Chapter 2
I sat in the kitchen of our rented lakeside cabin, staring at my silent phone. Three days. Three entire days without a single call, text message, or even a missed call notification.
"Still nothing?" Della asked, looking up from her laptop.
"Nothing," I replied. "What about you?"
"Dylan sent one text: 'Where's the coffee machine manual?'" She rolled her eyes. "That's it."
Thirty years of marriage, reduced to a coffee machine manual. This might be the most pathetic divorce reason in history.
"Maybe they really don't care," Della said, though I could hear the uncertainty in her voice.
"Maybe." I stood up and walked to the window, looking out at the lake. "Or maybe they're just waiting for us to come crawling back."
The next morning, I found myself sitting across from Sarah, the young manager at The Daily Grind, as she studied my nearly blank resume.
"So, Mrs. Morrison," she said, "tell me about your work experience."
I took a deep breath. "Well, I've been a homemaker for thirty years. But I managed all the household finances, organized charity events for the Country Club, coordinated school fundraisers..."
Sarah's expression told me everything I needed to know. None of that counted as "real work experience" in her eyes.
"I see. And why are you looking for employment now?"
Because I'm fifty-four years old and just realized I need my own money, my own identity, my own life. But I can't say that.
"I'm recently separated and need to establish financial independence."
She nodded—at least this reason made sense to her. "The position is part-time, twelve dollars an hour, mostly morning shifts. It's pretty basic—making coffee, cleaning tables, working the register."
Twelve dollars an hour. I used to raise that much money in donations for a single Country Club charity event. Now it would be my hourly wage.
"When can I start?"
When I got back to the cabin, Della was on a video call.
"...the Q3 numbers show a fifteen percent increase in engagement, and if we pivot the campaign focus to Gen Z platforms..." She spoke with such confidence, completely different from the hesitant woman who tiptoed around Dylan at home.
She noticed me and said to her camera, "Excuse me one moment."
"How did it go?"
"I got the job. Twelve dollars an hour."
Her expression shifted from excitement to concern. "Mom, that's not enough to live on."
"It's a start." I sat down beside her. "How's your meeting going?"
"They want to promote me to Regional Director. It comes with a thirty percent raise and stock options."
"Della, you should take that promotion."
The next afternoon, Emma burst through the cabin door with Luke right behind her.
"Grandma!" she called out.
"Where's Daddy?" Luke asked, looking around the small space.
"Daddy and Grandpa are at home," I said, kneeling down to their eye level. "We're staying here for a little while."
Emma, always the more direct one, asked, "Why?"
How do you explain domestic dysfunction to a six-year-old? How do you tell her that her father and grandfather don't know how to treat women?
"Sometimes adults need space to think about things," I said.
"Like when Emma and I fight and Mom makes us go to separate rooms?" Luke asked.
"Something like that."
Emma looked toward the kitchen where Della was working. "Grandma, why did Mommy used to wash Daddy's socks? Doesn't Daddy have hands?"
Della poked her head out of the kitchen, looking surprised.
"Well..." I started, but Luke interrupted.
"I'm going to wash my own socks when I grow up," he announced. "And I'll help girls wash theirs too."
"You don't need to wash girls' socks, sweetie," Della said with a laugh.
"But I want to help. Emma says girls and boys are equally strong and should be treated nicely."
Hearing these words from a six-year-old made me realize maybe we were doing something right. At least the next generation wouldn't repeat our mistakes.
That evening, after the children had gone home, Della and I found ourselves in the kitchen together. She was washing dishes while I dried.
"Mom, I want to tell you something," she said. "About living with Dylan."
I sat down at the small island, waiting for her to continue.
"Every morning at six, I get up to make breakfast. French toast, because that's what he likes. But he never says thank you. Just complains that the syrup isn't warm enough, or the coffee isn't strong enough."
She paused, her hands still in the soapy water.
"When I get home from work, I have to wash his dirty clothes that he leaves everywhere. He says it's what wives should do. I work and do housework, but he says I'm 'too busy with work to take care of the family.'"
I'd raised a monster. How had I let my son become this?
"Last month at a dinner party, he introduced me by saying, 'This is Della, she's just a marketing girl.' Just a marketing girl. I have an MBA, I manage a fifty-person team, I make twice what he'll earn in his entire lifetime, but I'm just a 'marketing girl.'"
"Della..."
"The worst part is, I started believing him. I started thinking maybe I was just settling for mediocrity, maybe I should be grateful he married me."
On Friday night, I was going through our financial documents, trying to figure out how we could survive independently, when I noticed something wrong.
"Della, come look at this."
She walked over and looked at the bank statement.
"What's this forty-five thousand dollar transfer?" I pointed to a large withdrawal from three months ago.
"I have no idea. Did you ask Theo?"
"He never let me handle these accounts. Said I 'didn't understand finances.'"
Della took the statement and studied it carefully. "The recipient is... Becca Sterling?"
My heart sank. "Becca Sterling."
"Who's Becca Sterling?"
Theo's law school classmate. The woman who always appeared in his Facebook photos. The one who was 'just a friend.'
"Someone I need to look into."
Saturday morning, I was making coffee and enjoying a rare moment of peace when I saw a familiar figure outside the window.
Della saw him too. "Is that...?"
"Dylan," I finished her sentence.
He was standing outside the coffee shop—my new workplace—looking absolutely terrible. Three days without anyone taking care of him, and it showed. His clothes were wrinkled, his hair messy.
"He looks awful," Della observed.
"Good," I replied, then realized how harsh that sounded. "I mean..."
"No, you're right. Good." Her voice was firm. "Let him figure out how to take care of himself."
Just when I'd started to believe maybe they really didn't care about us being gone, Dylan had appeared. He stood outside the coffee shop, looking lost and disheveled.
"What do you think he wants?" Della asked.
I stared at my son, this man I thought I knew, who now looked like a lost child.
"I don't know," I said. "But I guess we're about to find out."
This was the first contact. Not an apology, not an explanation—just him showing up when he needed something. Some things never change.