Luke closed his eyes.
“Because I wanted to leave first.”
“Why?”
When he looked at me again, tears were streaming down his face.
“Because leaving hurts less when you’re the one who decides when it happens.”
I couldn’t speak.
Luke had spent years making sure he was always the one who walked away.
Being abandoned had hurt too much.
So he had decided no one would ever get the chance to leave him first.
Then he whispered something else.
“I was going to do it to you.”
My heart stopped.
“What?”
“When I moved in, I had a plan.”
He couldn’t look at me.
“Stay a couple months. Let everyone get comfortable. Then change. Start pushing you away. Make you give up.”
His voice broke.
“So I could leave before you decided you didn’t want me anymore.”
I should have felt hurt.
Instead, I almost laughed through my tears.
Because the boy describing that plan was clearly not the same boy sitting at my table now.
“But you didn’t do it.”
“I messed up.”
“How?”
“I liked it here.”
He covered his face.
“I liked you.”
His shoulders started shaking.
“I liked the porch and your meatloaf and how you didn’t make everything into a huge thing.”
Then he broke completely.
“And then I started loving you.”
I stood and went around the table.
“And when the adoption became final,” he cried, “all I could think was that Emma would find out.”
He struggled to breathe.
“She’d think I chose you instead of her.”
I pulled him against me.
For years, this boy had tried to make himself small.
Polite.
Easy.
Perfect.
Now he finally collapsed.
Four years of grief came pouring out against my shoulder.
“You should have told me,” I whispered.
“I know.”
“But listen to me.”
I pulled back.
“You are my son.”
He stared at me.
“You are not going anywhere.”
His face crumpled.
“Adoption is not a trial period, Luke. You cannot misbehave your way out of being my child.”
A small broken laugh escaped him.
“You’re stuck with me forever.”
His entire body seemed to loosen.
And while I held him, I made myself a promise.
I was going to find Emma.
—NEXT PAGE
