“I’ll be back,” Everett announces once we’ve settled around the couch. “The pizza should be ready in about twenty minutes.”
“Okay,” Teeny answers. She offers him a quick kiss, probably something adulterated with an audience, specifically her older brother, and he dashes off with his keys in his hand.
“I should go get Sophia changed,” I tell Teeny, pointing a loose hand to the noise upstairs. I hear both Sadie and Sophia giggle and hesitate with the thought that I might be an intruder in their moment.
“Sadie’s got her,” Teeny assures. “Just relax.”
I do as she instructs, sinking into the far side of the couch. “Sadie’s really good with her.”
Teeny reaches for the only dry towel in the pile that was brought in and folds it a few times before sitting on top of it. “Yeah, she’s actually thinking about changing her major to early childhood development. She wants to be a teacher.”
I smirk. “That’ll be a really good fit for her.”
“You know, if you ever want to drop Sophia off over the summer for a few days, you can,” Teeny offers. “I’ll be here too, and I’m sure Kendall could use the break. And Sadie loves hanging out with Sophia.”
“I’ll talk to Kendall.” It’s the only answer I can give right now. Maybe I’ll bring it up to Kendall later, something in passing. Or maybe not. Maybe we won’t get there, an incidental exchange of our day that never quite reaches the surface. Similar to the schoolyard gossip she carries home with her every day but chooses not to share with me. Small accounts like a mishap with one of her kids or an annoying occurrence at my office. Even something concerning or funny that Sophia did. Probably not.
“How is she?”
I hear the care and heed in her voice. The question she asks when we have a quiet moment alone. When we aren’t surrounded by our brothers or parents or kids.
“She’s…” I consider lying but then remember who I’m talking to. Teeny isn’t our friends or our other family members. It’sTeeny. “She has her good days and her bad days.”
She nods, and I know I don’t need to elaborate. We sit in a moment of awkward silence, and I consider whether or not it’s okay to ask the question I want to ask. But with the thought of my wife at home and the knowledge she’s wallowing in her grief, I ask anyway.
“Hey, can I ask you something?”
Teeny sets down the remote she had in her hand. She’s settled on some cooking show but ignores it as she faces me. “Sure.”
It’s not a topic I know she particularly enjoys talking about, but it’s me, and I feel like if I sit any longer in this quiet my insides are going to claw up my throat. “I know back, you know, before…I know it was your choice and all, and I know it was a long time ago, and you were really young, but?—”
“Are you talking about my abortion?” She says the word so boldly, it throws me off guard. But it also eases whatever apprehension I have talking to her about Kendall.
I clear my throat. “Uh, yeah.”
“What about it?” she asks earnestly. There’s no offense or insult behind her question, and there would never have to be any. I was there. I was theonlyone there when she didn’t want our parents to know. When she was sixteen and her mistake haunted her more than two decades after a decision that changed the entire trajectory of her life.
“I know it’s not the same thing as Kendall’s miscarriage, but…I don’t know. I’m just trying to figure things out. It was such a long time ago, and I think it’s still weighing on her. I’m trying to do the right thing, but it always feels so wrong. And I feel like…maybe neither one of us are over it, but I don’t even know how to talk to her about it.” Everything comes out in a projectile word vomit. I let the dam open. I’m desperate, and I don’t even know what I’m saying. All I know is that I want my wife back. “Sorry. I just really have no one else to talk to.”
I watch the way Teeny takes me in. My haggard posture, my dejected face. And I see pity deepen the creases on her face. “I can’t speak for Kendall,” she finally says after a careful, solicitous pause. “I just know that…I don’t think I’ll ever be over it.”
“Even after all this time?”
She smiles softly, and I can tell it isn’t a smile that’s fond or even sad. It’s a mask. A shield methodically drawn up whenever she talks about her past. “You know, before I went through with it, I thought about having it.”
I nod. It doesn’t surprise me. Even at sixteen, I saw how she struggled with the decision.
“Kendall didn’t have that choice,” she continues. “In fact, she made the choice to have a baby you guys didn’t plan on, but it was made for her. Her choice was taken from her. I think it’s good that you’re trying to figure out how to help her.”
“I don’t know how much help I am.” I think about how I try to help. In the grand scheme of things, I do so little. I’m just…there. We exist in the same home, filling it with delicate glances and succinct inquiries that lack weight or purpose. But it’s all we have. If we took what little we have away, we’d be left with nothing. There would be no us. So maybe, in my own broken way, itishelping.
“She uh…she had to deliver the baby,” I say, no preamble.
“What do you mean?” I’d given her so little about our miscarriage, this bit of information is news to her.
I exhale a deep breath. I’ve never told anyone this. Sylvia knew because she was there, but I’ve never let someone in on Kendall’s trauma. “Her water broke at almost twenty weeks, and the doctors couldn’t stop the baby from coming. They had no choice but to have her deliver the baby knowing they wouldn’t be able to save it.”
“James,” she gasps. She reaches to smooth a comforting hand over mine and I see her eyes glisten.
