"Sign them, Marissa. Accept that this is over and try to maintain some dignity in how it ends." She stared at the papers for a long moment, then looked up at me with something that might have been hope. "What about our son?"
"You can't keep him from his mother." "Watch me." I pulled out my phone and showed her the screen. "I've got video of you and Leo being wheeled out of the building on the same stretcher."
"I've got screenshots of your message history. I've got documentation of your drug use. Oh, yes. I had that milk tested."
"Ambien, in case you're wondering." Her face went white again, but this time it was tinged with something that looked like genuine fear. "Any custody battle is going to involve a lot of uncomfortable questions about your judgment, your lifestyle choices, and your fitness as a parent. Are you really sure you want to go down that road?"
She grabbed the papers with shaking hands and tore them in half. "I'm not signing anything," she said. And for a moment, there was a flash of the old Marissa, defiant, stubborn, convinced she could fight her way out of any situation. "You want a divorce? Fine."
"But I'm not going to just roll over and let you take everything." I smiled and pulled another set of papers from my briefcase. "I was hoping you'd say that." "What's that?"
"Plan B. If you won't sign the generous settlement I'm offering, we go to court. And in court, all of this becomes public record." "The affair, the circumstances of your medical emergency, the drug use, everything. Is that really what you want?"
She stared at the second set of papers, and I could see the exact moment when she realized there was no way out. No clever legal maneuver, no last-minute rescue, just the cold, hard reality of consequences finally catching up to choices. But instead of accepting defeat gracefully, she did something I didn't expect. She started to laugh.
Not happy laughter. The kind of broken, hysterical laughter that people make when their sanity finally gives up and goes home. It started as a giggle, then built into full-blown cackles that echoed off the hospital-room walls. "You think you've won," she said between gasps.
"You think you're so smart, so clever, but you have no idea what you've done." "Enlighten me." "Leo isn't going anywhere. Even if we get divorced, even if you take everything, he'll still be there."