my dad, and she hadn’t been wrong. I wasn’t good at talking about all the emotional stuff, not when it came to myself, at least.
Setting down my carving knife, I picked up my phone again. Carol answered on the second ring. “Hey, you,” she said softly.
“You were crying?” I could hear the sadness in her voice.
“Yeah, I got into it with Logan again. I don’t know what’s going on, Knox. He’s failing one of his classes. You know that’s not like him.”
My heart spiked, and my hand tightened on my cell. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I just found out! I don’t know why I wasn’t notified. I don’t know what to do.” Her crying filled the silence between us.
Bracing my elbow on the counter, I rested my forehead in my hand. “I hate being so far away. I feel helpless.”
“I know you do. No matter what happened between us, you know I love you. You’re the best man I’ve ever known and a great father. I—”
“Is that Dad?” Logan’s voice came from the background.
“Yeah, sweetie. It’s your father. Do you want to talk to him?”
There was rustling on the line, and then Logan said, “I want to live with you. I don’t like it here anymore. Can I come and live with you?”
Carol gasped, and shock landed in my chest. Logan wanted to live with me? I would take my kids in a second, but from the beginning, as a family, we’d all decided it would be best for them to live with Carol. At the time the kids had agreed.
“I’m sorry, Mom. It’s not you. I love you. I just…I wanna move in with Dad. Please, can I move in with Dad?”
My heart dropped at the pain in his voice. Clearly this was something he’d been thinking about but hadn’t wanted to bring up. My mind raced through everything that could have gone wrong. Had we missed something? Had someone hurt him?
He started breathing too fast, trying to get air that wasn’t coming to him. A wheeze came through the line, and I shoved to my feet, like I could do something from half a country away. “Logan, calm down, buddy. Breathe.” My voice trembled as I paced the shop.
I heard Carol say something, and then she was back on the phone. “I gave him his inhaler. Listen, I gotta go. Let me take care of Logan.”
“Okay, but if he wants to come here—”
“I know, Knox. I know. Let me get him to calm down, and I’ll call you back.” She hung up without another word.
My hands were shaking, my pulse racing. It killed me when he had an asthma attack. I hated being so far away, being helpless. I should be there with him. “Fuck!” I shouted into an empty workshop, then forced myself to calm down. Losing my shit wasn’t going to change anything.
A couple of hours later, Carol called me back.
“How is he?” I asked.
“He’s resting. I guess…I guess he’s been wanting to come stay with you for a while, but he was afraid to tell me. He didn’t want to hurt my feelings. He says he has no friends. His buddy from elementary school moved, but I didn’t realize there was no one else. He’d mentioned names before. I didn’t know, Knox. How could I not have known that? I’m his mother. I should have seen it.”
“Hey. Shh. It’s okay. We’ll figure it out. It’s not your fault. Middle school is hard. There are all sorts of things going on around and inside him. You’re not a superhero, so don’t beat yourself up.”
She sniffed, then blew her nose. When Carol and I divorced, we decided that no matter what, our kids came first. They were the most important thing, and I knew we were on the same page with that. “I know this is hard, but if he really wants to move here, we have to let him.”
“I know,” she said softly. “He’s been missing you a lot. He talks about you all the time.”
“He never calls. Half the time he doesn’t answer when I call him.” That should have been a stronger clue to me that something was wrong. I’d always had a different relationship with Logan—he’d never wanted to spend as much time with me as Charlie did—but until recently, he’d always take my calls. “I should have known.”
“Hey, if I can’t beat myself up, you can’t either.” She was quiet for a moment, then said, “I can’t believe I might lose my