The door had barely opened before Coco threw out her little arms and ran straight for them.

My dad scooped her up and spun her around, and my mom laughed behind him. "Coco's gotten taller."

They'd brought a lot. A teddy bear half a person tall, a red rocking horse, a little toy piano with built-in music.

All of it bright and colorful, jarring against the bare white walls.

Coco loved the piano most. She jabbed at the keys with two little fingers, giggling without stopping, and for once the living room filled with a warm kind of noise.

In the middle of all that peace, Peter's face darkened.

He didn't blow up right away. Instead, in front of my parents, he started "tidying."

One moment he was sweeping the scattered toys into a corner, the next he was complaining about cracker crumbs on the floor and reaching for the broom.

My dad said, half joking, "Peter, a place is only a home when it's a little messy."

Peter smiled. "Dad, too much clutter ruins a child's focus."

Halfway through dinner, Coco ran over holding the little piano, wanting to put on a show.

Peter reached out to take it.

Coco flinched back a step without thinking.

My mom caught it. "Peter, why does Coco seem a little afraid of you?"

I almost said she wasn't, then I remembered Coco's face the day before, when her book went into the trash.

She hadn't even dared to cry.

Peter was unbothered. "I'm busy with work most of the time. It's only natural she's not close to me."

I said nothing. I pulled Coco onto my lap.

Only then did she relax, tapping clumsily at the keys, the notes coming out broken and uneven, and everyone at the table laughed.

By the time dinner ended it was nearly dark. I got Coco to sleep, walked my parents down to the street, and went back up.

The door opened and there was Peter, stuffing all the toys into a big black garbage bag.

"Your parents brought way too much. Coco can't play with all of it," he said, brushing the dust off his hands. "Sitting around, it just collects dust."

"Those are Coco's birthday presents."

"She's already played with them." He bent and lifted the bag. "Sheila, I don't want this house turning into a toy store. Try to understand."

I understood.

I'd understood plenty of times.

"But Peter, my parents gave those to her." I blocked the doorway. "They're Coco's things."

He pushed past me toward the door.

I grabbed the hem of his shirt. "Can't you let her keep one, just her favorite?"

He didn't stop. "Keep one and there'll be a second, then a third."

"Do you have any sense of reason at all?"

"Me, no sense of reason?" He finally turned around. "Sheila, look at this place. Spotless. This is what a home people actually live in looks like. Every time your parents come they shove a pile of junk on us, and who ends up cleaning it up?"

"No one's forcing you to clean it—"

"I'm the one who paid for this house."

The air went quiet.

Yes. He was the one who paid for it.

"But isn't this home supposed to belong to both of us?"

Peter said nothing. He slammed the door behind him.

I stood frozen where I was, the cold seeping out from my heart, thread by thread, all the way to my fingertips.

It took a long while before I had the strength to walk back to the bedroom.

Coco's little face was buried peacefully in the pillow, her cheek pressed into a soft curve.

Just this afternoon she'd been surrounded by all those toys, like a little princess.

And I hadn't managed to keep a single thing for her.

When you wake up tomorrow, will you blame Mommy?

I'm sorry.

Mommy didn't protect you.

Peter didn't come home that night.

In the middle of the night, Kayla Simmons sent me a screenshot.

It was a post from Julia Fox's social media feed.

In college, she and Peter had been everyone's idea of the perfect couple.

Later, Julia got married, and Peter and I slowly drifted together.

With a tangle of feelings, I tapped the screenshot open.

"Baby learned to say Daddy."

I swiped down, and there was a video.

On the screen was the kind of cozy decorating that stung my eyes, a pretty rug.

All the things I'd thought he threw away.

Sitting there, plain as day, in someone else's home.

The camera jerked, then fixed on a little boy and Peter.

Peter was holding that half-my-height teddy bear, coaxing the boy to call him Daddy.

Kayla's call came in right behind it.

I picked up and said nothing.

On her end she was loaded for bear: "Sheila, does your husband have a twin, or a long-lost brother?"

"...Neither."

"So you saw what I sent you?" She talked fast, like a machine gun. "I just heard—Julia's back from overseas, with a kid, about Coco's age..."

"I know," I cut in. "Let me look a little more."

Kayla was strangled with frustration. "He's already done all this! What more is there to look at! I told you back then I didn't want you two together..."

I listened to Kayla scold on and on, and opened the photo again.

Peter was good-looking.

I'd thought so in college, and I still thought so now.

A man with good grades, disciplined and exacting, paired with a decent face.

He could steal a sincere heart away easily enough.

I pressed the phone dark.

Beside me, Coco was still asleep.

I tucked her blanket in.

The next day I took Coco to the toy store.

"Which one does Coco like?"

Coco looked anxious. "I don't want one. Daddy will throw it away."

