Page 48 of The Space He Left
Taking it one day at a time,I replied.
How's Emma?
Perfect.
There was a pause before his next message:Jack's staying at the Willowbrook Inn. He looks like hell.
I stared at the message, unsure how to respond. Part of me was glad Jack was suffering – it seemed only fair that he should feel some consequences for his actions. But another part of me, the part that loved him, felt a pang of sympathy.
I'm not ready to talk about Jack yet,I typed back.
I understand. I didn't tell you to make you feel bad. Just thought you should know he’s finally realised his actions have consequences. He's not bothering anyone, not making a scene. He's keeping his distance like you asked.
It was such a small thing – respecting my request for space – but it was more consideration than Jack had shown me in weeks. It felt like a sign that he was finally listening again.
I set the phone aside and looked down at Emma, who was watching me with those serious blue eyes. "What do you think, baby girl? Should Mama give your daddy a chance to prove he's changed?"
Emma made a soft cooing sound that could have meant anything.
"You're right," I said. "It's too early to decide. We'll see what kind of man he becomes when he thinks nobody's watching."
Because that was what it would take – not grand gestures or romantic apologies, but consistent, daily proof that Jack had learned from his mistakes. Proof that he could be the husband and father we needed, not just when it was convenient, but especially when it was hard.
And if he couldn't prove that? Then Emma and I would build a different kind of life, surrounded by people who had shown up when it mattered most.
Either way, we would be okay.
Chapter 17
Jack
The apartment above The Copper Fox wasn't much, but it was a start.?
Shortly after our chat at the hotel, Sam had cleared out his spare room and helped me set up a bed, a dresser, and a desk where I could work on Henderson Construction paperwork in the evenings. It wasn't the home I'd shared with Harper, but it was better than the hotel, and Sam's presence downstairs meant I wasn't completely alone with my thoughts.
The house was their domain now, Harper and Emma's. While I couldn't be there to fix a leaky faucet or carry in the groceries, I could make damn sure they were secure. I'd set up a generous weekly payment into Harper's personal account so she would never have to ask me for a thing. Since the mortgage and all the household utilities were already in my name, I'd rerouted the payments to draw directly from my account rather than our joint account. She wouldn't have to worry about a single bill. It was the least I could do - to ensure the only things she had to pay for were the things she wanted, not the things she needed.
"You sure you don't mind me being here?" I asked for the dozenth time as Sam handed me a cup of coffee.
"Jack, if I minded, I wouldn't have offered. Besides, someone needs to keep an eye on you, make sure you don't do anything stupid."
"Like what?"
"Like showing up at Harper's house at midnight with a boom box playing 'In Your Eyes.'"
Despite everything, I almost smiled. "That's a very specific fear."
"I know you, man. Grand gestures are your default setting when you're desperate."
He was right. My instinct was to make some dramatic gesture, to prove my love through action rather than patience. The bitter irony was that Harper had never cared for the grand gestures. Her happiness was built in the small, quiet moments, the unspoken acts of service that showed I was paying attention. She was the woman who would find her car windshield scraped of ice on a winter morning before she even put her coat on, or who would sink onto the sofa after a long day to find her favorite fuzzy blanket already waiting on her side.
I knew her. I knew she hated stopping for gas, so I made it a point to take her car once a week and fill the tank. I knew she devoured books, so when she'd mention an author she loved had a new release coming, I'd pre-order it so it would land on our doorstep the day it came out. I'd spent years learning the language of her heart, written in the smallest of gestures, only to forget how to speak it when it mattered most. I had abandoned the man Harper had married, and now I had to prove I could find my way back to him.
It had now been three months. Three months of sleeping in this small room, of drives to the city for my weekly sessions with Dr. Cox, of trying to understand the architecture of myown failure. The term he’d given me in our first session - hero complex - had settled deep in my bones. I understood it, intellectually. I derived my worth from rescuing people, a pattern learned at my father’s knee.
But a question Dr. Cox had posed last week kept echoing in my lonely apartment: “This heroism, this need to help, it wasn’t a problem in your marriage before Madison, was it? So what made this time different?”
The question had gnawed at me. Because he was right. Harper had fallen in love with the man who organized the fundraiser for the town library after the fire, the man who spent a weekend re-roofing Mrs. Gable’s house for free. She had been my partner in it. When the Petersons’ basement flooded two years ago, we’d gone over together. I’d worked on the pump while she helped sort through drenched photo albums, making coffee for everyone. It was always us, a team. She was proud of that part of me.
