3
I put my arm around Amy’s daughter, Beth, and
laughed.
“Don’t worry, I’ll be there.”
<
8:51
A few Fridays later.
Jason and I ran into each other at school.
Heather was there with Jason.
She was holding his arm and greeted me.
“Hi Sarah. Mikey didn’t mention you were coming.”
8387
Beth was the team captain of the school
running team, so there was definitely a game that day.
But that wasn’t why I was there.
I walked toward the stands, ignoring Heather.
Jason was a step behind, grabbing Heather’s
hand and coming over to say.
<
8:51
37
“You said you wanted nothing to do with your
son. What are you doing here?”
I didn’t want to talk to Jason, so I said.
“Please don’t stand next to me, I don’t want,
people getting the wrong idea.”
“What wrong idea?”
“That we’re still together.”
Jason was surprised at first, and then his face changed.
“Sarah, don’t push it.”
I didn’t know what that meant.
I waved to Beth, who was on the track.
Mikey was only a few feet away from Beth, and
I knew he saw me.
8:51
He thought I was waving to him.
That was probably why he looked so disgusted.
The gun went off, and both groups of boys and girls started running.
Beth was surprisingly fast.
Mikey usually did really well, but he tripped
halfway through the race.
After the race, Jason and I both ran to the
track.
Jason got there first, going to Mikey and asking
the medic how bad the injury was.
As the medic was about to answer, Jason said
to wait.
Jason turned to look at me, frowning as I texted
<
8:51
- ))
37
“Sarah, what are you doing? Can’t you see your
son is hurt?”
Jason’s voice got the attention of everyone
around us.
I put my phone down and looked at Mikey, who was pale.
His knees were scraped and bloody.
His left ankle was bent at a weird angle.
Mikey reached out to me, looking at me with
sad eyes.
I thought it was funny.
What did that have to do with me?
As Mikey wrote in his essay last year, he was all
grown up.
く
8:51
337
He didn’t need a boring mom like me who only
cooked and cleaned.
1
I skipped past Mikey and hugged Beth.
“You were amazing. Congrats on the second place win.
Let’s go, my mom is waiting at the door, she wants to take us to the seafood restaurant that you wanted to go to.”
I walked out of the school and got in the car. Jason was calling me.
I wasn’t going to answer.
But he texted me: [Talk about the divorce]
When we got to the restaurant, I told Amy to
take Beth in, and I’d be there later.
<
For the first time in two months, I called Jason.
He picked up in half a second.
“Sarah, where are you?”
“Wherever I am, you can still tell me when
you’re free to go to the courthouse.”
Jason paused before saying.
“Come to the hospital. Mikey’s injury is pretty
bad. He might not be able to race again. The doctors want to talk to us.”
“Okay, if he can’t race, he can’t race. You don’t need to tell me.”
Jason couldn’t believe what he was hearing.
“How can you say that? Are you even Mikey’s
mother?”
I leaned back in my seat, and said quietly.
<
“You’re the one who asked Mikey to tell me that
he didn’t want to live with someone who wasn’t
a Carter after we got divorced.
Why are you acting like I’m the one who left
him?
Don’t you think that’s hypocritical?”
The call was silent for a while.
Just as I was about to hang up on him, Jason
spoke.
Jason’s voice sounded like a child who was
about to cry.
“Do you have anything that you want? I’ll do
whatever you want.
Just come take care of Mikey at the hospital.
You know how busy I am, I can’t be here all the
time.”
8:51
I laughed to myself.
“I just want you to sign the divorce papers.
If you want to take care of Mikey, I suggest hiring a nurse.”
37
Jason got mad and something fell on the floor.
Then he yelled.
“Mikey is your baby. He was born after two days of pain.
Are you really going to get a divorce and make
our son live with only one parent?”
“Why would I do that?”
I told Jason that Heather had always been there
for him.
AAT
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