Chapter 4
Daniel
I run a finger along my brand new niece’s soft cheek. “Good job, kiddo,” I say to Sammie, “it must have been tough popping out this big, old head.”
My little sister rolls her eyes. “Ignore your uncle, Hannah. He’s a hater. You may not understand what that word means right now, but hang out with him long enough and you’ll get a clear idea.”
Maxwell pipes in, leaning over the baby. “Don’t worry, honey. You’ve got cool Uncle Maxwell to pick up the slack.”
Psht. As if I’d let Uncle Maxwell upstage me.
I punch him playfully in the shoulder. “Don’t throw shade. Uncle Daniel is about to be lit and poppin’. You better stay woke!” I wink at a baffled-looking Maxwell. “See, I’ve been practicing my tween-girl slang and everything. Me and Hannah are so gonna hang. Hundo P.”
(Translation: “Don’t be jealous. Uncle Daniel going to be much trendier than you. You’d better beware! Hannah and I will spend lots of time together. One hundred percent.” How do I know this? I spent fourteen billable hours researching slang currently used by teenagers for an online bullying case I was working on last month. #Slay.)
Maxwell grumbles under his breath. “What the hell did you just say?” He looks away in defeat.
Chuckling, I bring my attention back to the baby. “She’s adorable. Cutest little girl I’ve ever seen,” I tell the proud parents.
Huddling around the newborn, we continue to make small talk for a few minutes.
When, I glance down at my watch, I feel my mother’s hard stare on the side of my face. “Don’t tell me you’re going back to work,” she says with disdain in her tone.
I shrug. “Got a full plate,” I mutter under my breath as I slip back into my jacket and grab my briefcase. “Clients…Deadlines…Blah blah blah…”
That’s just an excuse. The truth is that I need to get far away from here, I need to get out of this room. Because what my family doesn’t know is that it was in a hospital room just like this a little over a year ago that my marriage began falling apart. As I held my son in my arms for the first time, my heart about to burst from joy, my wife was beginning to withdraw from me for some reason that I still don’t understand. I didn’t realize it then, but I started losing her that day. She began fading away.
I suck in a deep breath to pull myself back into the present. My mother continues to glare at me.
My father vocalizes the contempt her face displays. “If you devoted half as much time to your marriage maybe Grace wouldn’t be serving you with divorce papers on the evening news.” His cheeks are nearly as red as the hair on his head.
Well, then…
A cold tension slides over the room. Up until now, my family had been polite enough to avoid discussing the petite, blonde-haired, brown-eyed heartbreaker who just waltzed out of the room. But now here it is, the hot topic on everyone’s mind, laid out in the open – my disgruntled wife and my failed marriage.
Thanks, dad.
My mother mutters under her breath. “The nerve of that girl to come in here after what she just did…”
“Mom!” Sammie hisses, tilting her head suggestively in Faith’s direction. Faith goes tense as she prepares herself to defend her sister’s honor.
Welcome to the maternity unit of Awkward General Hospital…
I want to tell them to mind their own business because they don’t have the first clue what happened between me and Grace. I want to punch a wall. Hell, I want to ball up in a corner with my thumb in my mouth. I’m pissed. I’m shocked. I’m hurt.
Maybe I should have paid more attention to my marriage. Maybe I should have spent less time solving other people’s problems and focused more on my own. But Grace has been pushing me away with all her might. A man can only take so much before he just gives up and turns to something else.
Another guy might have found a mistress, someone to invest in emotionally and sexually. Me, I turned to my work because the thought of another woman’s hands on my body turns my stomach inside out.
I love my wife.
But I hate her.
The baby’s little whimpers fill the silent room and Sammie coos in her ear, attempting to hush her. Everyone stands wordlessly, waiting for my next move. I’m not in the mood to be tonight’s source of entertainment. I’ve already made a clown of myself once today.
“Take care,” I throw coldly over my shoulder as I march toward the door.
I hear Keeland call out to me. “Hey man – let me walk you out.”
I give him a smile as he catches up to me. “Don’t leave your little girl right now. I’m cool.”
With a hitched brow, he repeats himself. More forcefully this time. “I’m walking you out.”
I sigh with resignation as he strolls down the hospital corridor beside me.
We walk in silence for a solid minute before he finally says. “So, you okay, man? We saw the video. I could tell that she completely blindsided you with that divorce petition.” His forehead creases with concern.
I breathe in sharply and dodge around a gurney sitting the middle of the path. “I’m good. I’m…good.” But Keeland has been my best friend since high school. He knows that I’m not good.
He shakes his head. “That was cold. The way she just threw those papers in your face when you least expected it. And in public. On screen.” He shakes his head some more. “I definitely wouldn’t be ‘good’ if Sammie pulled that shit on me.”
A pair of nurses walk by, their gazes locked on my face. They lean in close to one another and begin whispering. I’m sure they’ve seen the damn video, too. “Look, I can’t focus on this right now. It’ll drive me crazy and I need my sanity. I’m working on the most important case of my career.”
“Would you listen to yourself? No case can be more important than fixing your marriage,” Keeland tells me as we stroll out the hospital’s sliding doors.
My steps halt and we face each other. “There’s nothing left to fix. It’s over.”
He gives me a hard stare, penetrating my skull with his freakish silver-blue eyes. “Is that what you want?”
I shrug a shoulder. “She decided. It’s what she wants. So I’m not going to run her down and beg like some chump. I’m gonna stand with my fucking head high.”
He huffs and folds his arms across his wide chest. “Hiding behind your pride, huh? That’s a little boy move. Be a man, Daniel.”
I glare at him with sharp eyes. “Are you on my side or what?”
“I’m on your side. I support whatever makes you happy. And this divorce isn’t it, man. All I know is that if it was Sammie sending me divorce papers, I would move heaven and earth to make things right.”
My patience starts wearing thin. “You’re not in my shoes, okay? You don’t know what my marriage has been like over the past year. Do you think I want to stay in that hellhole studio apartment all by myself? I'm restless. I don't eat. I don't sleep. I work around the clock so I don't have to face how miserable I am. I want my wife…But she wants a divorce.”
His chest heaves on a stoic exhale. “Fine,” he says and then claps one hand on my shoulder. “If you need anything, remember that me and your sister are just one phone call away.”
I give him a nod. He stretches his hand out to me for that silly handshake we invented when we were dumb high school kids, when we had all the girls dropping at our feet, when life was simple.
I laugh as we clap palms and then bump fists twice before twisting our fingers into what can only be described as gang signs. A spear of gratitude spins in my stomach, pushing its way through the cloud of despair wrapped around my brain. At least, I’ve got a few good people I can count on to get me through this.
“All right, man,” I say as I aim my car starter in the direction of my Mercedes.
“All right.” Keeland takes two steps backward toward the hospital entrance.
I call out to him just as he’s spinning to go back inside. “Hey Keeland.”
“Yup?”
“Hold onto your girls – your wife and your daughter. Don’t end up like me.”
He gives a hard nod and disappears through the automatic doors.