The shampoo bottle slipped from my hand and clattered against the tub. I forced my mouth into something that resembled a smile.
“Pinky promise you won’t tell Daddy.”
“Oh? Where does Daddy sleep, honey?”
“Oh? Where does Daddy sleep, honey?”
“He drops me off at the campground’s sleepover program with Miss Jenny and the other kids,” Toby said cheerfully. “Remember? The one you signed my paper for? We sleep in the kids’ tents near the activity cabin. Daddy says I’m a big boy now, and then he comes back in the morning.”
I hooked my pinky around his tiny wet one.
“But it’s a secret, Mommy. Pinky promise you won’t tell Daddy I said anything.”
The image arrived before I could stop it.
I rinsed his hair, wrestled him into dinosaur pajamas, and read his truck book. My voice sounded almost normal.
Three months. Every other Friday. Six nights he’d told me he was sleeping beside our son when he’d been somewhere else entirely.
