Unmatched Wife: Not His To Claim Anymore novel Chapter 162

Chapter 162

MATTHEW

Theo was already awake when I got up.

That was the first unusual thing. Normally I was the one who went to his room at six–forty–five and found him in the intermediate state between sleep and waking, conducting his private morning review of whatever he’d been thinking about the night before. Normally I was the one who initiated the day.

This morning, when I came downstairs at six–thirty, Theo was already at the kitchen table in his pajamas with his red bag open in front of him, sorting through Daniel’s borrowed books with the focused efficiency of someone who had plans and needed to organize before they could begin.

He looked up when I appeared in the doorway.

“I was being quiet,” he said immediately, which told me he’d been aware that being downstairs before me was a departure from routine and had decided to preemptively address it.

“You were,” I said. “I didn’t hear you at all. How long have you been up?”

He considered this with the seriousness he brought to questions about time, which was a concept he was still developing a precise relationship with. “A while,” he said. “I woke up and I wasn’t tired anymore so I came down.”

“Did you sleep okay?”

“Really okay,” he said, and the way he said it–the mild surprise in it, like he was reporting something that had exceeded his expectations–made something shift in my chest. “I didn’t wake up at all. Not even once.”

ked at him for a moment. His hair was still sleep–rumpled and he had a slight crease on his cheek from the pillow and he

ing at the kitchen table at sixty in the morning sorting dinosaur books with the energy of someone who’d woken up

d the day worth gettin

ed lighter than he

ixed. I wasn’t

ef, about the

pressing on

I made

He

word, not after everything Dr. Fisher had taught me about the non–linearity of and backward and sideways all at once. But lighter. Like something that had been weight overnight.

d listened to him talk.

golden retriever had apparently occupied significant space in his thinking overnight, and the ed yesterday had been refined overnight into something considerably more detailed. He’d saurs he would bring, which ones were approp

eping away from home versus which

ld tell the difference between

r usual positions, and he had questions abou ur figures or whether they just saw them all

ncern,” I said, turning the eggs. “I’d keer

he same thing,” Theo said, with the relie nitely stays home. But the smaller ones

approach.”

he said, “Daniel said Biscuit knows

s an impressive skill.”

1. ne.

at reasoning had been validated. “The

andshake. With his paw.

now. I’ve never shaken h

n his experience with the same seriousness he brought to

alt

Chapter 162

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all genuine gaps. “I think I’ll be good at it. I’m good at handshakes.”

He was, actually. He’d decided at some point in the past year that handshakes were important and had practiced them with me until he’d developed a grip that was firm without being aggressive and was accompanied by appropriate eye contact. Bianca had laughed the first time she’d seen him deploy it on a pack member at a formal function, that particular laugh she had when something delighted her more than she’d expected.

I plated the eggs and brought them to the table and sat across from him and we ate, and he talked, and I listened, and it was so close to normal that I had to work to stay in it rather than hold it at arm’s length the way I’d learned to hold good things recently, afraid of what it cost when they ended.

Just have it, Dr. Martinez had told me, more than once. Just let yourself be in the good moment without auditing it. The audit comes afterward and it will tell you the same thing: it was good. That’s enough.

I was in it. I was trying.

After breakfast, Theo went upstairs to get dressed with unusual speed for a child who generally treated the transition from pajamas to school clothes as a negotiation requiring multiple stages. He came back down in eight minutes, fully dressed, shoes on the correct feet, red bag over both shoulders, Daniel’s books carefully redistributed within it to balance the weight.

“Ready,” he announced.

I looked at the clock. We had twelve minutes before we needed to leave, which was an unprecedented surplus.

“We have some time,” I said.

“I know.” He put his bag down beside the door with the precision of someone who’d decided exactly where it needed to be for efficient retrieval. “Dad. Have you thought about Biscuit?”

“I’ve been thinking about Biscuit,” I said.

my son standing by the door in his school clothes with his carefully packed bag, asking me about a sleepover with the of a child who’d decided that asking clearly was better than hinting around the edges. Three months ago, he’d been ne to stay by his bed until he fell asleep because the dark felt too empty. Two months ago, he’d been calling Dr. Fisher school because something in a story had made him think about Bianca and he’d needed to talk it through before he could back to class.

This morning he’d woken up ea He was asking about a sleepo

“I’ll talk to Daniel’s moth

asn’t tired anymore. He’d packed his bag with the books his friend had lent him. ce that assumed the world would generally cooperate with reasonable requests.

some details. If everything seems okay, we’ll work something out.

CO

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