Alvarez entered our home.
The ambulance dispatch record.
The hospital admission.
The medical notes recording that the father could not be reached.
Beside those times were screenshots from Celeste’s public posts.
A cocktail.
A balcony.
A restaurant.
A photograph of Daniel kissing her temple beneath the sunset.
Finally free.
Daniel’s face hardened.
“You printed her social media?”
“I preserved evidence.”
“This is insane.”
“No.
Calling your husband nineteen times while your newborn struggles to breathe is insane.
Discovering later that he was posing for vacation photographs makes it evidence.”
Celeste covered her mouth.
I could tell from her face that Daniel had not told her the whole story.
Maybe he had said Noah had a mild fever.
Maybe he had said I was overreacting.
Maybe he had said nothing at all.
I did not need to guess.
Daniel would eventually tell us himself.
People like him hated silence.
I gave him some.
He filled it immediately.
“You always panic about everything.”
There it was.
Celeste looked at him.
I stayed still.
Daniel continued, louder now.
“You called me constantly during the pregnancy.
Every ache, every appointment, every little thing was an emergency.”
“Was Noah’s hospital admission a little thing?”
“I didn’t know he was being admitted.”
“Why not?”
He opened his mouth.
Nothing came out.
Because the answer was sitting between us.
He did not know because he stopped answering.
Celeste moved toward the stairs.
“I really should leave.”
This time I did not stop her.
Daniel did.
“Don’t.”
She looked at him with open disbelief.
“Your newborn was in the hospital?”
He rubbed both hands over his face.
“It wasn’t like that.”
I said nothing.
Celeste looked at me.
“How sick was he?”
For the first time since she had entered the house, she did not look like my husband’s mistress.
She looked frightened.
“Sick enough that doctors took him straight from my arms,” I said.
