My son drew a picture in therapy that made the counselor stop smiling.
She slid it across the table without a word.
Three stick figures – and one had X’s for eyes.
I’ve been raising Dylan alone for two years, since his father Mark and I split.
He’s seven, quiet, the kind of kid who watches doorways more than he plays.
The custody schedule gives Mark every other weekend, nothing more, and I fought hard for that arrangement.
Dr. Patterson had been seeing Dylan for a month, just to help him adjust.
I never expected her to call me in for a special session.
The drawing showed our kitchen, our fridge, our exact magnets.
One figure was small – Dylan.
One was tall with yellow hair – me.
The third had brown hair, X’s for eyes, and something dark scribbled across his mouth.
“Who is this?” I asked, pointing.
“Daddy’s friend,” Dylan said. “She comes when you go to work.”
I told myself kids draw scary things, that it didn’t mean anything.
But that night I couldn’t sleep.
I kept thinking about the times Dylan came home from Mark’s house too quiet, refusing dinner, checking the locks himself.
The next weekend I picked Dylan up early, before Mark expected me.
A woman answered the door in one of my old bathrobes.
The one I thought I’d lost in the divorce boxes.
She said her name was Renee and that she was “just watching Dylan for the afternoon.”
Something cold moved through me.
I called Mark’s phone right there in the doorway, and it rang inside the house, on the kitchen counter, next to a school folder with DYLAN written on it in handwriting that wasn’t mine or Mark’s.
I asked Renee how long she’d been coming around.
She looked at Dylan, then back at me, and her face went pale.
“You don’t know, do you,” she said. “About the custody paperwork Mark filed last month.”
MARK HAD PETITIONED FOR FULL CUSTODY, and Renee was listed as his “support witness.”
My legs stopped working.
I didn’t even get to ask what she meant before Dylan tugged my sleeve and said, “Mommy, she’s the one who told me not to tell you about the trip.”
For another look at how kids can sometimes see things adults miss, check out My Six-Year-Old Said the Neighbor “Smells Like Daddy’s Truck.” I Told Her She Was Imagining Things., or for more stories about difficult situations, read The Nurse I Overruled Brought a Second Folder to My Hearing and Am I Wrong for Recording a Hospital Meeting Without Telling Anyone?.
