Chapter 7: What Cecily Decided
I called my attorney the next morning.
Not a family friend.
My attorney — a woman named Patricia Hale who had helped me navigate the original divorce and who had, over eight years, become something close to a trusted ally.
I stepped outside into the Montana cold while the children were still asleep, the snow from the night before sitting clean and undisturbed across the fields, and I told her everything.
She was quiet for a long moment after I finished.
"The clinic consultation," she said.
"That's the strongest piece.
Using your personal medical information to request a procedure in your name, without consent — that's not a gray area, Cecily."
"I know."
"And the surveillance.
Two years of documented monitoring.
She kept the records herself, you said?"
"And handed them to me."
Another pause.
"That's either remorse or strategy.
Possibly both."
"That's what I thought."
"What do you want to do?"
I looked out across the snow.
A crow had landed on the fence at the edge of the property and was watching me with the detached interest of something that had no stake in human problems.
"I want her to understand that what she did had consequences," I said.
"Real ones.
Not just an apology at a dinner table."
"That can be arranged.
Civil action is viable.
The question is whether you want the expense and the time, or whether there's another form of consequence that serves you better."
"What would you recommend?"
"I'd recommend you sleep on it," Patricia said.
"You've had less than twenty-four hours.
Don't make the permanent decision tonight."
"It's morning."
"Don't make it this morning either."
I almost smiled.
"Alright."
"One more thing," Patricia said.
"The children.
If Conrad wants to establish paternity formally and pursue a relationship, that process needs to be on your terms and your timeline.
Not his.
Not his mother's."
"I understand."
"Do you want me to draft something?"
"Not yet.
Let me talk to him first."
I went back inside.
Conrad was already up, sitting at the kitchen table with two cups of coffee.
He pushed one toward the chair across from him when he heard me come in.
I sat down.
"I called my attorney," I said.
"I figured you would."
"She's advising me on the consultation and the surveillance."
He nodded.
He didn't look surprised, and he didn't look defensive.
He looked like a man who had spent the night arriving at the conclusion that he had no right to be either.
"My mother knows," he said.
"I told her this morning that she should expect to hear from your attorney."
"How did she take that?"
"She said it was fair."
I wrapped both hands around the coffee cup.
"Conrad.
I need to ask you something, and I need you to answer honestly."
"Alright."
"If your mother hadn't intervened — if you had received that letter eight years ago — what would you have done?"
He was quiet for a long time.
"I'd like to tell you I would have come back," he said.
"But I don't know.
I was in a bad place.
I had convinced myself of a version of events that made me the one being wronged." He looked at his cup.
"I might have needed time.
But I would have come back eventually.
I think I would have."
"You think."
"I know I would have wanted to." He looked up.
"That's not the same thing.
I understand that."
It wasn't the answer I had wanted.
But it was an honest one, and I had asked for honesty.
"The children will need time," I said.
"You don't get to be their father because you showed up at Christmas.
That's earned.
Slowly."
"I know."
"And Eleanor—"
"My mother will face whatever she needs to face.
I won't interfere with that."
From upstairs came the sound of small feet hitting the floor — the particular thunder of four eight-year-olds waking up in an unfamiliar house and finding it interesting rather than frightening.
Rose's voice, bright and carrying: *"It snowed more!
Thomas, come look!"*
Conrad turned toward the sound.
His expression was not happiness exactly.
It was something rawer than that.
The face of someone looking at eight years they could not get back and trying to decide what to do with the years that remained.
"Go up," I said.
He looked at me.
"They'll want to go outside," I said.
"They always want to go outside after snow.
Take them."
He stood up slowly.
Then he stopped.
"Cecily.
Thank you.
For coming.
For bringing them."
"I didn't do it for you," I said.
"I know," he said.
"That's why it means something."
May you like
He went upstairs.
I sat alone at the kitchen table with my coffee and the quiet of the house around me, and I listened to the sound of his footsteps reaching the landing, and then the sound of four children's voices rising to meet him.
