“For you.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.
“I thought once enough time passed, you’d stop dwelling on him.”
“Dwelling on him?”
My voice rose.
“He’s my son.”
“He made his choice.”
“No.” I stepped closer until we were almost face-to-face. “You made it for him.”
Marcus’s expression hardened.
“I gave him a push.”
“You lied to an 18-year-old who already believed he was a burden.”
“I gave him an opportunity to start over.”
“You manipulated a grieving child.”
“He was legally an adult.”
I stepped closer.
“He was still my child.”
The words echoed through the room.
Marcus looked at Andrew.
“You’ve done well for yourself.”
Andrew didn’t respond.
“You came back stronger. In a way, maybe leaving was the best thing that ever happened to you.”
I stared at my husband in disbelief.
Even now.
Even after everything.
He couldn’t admit what he’d done.
Andrew spoke again.
“The note I left behind, when I said ‘Please don’t look for me,’ I meant for a few days.”
I looked up at him.
“I was hurt. I needed space.”
His eyes filled with tears.
“I was sitting at the bus station when his messages started coming.”
My chest tightened.
“I read them over and over.”
He looked at Marcus.
“I kept thinking, ‘Maybe he’s right.'”
Marcus folded his arms but said nothing.
“I thought about coming home.”
Andrew’s voice cracked.
“I even stood up once.”
He laughed softly, though there was no humor in it.
“Then another message came.”
He unlocked the phone again and scrolled.
“There.”
I read the message.
“If you come back, she’ll choose me. Don’t make her say it to your face.”
I covered my mouth.
“I believed him.”
Andrew looked at me.
“I couldn’t survive hearing those words from you.”
“You never would have.”
“I know that now.” He took a shaky breath. “But I didn’t know it then.”
I closed my eyes.
Every moment of guilt I’d carried for over half a decade became something else.
Rage.