She was so small, and the first thing she thought of when she saw something she wanted was losing it.

"He won't anymore. From now on Mommy will buy them for you, and no one is allowed to throw them away."

Coco looked at me, then at the toys, and reached up to take a palm-sized little bear off the shelf.

"I want this one." She hugged the bear to her chest like she was holding some treasure. "It's small. Daddy won't see it."

Back home, Peter's dress shoes sat in the entryway.

He was home, and he hadn't said a word to me.

I thought about it, then kicked the pair of shoes out the door.

Peter was right about one thing.

Throw away the useless things, and you'll find your whole life opens up.

The door thudded.

Peter came out of the bedroom rubbing his eyes. "It's first thing in the morning. What are you doing?"

"Decluttering, for you," I said, turning and going inside. "Didn't you say too much stuff is just dead weight?"

Peter froze for two seconds and glanced at the entryway. His dress shoes used to sit neatly beside the shoe cabinet; now one lay upside down in the middle of the hallway and the other leaned crooked against the wall.

He frowned, went over, and picked them up. "Sheila, what's gotten into you?"

"Nothing," I said, scooping Coco up. "Isn't this what you said—it's not about having a lot, just enough to use? One pair of slippers is plenty for you, right? The dress shoes just sit by the door collecting dust anyway."

He stared at me for a few seconds, like it was the first time he'd noticed my tongue could be this quick.

In the end he didn't answer. He picked up the shoes, brushed off the dust, put them on, and left again.

After the door closed, Coco asked me in a small voice, "Is Daddy mad?"

"No," I said, kissing her forehead. "Daddy just went to work."

Who cared whether he was mad.

Over the next few days, Peter came home later and later.

I couldn't be bothered. Better if he didn't come home at all.

This home had never been one that fell apart without him.

I bought a play mat for the living room. It was bright and patterned all over with little animals.

Coco bounced on it, laughing, and watching her I suddenly felt how much I'd let slip away over these years.

But it wasn't too late. As long as I started, no moment was too late to start walking toward a better life.

I opened the job app and sent out another résumé.

That night, a little past nine, Coco was already asleep and I was mopping the living room.

Peter pushed the door open and came in.

He stood at the entryway changing his shoes, his eyes landing on the play mat, and his brow furrowed.

"It's in the way."

"It's not. Takes two seconds to roll up."

His frown deepened. I didn't want to hear another one of his lectures, so I got there first. "Besides, all you do at home now is sleep. How is it in your way?"

He looked at me, and in the end said nothing, just turned and went to the bathroom.

When the water started running, I dug a food delivery receipt out of his coat pocket.

The address was an upscale neighborhood.

A can of imported formula, two sets of kids' pajamas, and a scatter of other children's things.

He'd never put that much care into Coco.

Without a word, I slipped the receipt back where it had been.

The next day, I took Coco and went to Julia Fox's door.

Julia was thinner than in college, but her face hadn't changed much. When she saw it was me she smiled, as if she'd known I would come.

"You're here."

I didn't say anything. Facing the woman I'd thought of as my "rival," I didn't know what I was supposed to feel.

"I came because of Peter."

"Come in first."

Julia waved me inside and carried the two children off to the kids' room to play on their own.

I looked around the apartment.

It was warm, cozy. Nothing like Peter's hand.

Had I never understood him? Or was this side of him something he'd simply never shown me?

"You came at a good time." Julia poured me a cup of tea. "I'd been meaning to go find you, actually."

"Peter told me back then that the two of you had been separated for a long time, that you just hadn't filed the paperwork, and you lived your own lives."

Even though I'd braced myself for it, hearing the words out of someone's mouth still felt like a needle going in.

"I didn't believe him," she went on. "But I'd just gotten back from overseas, I was buried at work, my child had just been weaned, and the few nannies I tried weren't right. Peter said he could help, so I didn't turn him down."

She said it so openly that I was the one left not knowing what to do.

"Sheila." She said my name softly, her tone turning more serious. "I'm telling you all this today, but I'm not trying to take your man."

"I dated Peter back in college. You know what kind of person he is. So do I."

"Then what do you want?"

I was genuinely confused. If she didn't even like Peter, why was she doing any of this?

Julia took a sip of tea. "I just made partner last month. The firm has a stack of cases lined up for me, and I'm lucky to get five hours of sleep a night."

"I hired two nannies. One fed my child scalding oatmeal just to skimp on formula money, and the second sat there on her phone while the baby cried beside her."

"Sheila, you're a mother too. You know a child needs care, and needs someone there with them."

"But I don't have the time. I put in this much effort and these many years to get where I am. I'm not about to throw away my career for a man or a child."

"So that's why you came to me?" My throat was a little dry.

She pushed a contract across the table toward me.