I looked at it for a long moment.
“Trust doesn’t come back because you want it to,” I said quietly. “Our child will know you. I won’t keep you from that. But I need time, and I won’t pretend these weeks didn’t happen.”
“However long you need,” he answered.
I picked up the ring. I did not put it on. I slipped it into the pocket of my coat.
Then I stood, rested my hand gently on my stomach, and walked out into the daylight, deciding, for the first time in a long time, exactly where I was going next.
If you enjoyed reading this story, here’s you might like: My neighbor started treating our backyard pool like it belonged to her family. At first, I thought it was just a misunderstanding. By the end of the summer, I realized she had crossed a line neither of us could come back from.
