Chapter 15 - THE WHOLE LOBSTER
The divorce became final in April.
No fireworks.
No dramatic courthouse steps.
The judge reviewed the agreement, asked required questions, made findings, and signed.
I walked outside into cold spring rain.
Erin opened an umbrella.
“How do you feel?”
“Hungry.”
She laughed.
“Excellent legal conclusion.”
Thomas and I shared parental rights under the final order.
Oliver stayed with me most school nights.
Thomas had alternating weekends, one overnight during the week, rotating holidays, and longer summer blocks.
We shared school and medical decisions.
It was not the punishment Beatrice expected.
It was parenting.
Thomas did it well enough.
That mattered.
He stopped calling Beatrice for backup every time Oliver had a fever.
Learned the pediatrician’s number.
Packed lunches.
Forgot spirit day once and drove back with a superhero shirt.
Oliver came home laughing.
I let myself be glad.
Thomas never regained access to Harbor & Pine.
He found a smaller apartment in South Portland.
No recliner big enough to disappear into.
No mother cooking behind him.
No wife balancing books he refused to look at.
His employer kept him.
He started depositing his full pay where his accountant could track it for support calculations.
Normal adulthood had finally found him.
Cassandra moved into a two-bedroom rental with baby June.
She did not open Cass & Coast.
She took a receptionist job at a dermatology office, then began evening classes in medical billing.
Sometimes she brought June to see Oliver.
Always by arrangement.
Never assuming.
Our relationship remained cautious.
One afternoon she said, “Do you think we’ll ever be sisters again?”
I looked at her.
“We weren’t very good at it the first time.”
She laughed.
“That’s fair.”
“Maybe we can become something else.”
“What?”
“I don’t know.”
She accepted that.
Beatrice was harder.
She remained in the Falmouth apartment.
She paid her own rent.
She sold part of her brokerage holdings.
For the first time in years, she had to decide what her life cost.
Thomas told me therapy was going “badly.”
I said, “That might mean it’s working.”
He laughed.
I surprised myself by laughing too.
Beatrice did not see Oliver for eight months.
Then, through a family therapist, she requested structured contact.
I said no at first.
Then agreed to one supervised visit after the therapist spoke with Oliver’s counselor and both attorneys confirmed the boundaries.
No talk about court.
No blame.
No money.
No telling him secrets about adults.
The visit lasted one hour.
Oliver came home carrying a drawing.
Grandma had drawn a lobster.
I stared at it.
“Seriously?”
He laughed.
“She said she’s bad at apologizing.”
“What did she apologize for?”
“For saying you weren’t family.”
My throat tightened.
“Anything else?”
“She said grown-ups can be greedy.”
“That’s broad.”
“She said she was greedy.”
I sat beside him.
“How did that make you feel?”
“Weird.”
“Good answer.”
He put the drawing on the refrigerator.
I left it there.
Not as forgiveness.
As evidence that a child had heard an adult take responsibility without asking him to fix her.
Harbor & Pine changed too.
I hired Naomi, one of my longtime stylists, as general manager.
Expensive.
Worth every dollar.
I stopped opening Thursdays late.
I took one Saturday a month.
Not four.
Revenue dipped slightly.
My life improved dramatically.
The mortgage was not behind.
The world did not end.
I attended Oliver’s spring music program.
He sang one line too early and looked directly at me in horror.
I laughed.
He laughed.
Then the whole kindergarten row lost the song.
Best concert of my life.
The empty MHC category disappeared from my books.
Every month, Denise sent me financial statements.
I read them.
Not because trust was dead.
Because trust and verification had finally stopped being enemies.
On the first Friday of summer, Oliver and I drove to Harbor Fish Market.
He pressed both hands against the lobster tank.
“That one.”
“That one is enormous.”
“He looks strong.”
“He looks expensive.”
“You have money.”
I laughed.
“That is not how budgeting works.”
We bought two smaller lobsters.
Not five.
At home, I boiled them myself.
Poorly.
Butter splattered.
The kitchen smelled like seawater.
Oliver sat at the table wearing a paper chef’s hat he had made at school.
When the lobsters were ready, I split them.
One tail for him.
One for me.
Claws in the middle.
Corn.
Potatoes.
Real dinner.
I placed his plate down.
Then mine.
He stared at it.
“You get meat.”
“I do.”
“All of it?”
“An irresponsible amount.”
He grinned.
We ate.
Halfway through, he pushed one claw toward me.
“You can have this.”
“Why?”
“I’m full.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah.”
I cracked it open.
Clean white meat slid out.
For a second, I saw his five-year-old hand holding that dirty piece from his pajama pocket.
Mommy, I knew they wouldn’t give you any.
I put the claw meat on his plate.
“You eat it tomorrow.”
He frowned.
“You don’t want it?”
“I have enough.”
That sentence caught me.
I looked around.
The kitchen was the same.
Same cabinets.
Same old table.
Different people living inside the life.
I had enough.
Later, after Oliver went to bed, I cleaned the kitchen.
One envelope sat beneath the fruit bowl.
It had arrived that afternoon.
Beatrice’s handwriting.
Not through a lawyer.
Not through Thomas.
The return address was her apartment.
Inside, according to the outside of the envelope, was a letter she had asked the family therapist for permission to send.
I had agreed to receive it.
Receiving was not reading.
I stood at the counter with my thumb beneath the flap.
For months, I had believed I knew exactly what Beatrice was.
Cruel.
Dependent.
Controlling.
Then the financial records showed fear beneath it.
The emails showed calculation.
Therapy showed at least the possibility that a person could finally look at what she had done without asking everyone else to make it smaller.
I still did not know whether I wanted a relationship with her.
That was the one question I refused to answer just because time had passed.
I put the unopened letter into the top drawer beside takeout menus.
Maybe tomorrow.
Maybe never.
Then I turned off the kitchen light.
From upstairs, Oliver called:
“Mom?”
“Yeah?”
“Did you save the lobster?”
I smiled.
“In the fridge.”
“For me?”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
I walked upstairs.
Before I left the kitchen, I looked once at the clean plate drying beside the sink.
No head.
No scraps.
May you like
Nothing saved as an insult.
Then I shut the drawer containing Beatrice’s letter and went to tuck my son into bed.
