Chapter 10 - Michael Stopped Asking Catherine to Forgive Him
Michael started therapy without telling me.
I found out from his mother.
Not because she betrayed confidence.
Because she accidentally said:
“His therapist told him the same thing.”
I stared.
“What therapist?”
Her face changed.
“Oh.”
I almost laughed.
Later, I asked Michael.
“You’re seeing someone?”
“Yes.”
“How long?”
“Six weeks.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
He shrugged.
“Because I didn’t want therapy to become evidence in my campaign.”
“What campaign?”
“To get you back.”
That answer surprised me.
“You still want that.”
“Yes.”
“But?”
“But if I make every good thing I do into a presentation, then nothing changes.”
That sounded like something Daniel would say.
Or my therapist.
Apparently everyone had joined forces.
Michael became more reliable with Lily.
Tuesday and Thursday evenings.
Saturday mornings.
Medical appointments.
No dramatic gifts.
No expensive nursery redesign.
I had forbidden that immediately.
He complained once.
I said:
“You cannot buy your way into fatherhood.”
He stopped complaining.
Instead, he learned.
How much formula.
How to sterilize bottles.
Which pacifier Lily preferred.
How long she tolerated tummy time before declaring war.
One Saturday, I left Lily with him alone for two hours.
The first time.
At forty-seven minutes, my phone rang.
My heart jumped.
“Is she okay?”
“Yes.”
Michael sounded exhausted.
“She will not stop crying.”
“What did you try?”
“Everything.”
“That’s impossible.”
“Catherine.”
I heard Lily screaming behind him.
The old Michael might have hidden failure.
Pretended.
Waited.
Instead, he called.
“What does she need?”
“I don’t know.”
Neither did I.
I drove over.
We discovered Lily had a tiny hair wrapped around one toe.
Painful.
Easy to miss.
Michael looked horrified.
“I didn’t see it.”
“Neither did I at first.”
We removed it carefully.
Lily calmed.
Michael sat on the floor holding her.
“I thought you’d think I couldn’t handle her.”
“I thought that for about five seconds.”
He looked up.
“And now?”
“You called.”
Simple.
That became another building block.
Trust was not competence.
It was honesty when competence failed.
Months earlier, Michael had stayed downstairs because he could not tolerate being seen failing morally.
Today, he called because his daughter was crying and he did not know why.
That difference mattered.
Before I left, he said:
“I’m sorry.”
I looked at him.
“For what now?”
“Nothing new.”
Good.
“I just think about the hospital every time I’m alone with her.”
I sat.
Michael continued.
“I keep imagining what it would have been like to hold her that first hour.”
I felt the familiar anger.
Then something else.
Grief.
Shared, but not equal.
“You lost that because of your choice.”
“I know.”
“And I lost having her father beside me.”
His eyes lifted.
“I know.”
Neither of us could repair that hour.
We could only stop letting it poison every hour after.
Michael looked at Lily.
“I’m not going to ask you to forgive me anymore.”
I studied him.
“Why?”
“Because you already know I want it.”
A pause.
“What I need to do is become someone whose presence doesn’t make you brace.”
May you like
That sentence stayed with me.
When I left his apartment that evening, I realized I had not braced once.
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