He Betrayed Me in Court to Win a Game

My husband had just accepted a dare from his childhood sweetheart, Tessa: tomorrow, in court, he would prove I was unfit to be a mother.

"Don't make that face. Everyone's watching. I can't back down now." He said it as if my fitness for motherhood was just another chip he could cash in for a night of applause. He'd even planned the ending for me—raise a few "small concerns" at the hearing, then walk it back next week.

But tomorrow was my final adoption hearing. The one I had been waiting for. For five years, I had put up with him and Tessa's dares—until this year, when Tessa smiled and raised the stakes: "Tell everyone she's not fit to be a mother at all." He never turned down a dare. He looked right at her and laughed. "Why wouldn't I?"

I clenched the family photo in my pocket until the paper crinkled, then reminded him, one word at a time. "What gets decided tomorrow isn't whether you embarrass yourself. It's whether I get to be a mother." And if he really opened his mouth in court, what would be left of us to repair?