Chapter 6
Mediation was in a building off West End that looked like a dentist's office, with gray carpet and a coffee machine that hummed too loud. The mediator was a woman named Ms. Alston, early fifties, soft cardigan, no robe, no gavel. She had us in separate rooms, which Patel said was normal when there was tension. I was in Room A with Patel and a box of tissues. Daniel was in Room B with his attorney, a man named Mr. Yates who carried a leather folder.
Ms. Alston started with me. "Emma, what does a good outcome look like for you?" she asked, pen ready.
I had practiced this with Patel. "Lexi stays with me primarily. The new baby stays with me. Daniel sees Lexi regularly, but safe. And the money is split fairly. Not him taking everything because I was scared."
She wrote it down. "Safe means what, specifically?"
"Not overnight at his place until it's actually ready for a kid. No Kelsey making decisions about Lexi. No moves without telling me. And no disappearing money."
She nodded. "And if he offered to return the funds?"
"That's not enough if Lexi isn't safe," I said.
She went to the other room. I could hear the murmur through the wall but not words. Patel squeezed my hand once and whispered, "Two-line answer. Don't negotiate against yourself."
Ms. Alston came back after twenty minutes with an offer. She set it down like it was fragile.
"Mr. Carter will return the $9,500 to the joint account within seven days, plus provide receipts for every dollar. He'll set up Lexi's room with a real bed this weekend, documented by Ms. Keller. In exchange, he wants joint custody, fifty-fifty, week on week off, starting after the baby is born. Holidays alternating. Both names on school decisions."
Patel looked at me. I felt the baby shift and my back ache from the cheap chair.
"He wants to buy joint custody with my own money?" I asked, quieter than I meant to.
Ms. Alston tilted her head. "He frames it as correcting the financial issue so the parenting issue can be equal."
"Lexi had to talk to a judge," I said. My throat was dry. "She had to look at those photographs. He didn't have to do that. I offered to take less so she wouldn't have to, and the judge said no because it wasn't safe to let me trade my safety for his comfort. I'm not doing it now in this room either."
Patel put her hand lightly on the table. "Our answer is no on fifty-fifty. We will accept return of funds to be held in trust pending final division, immediate compliance with Keller's housing checklist, and continuation of supervised to unsupervised stepped-up plan only after evaluation. Primary remains with Ms. Carter."
Ms. Alston wrote, left again. The coffee machine hissed.
Ten minutes later she returned, her mouth tighter. "Mr. Carter says you are punishing him for having a girlfriend. He says Kelsey is good with Lexi and Keller is biased. He won't accept stepped-up supervised. He says if you won't do fifty-fifty, he'll see you at trial and ask for it there, and ask for the house."
"Let him ask," Patel said, but she was looking at me to make sure I meant it.
I did. I thought about the Kroger parking lot, the blow-up mattress, Lexi's hot chocolate in chambers, the envelope Whitaker held against her chest like something that could hurt a child if it was opened carelessly.
"Tell him no," I said. My voice didn't shake this time. "We can go to trial."
Ms. Alston capped her pen. "Then mediation is at impasse."
She wrote the one-page report while we sat there. Impasse. No agreement. Recommend custody evaluation and final hearing.
Daniel walked past my open door on his way out. He didn't stop, but he looked in. His face was no longer smug at all, and not just anxious either. It was angry in a way that tried to look calm.
"You could have had the money back today," he said to me, not to Patel, not to Ms. Alston.
I held my stomach with one hand. "I need Lexi safe more than I need money," I said.
He stared for a second, then Yates touched his elbow and moved him down the hall. The door to the elevator closed.
Ms. Alston gave me the copy of the report. At the bottom, in her neat hand, she had written: Parties unable to reconcile financial restoration with parenting time. No safety-based compromise offered by Father.
Outside, the air was cold for October. Patel walked me to my car and waited while I got in, the way she always did now, like she wanted to make sure I actually left the lot okay.
May you like
"I'm proud of you in there," she said. "That was the right line to hold."
I put my hands on the wheel. "I know," I said. And I did, even though I was already counting how I'd make rent again this month without that $9,500 yet returned.
