Chapter 34 - Nothing to Prove
The family lawyer’s name was Marisol Bennett.
She spoke to Lena first.
I liked her immediately for that.
“What are you hoping for?” she asked.
Lena glanced toward me, then back.
“I want the legal relationship to match the life we’ve been living.”
Marisol nodded.
“And the boys?”
“They asked about it.”
“That matters. We’ll make sure they understand what you’re considering in language that makes sense to them.”
There were documents to gather.
Questions about our family history.
Conversations about what adoption would mean and which arrangements already existed.
Marisol explained the process without promising that anything would happen simply because we wanted it.
I took notes.
Lena asked better questions.
Over the next several weeks, we worked through what was needed.
Nothing moved at the speed Noah expected.
“Have they finished reading yet?” he asked one afternoon.
“Not everything.”
“How much can there be?”
I looked at the folder on my desk.
“You’d be surprised.”
He regarded the paperwork with personal resentment.
Then he began bringing Lena things.
A glass of water.
Her slippers.
A biscuit wrapped in a napkin and presented with the solemnity of a diplomatic gift.
At first, she smiled.
By the fourth day, she looked worried.
“What’s happening, sweetheart?”
“Nothing.”
That evening, he refused to argue with Nico over a game he normally defended with ferocious attention to detail.
He even offered Isabel the last piece of garlic bread.
Lena found him folding a blanket badly enough to suggest intent rather than habit.
She sat beside him.
“You’ve been working very hard.”
He shrugged.
“Is there something you think you need to do?”
His hands stopped.
I stood in the doorway.
Neither of them noticed me.
“What if they ask whether we’re difficult?”
Lena’s face softened.
“Who?”
“The people deciding.”
“Oh, Noah.”
He looked down.
“I can be better.”
She moved the blanket aside.
“You don’t have to earn this by being easy.”
“But what if you change your mind?”
“I haven’t.”
“You could.”
She was quiet for a moment.
Then she said, “I know you leave socks under the couch. I know you argue about bedtime. I know you sometimes say you brushed your teeth when the toothbrush is dry.”
His eyes lifted.
“I know who you are,” she continued. “That’s who I’m saying yes to.”
His face crumpled.
She held him while he cried.
Later, we spoke again with his therapist about the fear beneath his sudden good behavior.
At home, we kept our routines.
Homework.
Dinner.
Disagreements.
Apologies.
Nobody became a model child to improve the application.
One Saturday, Noah shouted that I was the least fair father in Virginia because I would not extend his screen time.
Lena raised an eyebrow at me.
May you like
I waited until he had stomped upstairs.
Then, quietly, I smiled.
