Is he thinking about the baby? The child he won’t even be living with when it sleeps in that very crib?

Until this moment, I wasn’t sure if he even wanted to be a part of the baby’s life. But the look on his face proves to me that he does. I’ve never seen so much sadness in one expression, and I’m not even facing him straight on. I feel like the sadness he’s feeling in this moment has absolutely nothing to do with me and everything to do with thoughts of his child.

He glances up and sees me standing in the doorway. He pushes off the crib and shakes himself out of his trance. “Finished,” he says, waving a hand toward the crib. He begins putting his tools back inside the tool case. “Is there anything else you need while I’m here?”

I shake my head as I walk over to the crib and admire it. Since I don’t know if it’s a boy or a girl, I decided to go with a nature theme. The bedding set is tan and green with pictures of plants and trees all over it. It matches the curtains and will eventually match a mural I plan to paint on the wall at some point. I also plan to fill the nursery with a few live plants from the shop. I can’t help but smile, finally seeing it all start to come together. He even put up the mobile. I reach up and turn it on and Brahms’s Lullaby begins to play. I stare at it as it makes a full spin and then I glance back at Ryle. He’s standing a few feet away, just watching me.

As I stare back at him, I think about how easy it is for humans to make judgments when we’re standing on the outside of a situation. I spent years judging my mother’s situation.

It’s easy when we’re on the outside to believe that we would walk away without a second thought if a person mistreated us. It’s easy to say we couldn’t continue to love someone who mistreats us when we aren’t the ones feeling the love of that person.

When you experience it firsthand, it isn’t so easy to hate the person who mistreats you when most of the time they’re your godsend.

Ryle’s eyes gain a little bit of hope, and I hate that he can see that my walls are temporarily lowered. He begins to take a slow step toward me. I know he’s about to pull me to him and hug me, so I take a quick step away from him.

And just like that, the wall is back up between us.

Allowing him back inside this apartment was a huge step for me in itself. He needs to realize that.

He hides whatever rejection he’s feeling with a stoic expression. He tucks the toolbox under his arm and then grabs the box the crib came in. It’s filled with all the trash from everything he opened and put together. “I’ll take this to the Dumpster,” he says, walking toward the door. “If you need help with anything else, just let me know, okay?”