I didn’t call my father. I called Diane.
It was an hour’s drive for her. While I waited, it got dark, and I didn’t want to sit outside alone, so the clerk let me sit on the floor behind the counter. I sat back there and watched the door, and every time headlights swung into the lot, I sat up thinking it was his truck coming back for me.
It never was.
When Diane walked in, she didn’t ask me a single question. She knelt down, put her hand on my shoulder, and said, “You’re staying with me now.”
The next week, she went to a family law attorney in town and filed for emergency custody. I remember sitting in a waiting room that smelled like burnt coffee while she signed paper after paper.
My father didn’t fight it, not even a little. He signed the custody transfer like he was returning something to the store. I never got a phone call or a letter, or even a box with the rest of my clothes. Diane had to drive over herself and load my things from the front porch, where Cheryl had already stacked them in trash bags.
