It went on like that all through winter and the beginning of spring. Sometimes he'd come with me, sometimes he wouldn't. There was no rhyme or reason to it. There was no way of knowing beforehand. No way of planning anything in advance. It was either a good day or a bad day. My stomach was in knots every other Saturday, just like when I was taking exams, just like when I was defending clients, I'd throw up before leaving the house.

When I couldn't get him to come with me, I'd go to the police to file a report. It was my lawyer who told me to do that, even though after doing it ten times I couldn't really see the point. I'd wait for hours. I'd waste my whole Saturday. The police were no strangers to this kind of situation. Often, the guy taking my statement would stop typing and tell me his own story. It was always the same. I'm starting to get used to it. We're one big family, those of us who walk out and end up losing our kids. They don't tell me everything's going to be OK. They know. That's something I realized recently. The cop in front of me is telling me that the justice system kills families. He says there comes a point where it's just too late, childhood goes by so fast.

When Paul did come, the time passed too quickly, and yet we didn't quite know what to do with ourselves, it was happy and sad at the same time. On the way home, when we were packing our things, when we were getting in the taxi or train, when we were making the same trip as the day before but in the opposite direction, we'd both slow down, talk less, stop smiling. On the train, he'd put his head on my shoulder, he'd fall asleep on me, sometimes I'd fall asleep too. When I got back, I went home, there was nobody waiting for me, I isolated myself, I waited for the sadness to subside, I waited for the depression to pass before going out, I wondered what the point of these weekends was, whether it was actually worse than not seeing him at all.

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