My lawyer, Ms. Patel, had said to be at the courthouse by eight. She had said to dress conservatively, to stay calm, to let her do the talking.
She had not said anything about what to do if your daughter walked into court carrying a shoebox.
Neither of us had seen that coming.
How We Got Here
Derek and I had been separated for two years when he filed the motion.
We had been together for seven years, married for five, and for most of that time I had believed I understood who he was. He was charming in the specific way of men who have learned to be charming — attentive when he wanted something, warm in public, the kind of person who made a good first impression that took a while to complicate.
The complications had accumulated slowly. The way things happened in our house that I couldn’t quite prove but couldn’t quite dismiss either. The money that moved in ways I didn’t entirely understand, because Derek handled the finances and I had let him, had trusted him, which I now understood as one of the most expensive mistakes I had ever made.
