My Ex-Husband's Fatal Ignorance

w, I'm an auto mechanic with a mangled right hand, hiding

ea, puts me on the spot, demanding I play for the city's e

nd in a rage. He still thinks our daughter,

"and maybe we can b

ing. He has no idea our daughter froze to deat

d the final, devastating truth. It wasn't an acci

ending a party. I'm orche

pte

Armstr

om a past I' d buried five years deep. It was Carter, my ex-husband,

uto shop. It was the same casual dismissal that had always defined hi

left hand. My right hand, a landscape of twisted scars and numb flesh, lay uselessly on the greasy engine block. Five

attached this time. It was an old picture of me, from before. Before everything. I was on stage, bathed

It was the ironic smirk of a survivor, looking back at a forgotten war. What did he expect? Tears? Regret? That girl in th

opin for engine oil. He probably thought I' d been pining, waiting for his grand return. He probably pictured me wasting away in some forgotten

arm millions and, for a time, charmed me. He' d be leaning back in a ridiculously expensive chair, tailo

n, obscuring my ghostly past. I wiped it away with th

hen another. He

o the gala next week. Alexandrea needs help

urned, but my mind was a blank slate. Disappoint him? That s

ply. Short.

eting, barely a ripple in the ocean of my indifference. I tossed the phone bac

al and the whine of air tools, cut through the shop. "The transmission on that old Civic i

grime, blurring my vision. My shirt was already soaked through, clinging to my back. My world was a symphony of metallic scrapes, engi