"Kids always know," Clare said. "Yeah." He put his hands in his pockets. "That's what scares me." Clare turned to look at him properly.
That she might get attached to someone. That she might get attached to someone and then I make the wrong call and she has to watch that person leave. Clare held his gaze. That's the same fear your ex-wife's lawyers use to argue you're an unstable parent. The words landed hard.
He blinked. That's I'm not saying it to hurt you, she said quietly. I'm saying it because you do the same thing your fear does to you. You take the worst possible version of what could happen and you treat it like the only version. Malcolm didn't answer.
On the field, Ava intercepted a pass and started running. "I'm not leaving, Malcolm," Clare said she wasn't looking at him anymore. She was watching Ava. That's not a promise about 6 weeks or about what we're figuring out. I mean, I've been here for 9 years.
I have never left. And I don't know what you do with that information, but I think it's worth something. He watched his daughter score. He didn't say anything, but he didn't look away from the field for a long time. And beside him, Clare sat in her folding chair in the October morning light, perfectly still, completely present, not pushing, not demanding, not performing, just there.
And Malcolm Reed, who had spent 6 years teaching himself that love was a liability he couldn't afford, felt the first small, terrifying crack run through the middle of a wall he had been building for a very long time. That night after Ava was asleep, he sat at the kitchen table with his phone face down in front of him and his mother's voice in his ear. He had called her because he needed to talk to someone who wouldn't let him get away with his usual strategies. "A six-week agreement," his mother said on the other end of the line. She proposed a six-week agreement.
"Yes." And you said yes. A pause. "Boy," his mother said finally, "that woman has been in love with you for a long time." I don't know that.
I know it. I've known it for 2 years. I've been waiting for one of you to figure it out. Malcolm rubbed his forehead. "That's—Mama, that doesn't help me."
What do you want me to say? You want me to tell you you're making a mistake? I can't. You want me to tell you it's definitely going to work out. I can't say that either.
The only thing I can tell you is that Clare Bennett has been next to you through every hard thing that has happened to you in the past decade. And the question isn't whether she cares about you. The question is whether you're going to keep punishing her for Diane's choices. The words sat between them. "That's not what I'm doing," he said.