A week later, a crying Dave woke me by climbing into my bed at 6:45 am. He’d slept with Sophia the night before, so I was confused as to why he was now here. Then again, he needed comfort, and she wasn’t much help.
“What’s the matter, buddy?” I asked, patting him.
“Mommy’s leaving,” he tearfully replied.
“What?” I looked at the clock again.
“For work,” he added.
She never left that early. Something was up. I picked up my phone and looked in the nanny cams, seeing no sign of Nina sleeping on the couch on the second floor. A light was on. The baby gates down there were both open. There was no movement. While there was a cam in Dave’s room, Sophia had turned it to the ceiling months earlier so I could not see her crying, or so she had claimed when I asked.
I got out of bed and carried him as I left the master bedroom, finding the baby gate leading downstairs open. So was the door to Dave’s room. I went in. No sign of Sophia, but I heard voices outside and went to the third floor window, gazing at the driveway, where Sophia sat in her Infiniti G35 coupe, the lights on, car running. Her mother stood at the passenger window, which was rolled down as she leaned into it. Sophia was yelling at her in Russian, her mother trying to placate her, from the sound of it. My impression was that Nina was trying to prevent her daughter from driving off in a rage.
Wondering what the hell was going on, I took Dave back to my room, stifling anger as I passed the open baby gate. They had left all the gates open and disappeared outside, leaving Dave to fend for himself. Fortunately, he’d come to me. I closed my master bedroom door and put him to bed with me. Moments later, I heard the front door slam and feet loudly stomping up to the third floor. The door to Dave’s bedroom slammed. I looked in the nanny cams as Dave tried to go back to sleep. Nina was sitting on the couch.
Did Sophia have another panic attack? Was she going to blame me again? This time she had abandoned Dave, though it’s possible she’d tried to leave him with Nina, who had instead gone outside to stop Sophia. Neither were fit to watch my son. I intended to make an issue of it and mention it to Dr. Thompson while watching Sophia’s lying face.
And I did.
“What was that about?” I asked her.
Sophia said, “I’d rather not talk about it.”
I snorted. “There’s a surprise.”
I never did get a straight answer. At least she hadn’t tried to take Dave with her. I didn’t have the GPS tracker anymore. But I doubt she would’ve gotten far and the stunt would’ve backfired. If she’d left for even a day, it was abandonment, and if she’d taken Dave, kidnapping. Neither would have played well. Damn Nina! This all could have been over right then.