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“What about your dad?” I ask quietly.

Kara shrugs. “He’s always been scared to disagree with her, despite whatever he actually thinks. Such a peacekeeper. I don’t think I know his opinion on anything.”

“Why don’t we tell them separately? We can talk to Pierre first, and hope he handles it better than she will.”

Kara leans in and presses a kiss to my lips.

“I don’t know, but we can try.” Another soft kiss. “Thank you.”

40

Pierre takes it so well. Apparently all he needed was to put some divorce papers into play in order to gain his own opinion, because he’s ecstatic that his daughter is happily married. He hugs me so many times I lose count, and he insists on paying for the dinner we invited him to. He offers to do it again, says the three of usmustget together often.

If my dad went years without genuinely smiling at me, and then turned into this overnight? It would be overwhelming in the best way, and that’s exactly how my wife is feeling.

Kara is lit from within, more alive than I think I’ve ever seen her. I can’t fully imagine being as strong as she’s been, or what it's like for her to feel like things are finally working out for the better.

I’m thinking we should have told her mom first, and saved the best for last, but it’s too late now. I’m scared. I was nervous about meeting with him, but I’m terrified of Colleen.

Rightfully so.

The woman before us is doing the most aggressive pacing I’ve ever seen in my life. Her red stilettos tap harshly against her polished, white tiled floors.

We’re sitting at a counter, in a kitchen that looks like it has never been used despite its size. Baking would be so much easier for me if I had this much counter space, I’m drooling at the thought.

It’s the only thing I like about this mini-mansion. It’s cold and void of any color orlife. Amelia should be allowed inside, she could make it feel a lot less like a prison. Or an insane asylum, because I’m definitely going insane just looking at the tall, bare walls.

“You’re getting it annulled. I’ll take you myself,” Colleen states once she’s standing in place.

Kara scoffs a laugh.

“No. We’re not doing that.”

“Yes, you are. You simple minded, girl.” The sentence feels like a gut punch and it wasn’t even directed at me.Who talks like that?“I’m not going to have you embarrass me anymore than you already have. This–” she gestures between us– “is not happening.”

“You must have missed the memoyearsago, but I’ve made it pretty obvious that I don’t care about embarrassing you.”

“Of course you don’t, you’ve always been absurdly ungrateful,” she says with a roll of her eyes. I hate to even think it, to compare the two of them at all, but that’s exactly where Kara gets it. “This is too far. When you got divorced, I did my best to look the other way and let you navigate things. It was challenging for me, I could not believe you screwed up such a good thing like that.”

“It wasn’t a good thing,” Kara says through gritted teeth. “Separatingwasthe good part.”

“Stop speaking to me like that! You walked into my house to speak with me, and you’ll do it with respect,” she demands.

“Do something that makes you worthy of my respect first.”

There is fear deep in my bones at the way the words make Colleen seethe. The temperature in the room feels like it goes up ten degrees. I’m starting to sweat, and panic, and it’s not pretty.

“I raised you! I don’t know how you turned out like this, but–”

“You did not! You showed up a couple times a month to tell me what a disappointment I was. Stop with the bullshit.”

“If that’s how you feel, then maybe you shouldn’t have been so pathet–”

“Okay, we’re done here,” I decide sternly.

I can’t just sit here and watch them argue and insult each other. I can’t just let this monster of a woman talk to my wife like that.

“No one is talking to you, you can leave at any time,” Colleen says without even glancing my way.