Chapter 3 - The Plan Nobody Told Him About
The next morning, David found Isaiah sitting at the kitchen counter with a bowl of cereal.
It was barely seven.
Sabrina and Jordan were still asleep.
David made coffee and sat opposite his son.
"Isaiah, I saw the boxes."
The spoon stopped moving.
"Did Sabrina tell you about Aunt Renee?"
Isaiah nodded.
"She said I'd be living there."
David put down his mug.
"When?"
"Before school starts again. She said it'd be better if I went somewhere I could have my own space."
"She told you I agreed?"
"Yeah."
David stared at the counter.
Several months earlier, he and Sabrina had discussed Isaiah possibly spending three weeks with Renee during summer vacation. Isaiah liked visiting his aunt, and David thought a change of scenery might be good.
Nothing had been decided.
They had never discussed moving him out for the school year.
"Did you want to go?" David asked.
Isaiah looked down.
"I thought you wanted me gone."
David couldn't answer immediately.
That silence hurt.
Finally, he said, "No. I don't."
He called Renee.
She answered on the third ring.
"David? Is everything okay?"
"I need to ask you about Isaiah staying with you."
Renee went quiet.
Then she said, "I was hoping you would call me yourself."
David tightened his grip on the phone.
"What do you mean?"
"Sabrina called me last week. She said Isaiah was becoming impossible to handle and that you both thought he needed a different home."
David glanced at his son.
"Did you agree?"
"No. I told her I would always help Isaiah, but I wasn't taking him away from his father because she was having trouble with him."
David stood and walked toward the window.
Renee continued.
"David, she kept saying it would only be for a while. When I asked whether you'd spoken to Isaiah about it, she changed the subject."
After the call, David returned to the counter.
"Renee never agreed to take you."
Isaiah blinked.
"But Sabrina said she already had."
"I know."
The boy stared into his cereal.
David felt anger rising, but another feeling came with it.
Shame.
He had been so determined to keep peace in his second marriage that he'd mistaken the absence of open fighting for a peaceful home.
He asked Isaiah to show him the messages Sabrina had sent during the previous month.
There were reminders about chores. Complaints about dishes. Warnings to be more respectful.
Then David found a message from nine days earlier.
"If you can't appreciate the dinner I make, you can eat upstairs again. Don't make another scene when your father gets home."
Another read:
"Your father works hard enough. Stop creating problems for him."
Isaiah watched his father's face.
"She said I shouldn't bother you."
David handed back the phone.
"I should have made it easier for you to come to me."
He didn't ask Isaiah to forgive him.
Instead, he asked the boy to tell him what had happened to the chest.
Isaiah explained that Sabrina wanted the hallway cleared before Jordan brought home more equipment for his graphic design classes.
He had refused to move his mother's chest to the garage without talking to David.
Sabrina called him ungrateful.
Jordan came downstairs when they began arguing.
Then Sabrina ordered both boys to carry the chest outside.
"It was heavier than we expected," Isaiah said.
David waited.
"We got to the steps. Jordan was mad. He said I was dragging my feet on purpose."
"What happened next?"
Isaiah's eyes filled.
"The chest shifted. I lost my balance."
"And you fell?"
Isaiah nodded.
"Jordan knows why."
David reached across the counter, then stopped, giving Isaiah the choice to take his hand.
After a moment, Isaiah did.
"Did Sabrina help you?"
"No. She said I'd made everything worse. She told me to wash up and stay in my room."
David looked toward the staircase.
His wife had spent the previous evening insisting that the injured child was the problem.
And now he knew the story about Renee had been false.
But one piece still remained unresolved.
What exactly had Jordan done on those steps?
David stood.
"I'm going to speak to Sabrina."
Isaiah's fingers tightened around his hand.
"Dad, if she's really mad, are you going to send me away?"
David crouched beside him.
"Isaiah, this is your home. You are not the one leaving because somebody else refuses to treat you right."
For the first time, Isaiah looked as though he might believe him.
May you like
Then footsteps sounded overhead.
Sabrina was awake.
