For the ninth time, my husband Silas Finch promised he wouldn't let his ex-wife, Luna Harding, come by at night.
That evening, he carried in a glass of milk. "Honey, there's a game tonight with Ronaldo playing, and Sean wants to watch it with Luna. Can she come over?"
Right then, the front door clicked open in the living room. My stepson, Sean, had let his mom in.
"She's already here. Why even ask?"
Silas let out a breath. "Sean hardly ever gets to be this happy. Don't read too much into it, honey. I promise this is absolutely the last time."
He gently stroked my belly, bruised purple and blue from eighty-seven straight days of hormone injections to keep the pregnancy. "Little one, be good. Your mommy's been through so much for you."
Then he stood up, closed the door, and walked out to the living room.
I couldn't sleep. Scrolling on my phone, I landed on a viral post in an online forum: After your divorce, what would you still do for your ex-husband?
The top reply read: "For the sake of my kid, I cook a late-night snack and go to my ex-husband's place to watch the game with them. His current wife is in poor shape from a difficult pregnancy, so it's only right that I help out a little more, isn't it?"
There was one highly upvoted comment:
"An ex-wife with zero boundaries is terrifying. I feel bad for the current wife—scrambling to play the sucker of a stepmom. Get out of there, fast!"
From beyond the door came the sound of glasses clinking, the three of them laughing together like one happy family.
I stared at that comment. I'd once believed that if I just endured, I could give my baby a peaceful home. Only now did I understand—you can't grow flowers in a garbage heap.
I gently touched my belly. "Baby, you have to be okay. Mommy's going to take you away from here."
——
"Have some more. Silas said your appetite's been off, so I made this from the recipe he used to love cooking for me when I was pregnant with Sean. It builds your blood and won't make you gain weight."
Early the next morning, I stopped in the kitchen doorway and watched Luna take three porcelain bowls out of the upper cabinet.
Those were the set I'd had custom-made to celebrate the pregnancy.
Silas came over to the dining table, casually picked up one of the bowls of porridge, and pushed it in front of me.
"That's right. Back when Luna was pregnant with Sean, I was the one who taught her to make this. Go on, try it."
"I'm not hungry." I pushed the bowl an inch away.
Luna glanced at Silas. "Did I make it too thick? Her appetite's not great. Let me go fix something lighter."
"No need to trouble yourself." I looked at her. "You're a guest too."
Silas's brows drew together slightly.
"Honey, don't say things like that. They hurt." He lowered his voice. "Luna stayed up late taking care of Sean last night, and she still got up early to make you breakfast. We're all one family. There's no need to draw such sharp lines."
I pulled my hand out from his palm.
Silas sighed, his gaze dropping to the bruised, purple-and-blue edges of my belly, tenderness surfacing in his eyes.
"The baby needs a stable environment. Don't get worked up."
He lifted his head and looked at me, his eyes earnest. "Last night was the happiest Sean's been in years. Do you understand what that means for our family? He's always thought that once I had another child, I wouldn't want him anymore. Only when Luna comes to keep him company does he feel secure."
He pushed that bowl of porridge back into my hand. "Be good, have a little. You're not just one person now. You have to think of the bigger picture."
He'd arranged it all so reasonably—so reasonably that if I refused again, I'd be the one with no sense of the greater good, the one wrecking this hard-won, harmonious family.
After breakfast, Luna went to wake Sean up.
Silas crouched by the couch, lifted my slightly swollen legs onto his knees, and kneaded them with just the right pressure.
"The day after tomorrow, I've taken the whole day off. In the morning I'll go with you for the fetal heartbeat check, and in the afternoon I'll take you to your favorite Japanese place." He fished his phone out of his pocket, opened the calendar, and held it out for me to see.
On the screen, Thursday's box was marked in red, with the words "Go with wife for fetal heartbeat check."
