Page 54 of Daddy to Go

Ryder made a strange choking sound, but I didn’t bother to look at him. Instead, looking down at Mattie’s beautiful eyes, I no longer saw Dr. Rivington. I saw my son, a completely separate person, a baby that needed me to stay strong. He needed me to be tough and to do my best by him. Sure, his dad was back, but were we ready to jump into the frying pan again? I didn’t think so after hearing these weird declarations about a missing letter sent by snail mail.

After all, when it came to my son, I was a protective mama bear. I wanted to protect Mattie from everything that could hurt him, and that included his own father, if it came to that. I no longer knew if I wanted Ryder to be part of Mattie’s life, especially if he was just going to get up one day and leave, and then lie about it. No child deserves that kind of treatment.

I glanced up at him. “You know, all this time you’ve been gone, I justified it in my head. I thought there must have been some good reason for your absence. But I realize now I didn’t do my son any favors by thinking that way because you’ll do the same thing to him. When the hard times come once again, Ryder, what are you going to do? Are you going to leave and blame it on your heightened emotional state? Are you going to go running? What happens to Mattie then?”

He stood there staring at me, with a shocked look. I could see tears forming in his gaze, and it touched me, but I had to force myself not to say anything. Ryder’s tears wouldn’t save him at that point, and frankly, I didn’t know if there was anything that could save him. At least not with me, that is.

I gritted my teeth as he walked toward me and dropped down on his knees. He put his hand on my leg and looked up at me like a lost puppy before bowing his head.

“I’m sorry, Abby. All this time, I had all these feelings for you, but I didn’t really know what I wanted. But standing here watching you with our son, cuddling him, I know exactly what I want.”

I lifted my eyebrows.

“Oh yeah? And what’s that?”

He bit his bottom lip and tightened his hand on my leg. His voice wavered as he spoke, and it was hard not to feel emotional myself.

“I want to work it out with you, Abby. I’ve been thinking of you nonstop for the last year, and I want you and Mattie in my life.”

I stared at him for several seconds, trying to contemplate which way to take the conversation. Part of me wanted to collapse into his lap and tell him yes, absolutely. It would make everything so much simpler. But how could I forget everything that had happened? How could I forget what he said today, and his blatant disrespect for his child’s mother? How do I get past the pain?

Staring at him, I sensed that it wasn’t possible, at least not now. And I had to make a decision based on what was best for our son, and not for me. My face stayed hard like a stone and I looked away from Ryder and down at Mattie.

“I want you to leave,” I whispered. “Please go.”

A lump formed in my throat and tears bubbled up in my eyes. But it was better this way. Dr. Rivington was a confused man, and until he got his head on straight, it was better for me and his son to keep our distance.

I felt him release my leg and I lowered my head, hiding the tears that were already trickling down my cheeks. His footsteps moved toward the door and I jumped slightly as he opened it, before closing it behind him.

Then, I was alone, clutching a baby. I looked down at Mattie.

“You and me, okay big guy? Mommy will always be by your side.”

My son cooed and gurgled, but inside, my heart broke all over again because Ryder had come home, and yet I couldn’t let him back into my heart.

27

Abby

The next day I felt like hell, like I had been through a war. I guess, in a way, I had, seeing the massive dust-up with Ryder. It felt useless to sit around the house, moping. As a result, I gathered up Mattie’s things and wandered across the way to my mom’s house, knowing that Belinda would give her grandson all the attention in the world. I wasn’t even sure if I was ready to talk to her about what had happened, to be honest. Hopefully, I could take a deep breath and let things simmer in my mind for a while.

After all, Belinda had been furious when I told her I was pregnant, and that Ryder had left town. She was disappointed in me, sure, because this is exactly what happened to her so long ago. But when she saw me take responsibility, and begin doing whatever I had to do to take care of my son, she relented and began to pitch in. I was thankful. I really needed my mother, and I was glad to have someone on my side.

After all, my mom loves us. I didn’t even realize the extent of her love until I held Matthew in my arms for the first time. My heart was overwhelmed and swelling, and I knew for the first time, what it was like to be a parent. This kind of love is unconditional, and I knew that I would do anything for my boy.

As a result, I wanted my mom to know how much I appreciated her and all the sacrifices she made to raise Melody and me as a single mom. It couldn’t have been easy, and now that I’m a single mom myself, it only made her love and generosity more apparent.

As I strode across the driveway, I realized that my mom’s car wasn’t there. Hmm. I hadn’t even thought about calling to see if she was going to be home. But then again, Belinda was probably at work, still trying to save up enough money so that Melody could go to any college she wanted to. My mom had offered to give me some money for the baby, but I told her to give it to my sister. My sister would feel resentful if she saw me and the baby getting extra, so it was better to be excruciatingly fair.

I went into the house anyways, and found Melody sitting in the kitchen. Mattie was sound asleep in his carrier so I set it down on the floor and covered him up with a blanket. Melody barely looked at me when I walked in, but she leaned and stared at my son sleeping.

“He’s cute,” she managed in a grudging voice. At least my sister loved the baby. After all, I made a huge deal out of her being an aunt, trying to make my sister feel special when all the focus was on me and my pregnancy. I could tell Melody liked having the title, and I was pretty sure that that alone was what changed her mind about the baby. Yet, she never held him. The only time I could remember her taking him into her arms was in the hospital when he was a newborn.

I didn’t let it bother me though, because Melody has changed a lot in the past year. Somehow, she’s lost a lot of weight, which is good in some respects. It’s just scary to see her subsisting on diet shakes and bananas. Plus, she continued to lose weight to the point where she was looking extremely thin. When she wore a crop top, I could see her ribs poking out. She looked strung out like an emaciated Barbie doll. Of course, I knew better than to tell Melody my thoughts. With me being thirty pounds heavier than before, she would just say I was jealous.

Yet with her weight loss came a lot of other changes too. For some reason, she bleached her hair platinum blonde and started dressing sexy. Personally, I thought her hair look absolutely awful. She bleached it herself, and it had burned her hair to the texture of straw. It looked almost like she was wearing a really cheap wig, but I didn’t tell her that, because she seemed to absolutely love it. Plus, I knew that my opinion didn’t matter to her in the least. She would have told me that I was jealous, which absolutely was not the case.

There wasn’t a single thing about my sister that I was jealous about. Melody had no aspirations, no hopes for her future, and no motivation. Even though I had no idea what her dating life was like, I suspected she was attracting the wrong type of guy with her new look and crass attitude. Of course, I said nothing about this. After all, Melody would just turn on me.