1

The Phone Call

A TWO-WEEK TRIP—that’s all it was supposed to be. Two weeks. I didn’t relish the
idea of being apart from my wife, Bruna, and our four-year-old son, Sean, not even for
two weeks, but it was unavoidable. I had to work. I can handle it, I kept reminding
myself. After all, I had clients scheduled aboard my charter fishing boat during the first
week my wife and son would be gone. After that, I planned to join Bruna and Sean for the
latter part of their vacation in Brazil, my wife’s birthplace. In a few days we’d be back
together as a family again.
I loaded the suitcases—there were more than the usual number of them—into my
Jeep Cherokee SUV, along with Bruna’s parents’ luggage. Although citizens of Brazil, my
in-laws. Raimundo and Silvana Ribeiro, owned a condominium in New Jersey, and
visited often, sometimes for a month or two at a time. The night before, we had attended
a local carnival sponsored by St. Leo’s Church, and Bruna’s parents had been at our home
the day of the trip, after going out to lunch with my parents. Everyone got along as usual,
two happy families united as one, with no tension among any of us and never a cross
word between us. Now Sean’s maternal grandfather, Raimundo—or Ray, as he was
known in the United States—and his grandmother, Silvana, were returning to Brazil with
Bruna and Sean.
It wasn’t the first time during our four-year marriage that Bruna had visited her
homeland. She and I had traveled to Brazil before Sean was born. Bruna took great
pleasure in spending time with her friends in her old stomping grounds. I enjoyed surfing
off the beautiful beaches of Barra, a suburb of Rio de Janeiro. We both savored Brazil’s
barbecues and delicious mangoes. Bruna took Sean to visit our extended family a few
months after his birth, and had made the trip by herself for her grandmother’s funeral a
few years earlier. More recently, in March 2004, she and a friend and fellow teacher at
the school where Bruna taught went to Brazil during the school’s spring break. So it
didn’t strike me as unusual for us to plan a trip during the summer, after Bruna completed
her teaching responsibilities for the 2004 spring semester. We usually traveled as a family
to Brazil twice a year, once during Bruna’s winter break and once during the summer.
Just as any couple whose family members live in different locations, we made special
efforts to enjoy time together with all of our relatives, especially after Sean was born.
Although Rio was a dangerous place, as Bruna and her parents often reminded me, it was
still her hometown in her native land and it was beautiful. We wanted Sean to be familiar
with both cultures, and to know that he was part of something much bigger than himself.

On Wednesday, June 16, 2004, I drove the family to Newark’s Liberty International
Airport to begin their vacation. Under Brazilian law, when any one parent travels alone
with a child to Brazil, the other parent or guardian is required to sign a letter of
authorization. So before the trip, as part of normal procedures, I signed the release
authorizing Bruna to take Sean out of the country for a limited period of time.
 Since I was going to see the two of them in a week or so, I didn’t think much of it
at the time. Besides, I was busy planning Bruna’s thirtieth birthday party. As a surprise
present for her, I hoped to have our kitchen redone while she was out of the country. I
was also working on an itinerary for another family trip to Turnberry Isle in Florida—one
that would include Bruna’s mom and dad—to celebrate her birthday in mid-August after
we had all returned from Brazil. Ordinarily when we vacationed together, I made the
arrangements. Having traveled as much as I had over the years, I found it easy to book all
the family members’ flights and hotels, and handle all the other details myself. But this
time, Bruna’s mom kept protesting, saying, “Oh, we can take care of that from Brazil.”
This struck me as odd, but I thought, Okay, fine. We’ll make the arrangements from
Brazil.
At the airport, after I got Sean comfortably situated from his stroller, I helped
carry Bruna’s, Sean’s, and my in-laws’ suitcases into the busy Newark terminal. I assisted
in getting all the suitcases checked in, then walked Bruna and Sean to the security area in
front of the Jetway leading to their flight. With passengers bustling all around us, I kissed
Bruna and Sean good-bye and embraced Bruna’s parents.
I watched as my family went through the initial identification checkpoint and
started down the hallway toward their flight. Then, as we always did when one of us was
traveling, Bruna and Sean stopped and turned toward me, and we used sign language for
our final good-bye. I pointed to my eye, my heart, and then to Bruna and Sean, and
mouthed the words “I love you.” Bruna and Sean pointed to their eyes, their hearts, and
then back at me: “I love you.” Bruna turned and followed her parents down the Jetway,
toward the security metal detector, pushing Sean in the stroller as she went. I watched
them until I could no longer see them, and waited a few minutes longer in case they had
forgotten anything or there was a last-minute flight cancellation. Then I returned to our
vehicle and headed back to our home in Tinton Falls, New Jersey. It was going to be long,
lonely night.

