Page 20 of Anatomy of Us

When I arrive, Yvonne is already in the room. She flips through papers like she's trying to memorize them by force.

“Ready?” she asks without looking up.

“You know I'm not.”

“Good. Doesn't matter,” she says, snapping the folder shut. “Remember. Neutral. Professional. Short answers. Don't let them bait you. Your ex's lawyer is a damn prick.”

“I know.”

Yvonne looks up, and when she looks at me like that, every alarm in my head goes off.

“You know he'll try to make you look like a bad mother. Selfish. Like you care more about your career than your son. Don't you dare lose your temper.”

“I can do this,” I tell her.

“You can. And you will.”

Inside the room, Nate walks in with his attorney, Matthew Harrington. My ex wears a perfect gray suit, pressed to perfection, hair cut shorter than usual and styled neat. He looks like an ad for a perfect family. The kind of dad who helps at home, does dishes, takes out the trash. The opposite of who he is.

He looks at me for one second. No sadness. No nostalgia. Just contempt.

Harrington is a walking cliché: mid-fifties, very expensive suit, even more expensive watch, shark smile.

“Ms. Méndez,” he says, stopping in front of me.

We sit at the table. Yvonne on my right. Across from us, Nate and his lawyer.

The mediator, Patricia Roberts, takes the head seat. Early sixties, thin glasses, a high-school-teacher voice that doesn't tolerate nonsense because she's seen too much of it.

She opens a brown folder to begin and, right then, the door opens behind me.

Soft steps on the carpet.

I don't turn. I don't need to.

Yvonne tilts her head. Her voice drops to a whisper.

“Is that a friend of yours?”

“Yes,” I admit. “From a long time ago.”

Tessa sits in the back, in one of the chairs against the wall. She can't speak. She can't step in. She can only be there. I guess that's enough, because she shows up to support me when I need it most.

The mediator recites the procedure, explains the difference between mediation and trial in this state, assures us she must protect the child's best interest. I nod because I'm supposed to, but I shake from head to toe.

“Mr. Harrington,” the mediator says. “You may begin.”

The lawyer stands. He opens his folder like he's opening a coffin and sliding me inside.

“Thank you, Ms. Roberts. We are here because my client, Nathan Henderson, has serious concerns about Ms. Méndez's ability to provide a stable and consistent environment for her son, Wesley.”

He pins me with his eyes.

He points without pointing.

“These concerns are based on a pattern of behavior that places professional ambition above the child's welfare. This is not about blaming her,” he adds, but his words drip poison. “As an elite athlete, she has always been trained to put her career ahead of anything else. Her health, her marriage, or in this case, her son's well-being. I suppose that is the price of fame.”

Yvonne squeezes my hand under the table. A breath escapes me, and I pray it isn't obvious. I put my career on hold at its peak because Nate couldn't wait three or four more years for us to have a child. He threatened divorce, and divorce happened anyway.