan to forget about you.
Drew O’Neil
Blinking doesn’t make the words disappear. Flipping the single page doesn’t change a thing. Even if the thing went up in flames, the hateful things written there would still be seared into my brain.
Had I known he was going to eventually blame me? It’s always been in the back of my head. Even when he touched me, when his lips brushed mine, when he held me in his arms, I knew it would come to this.
The letter flutters to the ground when the baby begins to whimper, and I do the only thing I can. I pull him from his crib, hold him to my chest, and begin the task of getting on with my life. Drew O’Neil doesn’t want us? Then that’s fine. This little boy will have more love than he can handle, even if his daddy is a lying coward.
Chapter 26
Drew
I fucking told her not to do this.
I was explicit about my demands.
I hold the birth announcement to my chest, somehow hating the damn thing and considering it my most treasured possession.
His date of birth, technically the day after my sentencing, which I consider a small blessing.
He was born weighing seven pounds thirteen ounces and was twenty inches long.
But those facts aren’t what makes my eyes burn.
The name at the top—Andrew Keen O’Neil Jr.
She named him after me.
A little boy exists in this world with my DNA and my name, and I told his mother I didn’t want him, didn’t want her.
I deserve every second of the pain I feel.
Chapter 27
Drew
Drew,
Please find enclosed a picture of Andy.
He has your eyes, and despite only having those two tiny teeth, he also has your smile.
He’s taken to eating baby cereal like a champ, although he hates vegetables and seems able to sniff them out when someone is trying to be sneaky and add them to the things he likes.
His favorite toy is a stuffed elephant, and for some reason he enjoys Sam Smith’s music over all others.
She doesn’t even put her name at the end of the letter.
Andy.
What a ridiculous thing to call a kid. I was adamant growing up that no one called me that, but as I look down at his smiling face, those two little teeth mentioned flashing in his grin, I think it suits him.
Chapter 28
Drew
Drew,
Andy took his first steps yesterday. You can’t tell from the picture, but he was moving so fast, he barely stopped in time before running into the wall.
He’s trying to keep up with Little Jameson and Little Cooper, so he’s doing things a little early for his age.