Ghosts with names

It was the smell of leather and rain that pulled me under.

I had been folding Anthony’s laundry, holding a tiny sock in my hand, when the scent hit me unexpectedly and visceral. Tio’s cologne. Or something so close it might as well have been. My knees buckled slightly, and I had to sit on the edge of the bed, sock still clutched in my fist like a lifeline.

I hadn’t smelled that since… the night he left.

Or rather, the night I told him to leave.

I thought I’d burned it all away. The love. The longing. The stupid hope that he would ever choose me—choose us—over the twisted loyalty he had to whatever version of family he believed he was protecting.

But trauma, like perfume, has a way of lingering in the fibers.

Kay had been texting me all week, saying I needed to talk to someone. Not Doc. Not her. Not Joe. Someone else. Someone “neutral.” I knew what she meant, and I knew she was right. But I didn’t want a therapist. I didn’t want a sterile room and someone scribbling in a notebook while I tried to explain why I let the father of my child walk away.

I wanted closure.

So, I made a call I swore I never would.

And now, here I was. Sitting in a cold visitor's room with white walls and too many security cameras, waiting for the man who once promised me the stars.

When Tio finally walked in, it was like a mirror cracking down the middle.

He looked older. Tired. But still disarmingly handsome in that way that used to make me forgive everything.

He sat across from me, hands cuffed, chained to the table. His eyes met mine, unsure at first, then softened like they always did. I hated that I still noticed.

“Andy,” he said, like it was a prayer. Or a curse.

“I’m not here for a reunion,” I said flatly, but my voice shook.

“I didn’t think you were.”

We stared at each other, the silence heavy with all the things we’d left unsaid.

“You ruined everything,” I said finally. “I trusted you with our son.”

“I didn’t know,” he said quickly. “You never told me—”

“Because I couldn’t, Tio!” I snapped, my voice echoing off the sterile walls. “Because you were too deep in that world. Because I saw what it did to your father, to your brother. Because I wasn’t going to let Anthony grow up thinking love looked like fear.”

His face crumpled, but he didn’t argue. He let it land.

“I loved you,” he said quietly. “I still do.”

I looked down at the table. There it was. The part that still hurt the most.

“Love without safety isn’t love,” I whispered.

He didn’t reply.

“I came because I needed to say it out loud. I needed to stop pretending I was okay. That I don’t think about you when Anthony does that thing with his smile or when he gets that little crease in his forehead when he’s mad. He’s so much like you. And I hate how much I still want you to be the man I thought you could be.”

Tio’s eyes filled with tears. “I wanted to be him, Andy. For you. For him. But I couldn’t get out in time.”

I nodded slowly. “That’s the thing about timing. It doesn’t wait for you to figure yourself out.”

Silence settled between us again.

“I wrote a letter to the court,” I said, more to the table than to him. “I didn’t testify. But I told them about the good you tried to do. How you kept certain people away from me even when it cost you. How you chose me, it was just too late. They might show leniency.”

He looked at me like I had handed him a miracle.

“I didn’t do it for you,” I said gently. “I did it for Anthony. Someday he’ll ask about you. I want to be able to say something that doesn’t make him feel broken before he even understands what that means.”

Tio nodded slowly. “Will you… ever let me see him?”

“I don’t know,” I said honestly. “Maybe. When he’s older. When I’m ready.”

He nodded again, like even a maybe was more than he deserved.

“I’m getting married,” I said suddenly, not even sure why I told him.

His face faltered for a split second. “To the doctor?”

I nodded.

“Do you love him?”

I paused. “I’m trying to. He’s good. He’s safe. He’s the kind of man I want Anthony to grow up looking up to.”

Tio looked down at the table. “Then you’re doing the right thing.”

There was nothing left to say after that.

When I stood, he didn’t ask for a hug. He didn’t beg or plead or try to fix what had been broken too long ago. He just looked up at me and whispered, “Take care of our boy.”

I left the room before I could fall apart.

Back at Doc’s house, I found Anthony curled up with Joe, watching a cartoon and babbling about dinosaurs. When he saw me, he jumped up and ran toward me like gravity didn’t exist.

I caught him, held him tight, and breathed him in like air after drowning.

“Hi, Mama!”

“Hi, my heart.”

He cupped my cheeks in his small, sticky hands and gave me a kiss on the nose. I smiled through the sting of salt behind my eyes.

Doc stepped into the room just then, his eyes finding mine. He must’ve seen something different there, because his smile faltered.

“You okay?” he mouthed.

I nodded. I was okay. Maybe for the first time in a long time.

But I also knew this wasn’t over.

Not yet.