Halfway through dinner, Alan turned to me with a grin. “Why don’t you take Zoey home after we eat and put her to bed? I’ll stay here, have a few beers with Jake, maybe smoke a cigar. Like the old days.”
The fork slipped from my hand. “You want me to leave? Alone? At nine months pregnant?”
He shrugged. “You’re always saying you’re tired. Someone’s got to put Zoey to bed.”
The silence was heavy until his mother, Grace, spoke. Calm but firm, she repeated his words back to him, making him hear their weight—the selfishness, the recklessness. She reminded him that I could go into labor at any moment and that he had left me to carry every burden alone. Alan flushed red, shrinking into his seat while the rest of the table avoided his eyes.
I couldn’t stay another second. I stood, every movement sending aches through my body, and took Zoey’s hand. “Come on, sweetheart. Let’s go home.” She asked if Daddy was coming too. I looked at the man I had loved for eight years, frozen in his chair, and told her no.
Grace followed us home, quietly humming to soothe Zoey in the car. Later, as she read a bedtime story to my daughter, I sat on the couch, back throbbing, wondering when my marriage had become so empty. Grace returned with tea and sat beside me, her support steady. “You won’t be alone,” she said. “No matter what my son chooses, I’ll be here for you and this baby.”
As the baby kicked hard against my ribs, I realized she was right. Alan hadn’t come home, and maybe he wouldn’t. But I wasn’t afraid of the birth itself. I was afraid of what kind of father, what kind of partner, Alan had chosen to be. Still, pressing my hands over my belly, I whispered a promise to the child inside me: “You will always be loved. Never doubt it for a single second.”
That night, everything shifted. Soon, I’ll have decisions to make—about my marriage, the example I want to set for my children, and what I will accept in the name of love. For now, I’m just a mother waiting for her baby, surrounded by those who truly care, ready to fight for the family my children deserve—even if it looks different than I once imagined.