Chapter 143: Being nuisance?
Violet,
After the conversation with Mirah tapered into silence, I stayed seated for a while, letting the weight of her words settle. She had leaned back, eyes closed, exhaustion finally overtaking anger. I didn’t move immediately. Some emotions needed space to breathe before they could be left alone.
When I finally stood, that was when I noticed her.
Erica was standing a few steps away, near the narrow passage that led toward the private section of the jet. Julia had been talking to Mark about Cyrus.
How long had she been standing there? She hadn’t announced herself. She hadn’t interrupted. She was just there, hands clasped together, shoulders slightly hunched, as if she had been unsure whether she was allowed to exist in that space.
Her expression stopped me.
She wasn’t crying. She wasn’t angry either. It was something quieter. Sadness mixed with hesitation, the kind that comes from watching a moment you were never meant to witness.
I softened my voice. “Erica. What's wrong?”
She startled slightly, as if pulled out of her thoughts. Her gaze flicked to Mirah first, then back to me.
“I didn’t mean to eavesdrop,” she said quickly. “I was just passing by.”
“It’s okay,” I replied. “Do you want to sit down? Come here.”
She hesitated. That hesitation said more than words. After a brief pause, she nodded and moved toward the seat across from me. She sat carefully, as though afraid of taking up too much space, hands folded neatly in her lap.
For a few moments, neither of us spoke.
The hum of the jet filled the silence between us. Erica’s eyes kept drifting toward the direction Knox had gone earlier, then returning to her hands. She adjusted the sleeve of her blouse twice, then smoothed it down unnecessarily.
Finally, she spoke. “Violet,” she said softly, “may I ask you something?”
“Of course.”
Her fingers tightened together. “Am I… being a nuisance?”
The question caught me completely off guard.
“What?” I asked before I could stop myself. " Did something happen?"
She flinched at my reaction, clearly regretting having said anything at all.
“I’m sorry,” she said quickly. “I shouldn’t have said that. Please forget I asked.”
I leaned forward slightly, my voice firm but gentle. “Erica, no. Don’t say that. Why would you even think that? Are you alright?”
She swallowed hard. Her lips parted, then pressed together. For a moment, it looked like she might retreat again into silence. Then she exhaled, shoulders sagging.
“I keep feeling like I’m in the way,” she admitted. “Like every time I speak, I’m disrupting something that already exists.”
That ache returned to my chest, slow and heavy.
“You’re not,” I said immediately. “I’ve never thought of you that way. Not even once.”
She looked up at me, eyes wide, disbelief flickering across her face.
“Then why does it feel like this?” she asked quietly.
I didn’t answer right away. I waited.
She took that silence as permission.
“I know Knox is married,” she continued. “I know he has a family. A life. I know I can’t just appear and expect to fit perfectly into it.” Her voice trembled slightly. “But I can’t help how I feel.”
I stayed quiet, attentive, letting her words find their shape.
“I feel like I’m losing him,” she said. “Even though I just found him.”
Her hands began to shake, and she clasped them tighter, trying to steady herself.
“I hate the thought of being at a distance from him,” she confessed. “Every time he walks away, every time he chooses to sit somewhere else, my chest tightens like I’m reliving something I don’t even remember losing.”
I could hear the raw honesty in her voice. There was no manipulation in it. Just fear.
“I waited so long,” she continued. “So long without knowing. And now that he’s here, now that I can see him, hear him, talk to him…” Her voice cracked. “The idea of being separated again terrifies me.”
She looked down, blinking rapidly.
“I know it’s irrational,” she said. “I know he isn’t actually leaving. But my heart doesn’t understand that.”
I didn’t interrupt her. I didn’t reassure her yet. I let her speak.
She took a shaky breath.
“Does that make me selfish?” she asked. “Does it make me a bad mother?”
The question lingered between us.
She rushed on before I could answer.
“I know I wasn’t there for twenty-seven years,” she said, the words heavy with guilt. “I know I missed everything. His childhood. His first steps. His first heartbreak. I don’t get to ask for anything now. I understand that.”
Her voice lowered. “But knowing that doesn’t stop the pain.”
She looked up at me again, eyes glossy.
“I couldn’t be his mother then,” she said. “And now… I’m terrified I won’t be allowed to be his mother now either.”
Something inside me softened completely.
She wiped at her cheek, frustrated when tears slipped through anyway.
“And I need to be honest,” she added, voice barely above a whisper. “I’m jealous of you.”
What? The admission hung heavy in the air.
“You had him,” she said. “All of him. For years. You know his habits. His moods. His silence. You shared a life with him.”
Her lips trembled. “You had what I never got,” she finished. “And sometimes, when I look at you, I don’t just see his wife. I see the proof of everything I missed.”
I felt that truth settle quietly inside me.
She looked ashamed now, shoulders curling inward as if bracing for judgment.
“I hate myself for feeling that way,” she said quickly. “I know you didn’t take anything from me. I know this isn’t your fault. But the feeling is there anyway. You helped me to find him, you helped me to-”
I remained silent, exactly as she needed.
She let out a long breath, like she had been holding it for years.
“I don’t want to compete with you,” she said. “I don’t want to replace anyone. I just… don’t want to be pushed aside.”
Her voice broke completely then.
“I already lost him once without even knowing,” she whispered. “I don’t think I could survive losing him again while watching it happen.”
The words finally stopped coming. She sat there, breathing unevenly, eyes fixed on the floor, as if bracing herself for rejection.
I didn’t speak right away.
I let the quiet stretch, not because I didn’t know what to say, but because she needed to know she had been heard first.
When I finally spoke, my voice was steady.
“Erica,” I said gently, my hand reaching for hers.
She looked up.
“You’re not a nuisance,” I told her. “And you’re not a bad mother.”
Her breath caught.
“You’re a mother who didn’t get a chance,” I continued. “And now that you do, you’re afraid of losing it. That fear doesn’t make you wrong. It makes you human.”
Tears slipped down her cheeks freely now, but she didn’t wipe them away.
“I don’t judge you for feeling this way,” I said. “And you don’t have to pretend you’re okay for my sake. I can't imagine the pain you must have felt. So take as much time as you need. Just stay with us. You two have no one there. It will be hard for you two.”
She shook her head slowly, overwhelmed.
“I didn’t expect you to listen like this,” she admitted. “I thought you’d be angry.”
“Why would I be?” I asked softly.
“Because I’m jealous of you,” she said.
I nodded. “And I understand why. I am not blind, Erica..”
She stared at me, surprised.
“You love Knox,” I said. “So do I. But our places in his life aren’t the same. They don’t cancel each other out. You are his mother.”
She swallowed, tears streaming down my face.
“There’s space,” I continued. “It may not feel like it yet, but there is.”
She let out a shaky laugh through her tears. “I don’t know how to find it.”
“You don’t have to figure it out today,” I replied. “Or alone.”
She looked down again, calmer now, as if some of the pressure had finally eased.
“I just want to be close to him,” she said quietly. “Even if I don’t know how yet.”
I nodded. “That’s enough for now. We will figure things out. Just, enjoy the time, Erica. This is a blessing for you. You know that, right?.”
Th
e jet continued its steady course through the sky.
And for the first time since I’d noticed her standing there, Erica looked like she was no longer afraid of being seen. She kept smiling, more of relaxed than that tensed expression she had been carrying quietly.