Chapter 5: Pressure
Jason’s next move arrived through counsel: a formal letter expressing concern about stability, new associations, and the optics of a viral image involving a public official. It requested voluntary mediation adjustments and implied that refusal would lead to filings. My attorney, Lena Ortiz, answered with the decree’s existing terms, a reminder that social-media speculation was not evidence, and a notice that harassing communications would be logged.
I started the medical-billing job search in earnest—applications from Sarah’s kitchen table while Clara stacked plastic cups on the floor. Sarah handled a morning drop at a neighbor’s playgroup so I could complete an interview by video. The work, if it landed, would not restore the joint account Jason had emptied. It would restore a line of income that did not require his permission.
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Marcus did not insert himself into the custody correspondence. He did send, through Lena at my request, a short factual note confirming the flight encounter had been a one-time request to reduce unwanted filming, that no personal relationship existed, and that any attempt to characterize it otherwise was inaccurate. Lena said the note was useful precisely because it was dull. Dull defeated spectacle.
At night I kept the old pier photograph in a folder with the divorce decree and Jason’s screenshots. Before the transfer. Before Miller made the call. The sentence had stopped feeling like a caption and started feeling like a hinge.
