And now I didn’t know who I was.
“You should have thought about that before you fooled Mom.
His face strained.
I know.
No, you don’t know.
I made a terrible mistake.
One mistake is to forget an anniversary. Six months is a choice.
He looked away.
My words seemed to strike him harder than I expected.
I walked back to the door.
“Open it.
This time he pulled a small remote control out of his pocket and pressed a button.
The lock was opened immediately.
I stared at it.
So you could have opened it all this time?
“Yes.
I felt a surge of rage.
You let me think I was trapped.
“I wasn’t going to hurt you.
That’s not the problem.
I pushed the door to open it.
“Please don’t tell your mother that I forced you to stay.
I turned around.
You didn’t physically force me.
I paused.
“But you lied to say that Mom was here. You used his phone. You brought me to a private place because you knew I would otherwise never have agreed to have this conversation.
He didn’t say anything.
That’s still manipulation.
His shoulders sank.
I walked to my car and drove straight to my aunt’s house.
Mom opened the door before she could even call.
As soon as he saw my face, he knew.
“Did he tell you?”
I nodded.
He closed his eyes.
I asked him not to get involved.
For the first time that day, I started crying.
He hugged me.
I thought something had happened to you.
“I’m sorry.
Why didn’t you answer the phone?
He let out a little bitter laugh.
Because he had it.
We sat together for hours.
He told me everything.
Not in a dramatic way.
Not with anger.
Just, little by little.
The adventure.
The lies.
The discussions.
The promises he made and then broke.
And then he said something I’ll never forget.
“You can love someone and still recognize that what they did was wrong.
That phrase stayed with me.
My stepfather had been part of my life for twelve years.
That shared story didn’t go away in a single afternoon.
But it didn’t go away either what I had done.
A week later, he moved out of the house.
It was months before I spoke to him again.
When I finally did, we met in a crowded coffee shop.
