The Years He Couldn't Give Back

Adrian waited near the rear corridor, beyond the room where the trophies had been stored.

Claire saw him before he saw her. For a moment he stood with his head lowered, one hand braced against the wall. Then Ethan said something, and he straightened.

Noah noticed him too.

His fingers moved from the trophy handle to Claire's hand.

"Are we stopping?" he asked.

She looked at Adrian, then down at her son.

"Only if you don't mind waiting with Tessa for a few minutes."

"In the car?"

"Yes. You can pick the music."

He considered the offer. "Not the sad playlist."

Tessa raised a hand. "I have other playlists."

"You didn't last time."

Claire kissed him goodbye for the length of a corridor, not a night, and watched them reach the exterior door. Ben walked with them to the car. Ethan remained far enough away that they wouldn't have to pass him closely.

Adrian approached only after Claire turned back.

"I won't keep you long."

"What do you need to say?"

He looked toward the door through which Noah had gone.

"I didn't know he'd been threatened. Not until Ethan brought me the material."

"I reported it."

"I know that now."

"You keep telling me what you didn't know."

He accepted the blow without looking away.

"Then let me tell you what I do know. The original video from three years ago doesn't support what I authorized. I should have reviewed it before I acted."

Claire rested her bag against her hip.

"You should have spoken to me."

"Yes."

The simple agreement hurt more than she expected. She had imagined arguments. She knew what to do with an argument.

"I called you," she said. "Not once. Not in a fit of temper. I called, and I wrote, and I sent the names of people who'd been there."

"I saw some of the correspondence afterward."

"I don't mean afterward. I mean then."

His mouth tightened.

"I was angry."

"At me. Without asking me what happened."

"Yes."

A crew member appeared at the end of the corridor, saw them, and turned back. Claire wondered how many times people had done that while she and Adrian were together. How much privacy had looked like respect when it was really fear of inconveniencing him.

"If Noah hadn't looked like you," she asked, "would you have reopened the file?"

Adrian didn't answer immediately.

She waited.

"I don't know," he said.

"I do."

"Claire—"

"I was already telling the truth. I didn't start telling it when you discovered a child you wanted."

He drew a breath and let it out slowly.

"You're right."

She looked away. Beyond a window at the end of the hall, evening light lay across the loading area. Someone was folding a table beneath it. The show was ending, whether she finished this conversation or not.

"What can I do?" Adrian asked.

"Stop making every answer something you get to arrange."

"I'm asking you."

She faced him again.

"Your attorneys paused the testing request. They didn't withdraw the proposed parenting demands. Mara checked. You're still asking for things as though you've already been part of his life."

"I want to be part of it."

"Then wanting will have to come before having. For once."

He looked down at his hands.

She remembered those hands repairing the loose hinge on her kitchen cupboard years ago. He had arrived after a bad audition with takeout, listened while she complained, and found a screwdriver without being asked. There had been tenderness. Remembering it didn't change what followed.

Perhaps that was what had taken her so long to understand. A person could have loved you in some moments and still have failed you when it mattered.

"The day you left," Adrian said. "You came to my office first."

Claire went still.

"Ethan found a visitor entry when we were checking dates. You never came in."

"Vivian was there."

"You heard us."

"Enough."

His expression shifted.

"What did you hear?"

She looked at him, tired suddenly of protecting the memory from detail.

"That you should have put her first a long time ago. That you knew how much she'd waited. I had a hospital report in my bag. I stood outside trying to decide whether to knock."

Adrian's lips parted.

"Claire."

"I waited for someone to open the door. Then I realized I didn't want to be standing there when you did."

"I should have come after you."

"You called twice. I didn't answer. Then you stopped."

"You said you wanted it over."

"I did."

They stood with that truth. She had left. She had chosen not to tell him. She could own those decisions without accepting the destruction he had brought into her life later.

"Noah asked me why you made me stop working," she said. "I couldn't give him an answer that made sense. Not because he isn't old enough. Because I couldn't find one."

Adrian closed his eyes briefly.

"I can't undo it."

"No."

"But I can correct the record. Restore the contracts where that's possible. Pay what you lost."

"Mara can discuss losses with your counsel. Don't confuse that with us."

His gaze lifted to hers.

For the first time, she saw him understand that a businesslike settlement might be all she was willing to accept from him. Not tonight's obstacle to another conversation. The shape of the conversation itself.

"And Noah?" he asked.

"He's five. He knows you frightened me. He watched you arrive and tell people to move. Then your mother came and blamed me in front of him. You need to understand what you've actually introduced him to."

Adrian swallowed.

"I won't force a meeting."

"Tell your attorneys that. In writing. And don't send your mother to change my mind."

"I didn't send her."

"Then tell her to stop coming anyway."

He nodded.

Claire picked up the bag she had set down without noticing.

"If there is ever a next step with Noah, we'll discuss it properly. Slowly. He won't be brought somewhere so adults can decide what he ought to feel."

"All right."

She started toward the door.

"Claire."

She stopped but didn't turn fully.

"I'm sorry."

The words were quiet. They didn't fill the corridor or change the years behind her. She had wanted them once with a hunger that embarrassed her now.

Tonight, she heard them.

That was all she could give him.

Outside, Noah had fallen asleep in the back seat, trophy propped safely in the footwell. Tessa sat behind the wheel with the radio barely audible.

Claire slipped into the seat beside her son and fastened her belt.

"You okay?" Tessa asked.

"Ready to go."

Noah stirred when the car crossed the first speed bump. His hand searched the seat between them. Claire put her fingers into his, and he settled without opening his eyes.

She watched the studio buildings pass through the window. For weeks, every entrance had meant checking who was waiting, what had changed, which version of her life someone had decided to film.

Tonight, she didn't turn around to look at the doors.

Inside the building, Adrian called Ethan back before his assistant reached the exit.

"Tell counsel to withdraw the current demands," he said. "Future contact goes through her attorney. No visits she hasn't agreed to."

Ethan studied him for a moment, then nodded.

Through the glass, Adrian could see the car waiting while Claire adjusted something around the child in the back seat.

Then the brake lights went out, and they left.