In many ways, ours had been a storybook romance. I met Bruna Bianchi Ribeiro in 1997
in Milan, Italy, where I was working as a fashion model and she was studying fashion.
We moved back to New Jersey, where we were married in 1999, and in May 2000, Bruna
gave birth to Sean. We had a beautiful marriage, an ideal little family; it was perfect in
every way, and we were head over heels in love.
At least so I thought.

The day after their flight, Bruna called from Brazil to let me know that she and the family
and arrived safely. “Sean is so excited,” she gushed. “He’s eating mangoes and he just
loves it here.”
Bruna’s unusual emphasis on how happy Sean was to be back in Brazil seemed a
bit over the top, but I was glad my wife and son were safe and sound and already
enjoying their vacation. We talked briefly, then said our “I love you’s” and our good-
byes.
On Sunday, June 20, Bruna called again. I could tell immediately from the tone of
her voice that something was wrong, but I would not have guessed what she was about to
say. “You’re a great guy, David, and a wonderful father to Sean. I have no regrets about
our relationship and having Sean together.”
 I didn’t even have time to wonder where Bruna was going with this line of
thought, as she continued without a pause, almost as though following a script.
“Our love affair is over. I’ve decided to stay in Brazil,” she said. “I’m keeping
Sean here with me.”
Whooom! It was as though the earth had suddenly dropped out from under me,
and I was hanging in midair. “What? What! What are you talking about, Bruna?” I could
not believe what I was hearing. Our love affair? What about our marriage? The tone of
voice with which she said those words to me was one I had never before heard from her.
She sounded cold, calculating, and unemotional—not at all like the upbeat, vivacious,
passionate woman to whom I was married.
I remember thinking, What is this? Where is this coming from? The person I
loved, and envisioned loving for the rest of my life, until death do us part, had suddenly
become as cold as ice.
It got worse. Bruna had a list of demands. “You need to come here immediately,”
she said. I want you to sign over the full rights of Sean to me. If you ever want to see
Sean again, you need to fly to Rio de Jeneiro immediately. I have a document my lawyer
has drawn up, and you need to sign it.”
Lawyer? What lawyer? And how could she have secured such a document? She
had been gone only a few days! It never occurred to me that this might have been a
meticulously devised plan by Bruna and her parents in collusion with a Brazilian
attorney.
According to Bruna, the document she wanted me to sign was ten pages in length
and spelled out several demands, including that Sean remain with Bruna and her family
in Brazil, and that I surrender my legal role as Sean’s parent, in addition to giving full
custody to Bruna. “And you need to agree never to press any criminal charges. Never to
go to the police in the U.S. to file kidnapping charges, never file any custody papers in
the U.S. courts, never file for separation or divorce in the United States, and you must do
nothing that will interfere with my plans to obtain U.S. citizenship.”
My brain was reeling, my body convulsing; I felt nauseated. Bruna, what is going
on here? I was shocked and devastated at the same time.
“David, if you do any of those things and go against what I want—if you hire a
lawyer—you will never see your son again, and you will spend all your money trying.”
“Bruna, what is happening?”
Bruna was done and she wanted to get off the phone. “You must come here,
David,” she demanded.
“I can’t believe this…”
“You need to come here now. Bye.” Click. The phone line went dead.
I hung up the phone. My knees gave out, and I slumped to the floor, my face in
my hands, my head still spinning, my heart pounding. I thought it might explode into a
thousand pieces. My mind refused to fathom what I had just heard, yet there had been no
equivocation in Bruna’s words. She had made herself quite clear. Our marriage was over,
and she planned to keep our four-year-old son, Sean, in Brazil.
Our son, my buddy, my baby boy, Sean. I loved that little guy more than my own
life. This couldn’t be happening. I was crushed and confused, distraught and disoriented,
by this ghastly turn of events. I had never felt so alone in all my life.
 I called my parents. My mom answered the phone. “Mom…” I struggled to get
sound out of my mouth.
“Oh, hi, David,” she answered cheerfully. “Happy Father’s Day.”
Happy Father’s Day? My wife has just run off with my son. It was not a happy
Father’s Day at all. It was the start of six years in a father’s hell.

Reprinted by arrangement with Viking, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc., from A
FATHER’S LOVE by David Goldman. Copyright © David Goldman, 2011