I stood just inside the doorway, feeling out of my depth. I was embarrassed at the way he was treating me and blaming myself because I knew I deserved it. He'll never know how much I regret my decision at least ten times a day. Or how I wish daily for a miracle that would erase the past and take us back. Back to the day before the day, I made the biggest mistake of my life.
I stop my thoughts and come back to reality .
Yesterday I had to beg him to let me take the baby back home with me since he didn't have a nursery set up or anything that was suitable for babies to safely sleep on. I wasn't very surprised when he insisted on coming home with us and didn't put up much of a fight even though the thought of him in my now seemingly tiny cottage filled me with anticipation and dread. Not that it would've mattered had I done so.
His behavior, cold as it was made it very clear that he didn't care what I thought and had no interest in my opinion. He'd driven on my tail back to the cottage if he were afraid that I'd drive off into the night, and he'd never see his sons again.
Once back at the cottage, he was back to pretending I didn't exist, and I was just a little jealous at the ease with which my babies accepted him. My little ones seemed starved for male attention, something they never had, and something I honestly never really gave much thought to until I watched them laugh and play with their dad.
I felt like a stranger looking in at the three of them, and nothing had ever felt so lonely. Once the babies had fallen asleep on his daddy's lap , Cadmus had put them to bed in their cribs. I grew increasingly nervous now that the buffer of our children was gone, but I need not have worried. He was there for his sons, and no one else, and my presence was pretty much unnecessary.
I felt like I was in the way, and wasn't even allowed to perform my nightly ritual of holding my babies for a just a little while longer while they slept before putting them to bed for the night. Cadmus hadn't put them down since he took him from the car, except for the drive here, and then he'd snatched them up into his arms again.
He'd slept in the twin's room on the floor next to the cribs as if expecting me to disappear with them in the night. That had hurt more than expected, the fact that he didn't trust me, but what did I expect after what I'd done to him.
He hadn't said two words to me; his only outward reaction apart from the time he spent talking to our sons was his look of disgust when he walked into my cottage for the first time. It's not that my place was a dump or in a bad neighborhood. But for someone who'd been born with a gold spoon in his mouth, I can see why he was annoyed by the fact that his children's first year had been spent in a place that he found less than ideal.
In the morning, he'd awakened with the babies and watched as I fed them, which had been a bit embarrassing since Cayden refuses to take anything but my breasts, in the end, that became the thing that saved me from being separated from him and his brother since his father was hell-bent on taking him and his brother with him.
I'd just taken Cayden off the breast when his dad's voice broke the silence that seemed even heavier with him here in the small space that had offered me so much comfort even the day before, but now felt like a coffin. "Pack some stuff for my sons ; they coming home with me. Not too much, just what they'll need for a day or so before I can get them what they need ." My heart almost fell out of my chest at his words spoken so coldly he could've been talking to the child's nanny for all the inflection in his tone.
"You can't take them away from me; I'm their mother, I'm the only one who's taken care of them their whole life." I held my babies close as if expecting them to be dragged out of my arms any second. Surely he wouldn't be this cruel; he must remember some of the warmth we'd shared. My mind was grasping at straws looking for a way out, so I was not separated from my kids.