Woman's Place by Barbara Delinsky

Author:Barbara Delinsky [Delinsky, Barbara]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Mystery, Fiction - General, Contemporary Women, Divorce, Custody of Children, Contemporary, General, Romance, Popular American Fiction, Fiction, Businesswomen
ISBN: 9780061735288
Publisher: Avon A
Published: 1996-12-31T06:00:00+00:00

"Do you?" he asked.

For an instant I couldn't respond. Then, sharply, I asked, "Why wouldn't I?"

"Well, you are the one who is against this divorce. Some mothers in your situation would make everyone involved miserable."

"I love my children," I protested. "No one, not even my husband, can deny that. Hurting them has been my single greatest fear. I'd have done most anything to have spared them the confusion, the upset, the pain of divorce, but now that it seems inevitable. I'll do most anything I can to ease them through it."

"The question," Jenovitz said before I had taken another breath, "is whether you're of a sound mind to do that. That's what I'm trying to find out, Mrs. Raphael. You may not like my questions, but the court expects me to ask them. I'm doing my job as best I can." I held my tongue, didn't say a thing, let him wallow in the silence this time. But he didn't seem to mind it as much as I did. Barely a minute had passed before I said, albeit calmly, even agreeably, "I'm sorry. Ask whatever you want. I promise to answer as best I can." He drew on his pipe, exhaled a thick stream of smoke. "You do fly off the handle."

"Not normally. Really, I don't. I've always been the calm one in the house. I've had to be to counter Dennis's moods." I was hoping he would pick up on that and ask more, but he didn't. "Your husband says you're under a great deal of strain."

"Only because of the divorce. I wasn't before. I was handling things just fine."

"Your mother's condition has to be stressful."

"Well, it's another thing to think about. To worry about. The stress I'm feeling comes from wanting to fly out to see her but fearing that it'll be held against me, that someone will think that because I'm absent, I'm negligent. The thing is, it's normal for a husband or wife to leave the children with the other to spend time with a dying parent." Jenovitz shrugged. "You're free to go."

"Last time someone said that to me, I came home to chaos."

"But was the chaos of your own doing? You've taken on a great deal, Mrs. Raphael. The question is whether you're up to it. Your husband says no."

"The chaos had nothing to do with my visiting my mother." I pointed at Page 115

Barbara Delinsky - A Woman's Place

his file. "Those examples my husband uses to show I'm not in control are the kinds of things that happen to people all the time. Good Lord, could have been the one going to court to show that my husband messed up the kids' arrival times and lost my daughter's medicine, or, worse, let her eat something she shouldn't have eaten. Would the court have taken the kids away from him for that?"

Jenovitz gave a smoky sigh. "You know that's simplifying the situation. There were additional elements in the complaint. Besides, your husband's life is simpler. You're the one running every which way trying to do everything.

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