He flinched slightly at my words and looked down at the table. An ache spread through me.

No. Fuck that ache. He deserves this.

“I deserved that,” he said.

“Finally, something we agree on.” I rolled my eyes and sat back in my chair, my arms still crossed.

“This isn’t easy for me either, you know,” he said softly. “For years, I’ve thought about what I would say to you if given the chance. Now here you are, sitting right in front of me, but my brain is paralyzed. I know that nothing I say will justify the decision I made five years ago and I’m not trying to justify it. I just want you to know where I’m coming from.”

I didn’t give a rat’s ass where he was coming from, nor did I want to hear it, but I knew that he wasn’t going to back down until I let him explain himself. In that moment, I decided to keep my trap closed and let him get whatever it was out. Then I would let him have it.

“I know you knew I was drinking back then, but you had no idea how much. I was out of control. I would go to work and put in just my eight-hour shift, even though overtime was always available. I couldn’t wait to get out of there and go drink.”

Remembering back to how much we went without because of how tight our money situation was, I gritted my teeth but let him continue.

“I didn’t even need anyone to drink with me. I would get a case of beer and just sit in my car by myself and drink. Then I would come home, you would go to work, and after I put the girls to bed, I’d drink until I passed out. It got to the point where I would have to have a beer in the morning on the way to work just so I could get through the day without the shakes.”

I sat there, staring at him in shock. I knew he drank—there had been beer cans here and there around the house—but I had no idea it had been that bad.

“I was sick. Then one day, I got pulled over and was arrested for a DWI. I should’ve been put in jail immediately, but if you remember, my mom worked in an attorney’s office back then. He worked his magic and got me released and my charges dropped on a technicality. A month later, I hit a car and the couple inside was seriously injured. Another DWI, another arrest, more charges. That time they stuck.”

I was fully engrossed in what he was telling me. I’d had no idea about his arrests.

Who had bailed him out? How had he been able to keep that from me?

“That’s when I decided that I was no good for you and the girls. Whatever happened to you three, you would be better off without me. I also knew that if I told you I was leaving because I was such a fuckup, being the devoted girlfriend that you were, you would have fought for us. Most likely, you would have won. Walking away from you and the girls was the hardest and stupidest thing I’ve ever done.”

My heart hurt. Knowing that he was in all that pain and had all those problems, and I was so oblivious was rough.

“Anyway, you thought I was at work one morning, but my mom took me to meet with the lawyer she worked for, who proceeded to tell me I was in deep shit. Later that afternoon, Christina came over to babysit and I made a split-second decision. I threw my shit in my car, scribbled a note to you, kissed the girls good-bye in their sleep, and that was it. I sobbed as I kissed them. That night, I drove past the house at least a dozen times, so fucking close to coming home and begging you to forgive me. I pulled in the driveway once. I remember it clearly.” He stared at the table, lost in his memory. “You had Lucy on your hip, still wearing your scrubs. You pulled the curtain back to see who it was, but you were blinded by the headlights. I started to pull out of the driveway and you walked away, assuming it was just a car turning around.”

Oh God. I remember that. It was so dark. I prayed it was him, but the car pulled out and I lost all hope.

He sniffed and wiped at the corner of his eye, still not making eye contact with me. “Anyway, after that I spiraled. I moved from couch to couch, drinking a case of beer a day, sometimes more. After awhile, beer wasn’t enough, so I started drinking more hard liquor. I just wanted to numb everything. When I was sober, all I thought about was you and the girls and all I was missing out on. I chose liquor over my girlfriend and daughters. It was the lowest point in my life, or so I thought.”

My eyes teared up and I was thankful he wasn’t looking at me. Like him, I’d also imagined what it would be like the first time I saw him after all these years. I pictured myself screaming at him, slapping him, spewing the most hateful things I could come up with at him. Instead, I was pinching the inside of my arm as hard as I could to try and distract myself and keep from crying. Those five years’ worth of anger I’d clung tight to had evaporated instantly into confusion as I found myself hanging on his every word.

“Somehow by the grace of God, and my mom, I was able to stay out of prison. My mom pleaded with me to get help. She offered to pay for rehab, threatened to come to you and tell you everything, and begged my dad for help; but as you know, he was a drunk himself. I was turning into him a little more every day and I was too out of control to notice. One day, I was sleeping on the couch of some girl I met in a bar and my sister found me. She told me that Mom had just had a freak brain aneurysm and died the night before.”

I couldn’t hold the tears back anymore. Zach had a rough life growing up. His dad was a loser drunk who used to beat his mom up. Finally, when Zach was a little boy, she got sick of it and kicked him out. She worked really hard to raise him and his sister, Tara, on her own and provide a good life for them. His dad was constantly making plans with him and then leaving him on the porch waiting with his overnight bag. His mom never complained about his dad, though. She just worked extra hard to make up for what he was missing from him. In hindsight, she probably loved Zach too much and in turn, enabled him to become his father. Zach was as big a mama’s boy as I’d ever seen. I can’t imagine how her death must have affected his already unstable life.

“I tried really hard to stay sober the next couple days. I helped Tara plan the funeral and put on a smiling face for my gram, but it all became too much and I went on a major drinking binge the night before her services. The next thing I remember is being woken up by loud banging on the door. I opened it and Tara started beating the shit out of me. She pounded on my chest and punched me in the stomach. Then, she reeled back and spit in my face.” His voice cracked and I had to swallow a sob. “Her boyfriend, Tony, grabbed her shoulders and pulled her back while I wiped her spit off my face with my T-shirt. She was screaming at me, but all her words were blurring together. She turned and cried uncontrollably into Tony’s chest. I asked him what the fuck was going on, and he glared at me and told me that they’d been trying to get ahold of me for hours, but I was too passed out. I slept right through my mom’s whole funeral.”

The sob I’d swallowed worked its way back up and escaped as I clasped my hand over my mouth. Zach reached over, grabbed a napkin from the next table, and handed me one before wiping his own eyes. “Needless to say, that was the lowest point in my entire life. My drunk ass was so selfish and so in love with the bottle, not only had I lost my kids, but now I missed my mom’s funeral. I checked into an inpatient rehab the next day and lived there for six long ugly months. While I was there my dad died too, but I chose not to go to his funeral. In my mind, that would have been a betrayal to my mom.”