Part 2Sharing My Home With Her Ex

My heart turned to absolute ice in my chest.

Before turning the doorknob, some pathetic, lingering part of me had still held onto a sliver of hope. But looking at her now, all that remained was a vast, hollow disappointment.

If my patience and compromise were rewarded only with deceit and eye rolls, then why the hell was I still breaking my own back?

That night, I dragged a blanket into Noah’s room and slept on the floor.

Through the thin walls, I could hear Lena’s phone chiming. She was messaging the neighborhood Facebook group, desperate for a recommendation for a late-night cleaning service. Over a spilled pot of soup. She would rather pay a stranger a premium than lift a mop herself.

Around 2:00 AM, the door to Noah’s room creaked open. Lena stepped in, her shadow falling over me. She nudged my shoulder with her toe.

"Chad is ready for bed," she whispered. "Go help him shower."

I picked up my phone. The harsh glare of the screen illuminated the time.

Chad was a night owl, and apparently, that meant I was expected to be on-call until the early hours of the morning just to scrub his back? The man had a broken femur. His hands worked perfectly fine.

"Get out," I said, my voice dangerously low.

I pulled the blanket over my head, shutting out the world. She stood there for a long, heavy moment, let out a dramatic sigh, and walked out.

The next morning, I woke up before the sun and began packing a duffel bag.

Noah rubbed his sleepy eyes from the bed. "Daddy, where are you going?"

I sat on the edge of his mattress and smoothed his messy hair. "Grandpa isn't feeling well. I need to go stay with him for a few days to help him out. You need to be a good boy for Mom while I'm gone, okay?"

Lena, hearing my voice, appeared in the doorway, her brow pulled into a tight knot.

"You can't leave," she demanded. "If you leave, who is going to take care of Chad? Who is going to take care of Noah?"

I looked up at her, my expression dead flat. "Are your arms broken?"

Her eyes widened in indignation. "Excuse me? Mark, let's get one thing straight. Chad is your best friend, not mine."

"Then tell him to leave." I stood up, zipping the duffel bag with a sharp, aggressive sound. "I'll go tell him right now."

"No!" Lena lunged forward, grabbing my forearm. Her grip was desperate. "He’s been your closest friend for years. How could you just kick him out when he's hurt?"

I let out a harsh, humorless laugh. "Is he really just my friend, Lena? Because from where I'm standing, you seem a hell of a lot more worried about him than I am."

She flinched. Her eyes darted away, unable to meet my gaze. "Don't be ridiculous. I've always treated your friends like they were my own."

"Then you shouldn't have any problem taking care of him."

I pulled my arm out of her grasp, picked up my bag, and walked out of the house without looking back.

My dad, Arthur, had been diagnosed with an inguinal hernia the week before. He had undergone surgery yesterday. Lena had known about this for weeks, but she hadn't bothered to make a single phone call to check on him.

I stayed with my dad at his apartment for seven days.

When he was finally cleared to move around a bit more, I planned to just stay there and keep nursing him back to health. But then Noah’s second-grade teacher called me.

She said Noah had been falling asleep in class. He hadn't turned in a single homework assignment all week. His grades, usually stellar, were plummeting.

"I asked him what was going on," his teacher said gently, "and he told me his mom said homework was optional. That he could just play video games if he didn't feel like doing it."

A high-pitched ringing started in my ears. The blood rushed straight to my head.

"Mr. Davis, there's something else," she hesitated. "Noah’s hygiene... hasn't been great this week. His hair is matted. He hasn't brushed his teeth, and he's been wearing the same stained shirt for three days. The other kids are starting to avoid him. They say he smells."

I pinched the bridge of my nose, fighting the sting of tears, and apologized profusely. I told her there was a family emergency, that things had fallen through the cracks, and that I would never let it happen again.

When I hung up, a suffocating realization settled over me.

We had made this child together, but I was the only one tethered to him. I was the only one who actually did the work of parenting.

I packed my dad's things and brought him home with me.

The moment we walked through the door, Lena grabbed my sleeve and dragged me into our bedroom, her face pale with fury.

"Are you out of your mind, Mark? Chad needs peace and quiet to heal. Why would you bring your father here?"

"He just had surgery. He needs someone to look after him."

"Hire a home health aide!"

"He has a son. Why would he need to hire a stranger?" I shot back, stepping into her space. "Why don't you hire an aide for Chad?"

Lena crossed her arms defensively. "Chad is a victim of a terrible accident. He has no family in this city. How could you be so heartless as to abandon him to some random nurse?"

A victim? A thirty-eight-year-old victim?

The absolute absurdity of her logic made my stomach churn. I felt physically sick.

"Let me remind you of something, Lena," I said, my voice dropping to a lethal whisper. "When we bought this house, my father paid for half the down payment."

It had been his life savings. Every penny he had, he gave to us to build our life. Since the day we married, he had treated Lena like his own flesh and blood. And now, when he just needed a quiet bed to recover in for a few days, she was treating him like an infestation.

Lena dropped her gaze, her mouth pressing into a thin, hard line. She didn't say another word.

I gave her one last look of utter disgust, turned, and walked back out to the hallway.

As I approached the guest room where I’d settled my dad, I heard Chad’s voice drifting through the cracked door.

"Look, Arthur, don't take this the wrong way, but I’m just gonna be honest with you. No young couple actually wants to live with an old person."