“No! You don’t get to say ‘it’s okay.’”
“I’m sorry,” he repeats.
“You weren’t there!”
“I know,” he responds, his chin quivering.
“You weren’t there while I watched her die in my arms,” I continue. “You weren’t there when they took her from me!” My arms flail and I gasp for air. My chest feels like someone punched a large hole into it, and it hurts so fucking much. I want to make it stop, but I don’t know how.
“It was a girl?” he cries. I forgot. I forgot I didn’t tell him. I forgot I kept all these little details from him and about my angry, spiteful promise to never tell him.
I manage a nod.
A part of me bends. Not enough, but just a little. Like an uncooked spaghetti noodle. I curve my anger to make room for his grief. But then I remember how alone I was in that cold hospital room, and I snap.
“I guess you’re off the hook.”
“What?”
“There’s no baby, so you’re off the hook.” The words sound icy, and I don’t care. I don’t have it in me to soften this so we can somehow come out of it alive. There’s nothing left to salvage.
“Hey, don’t say that.”
I head toward the kitchen to find the broom when James steps in my path.
“Can you please talk to me?” he pleads.
I whip my face to see his eyes filled with desperation and fear. How did we become this? We were so annoyingly happy just a few days ago. How did we get here?
“We don’t need to keep pretending this is actually something,” I argue bitterly. “We made this stupid decision to have a baby and move in together after what, six months together? Now there’s no reason for you to stick around. We can just go on with our lives. You can go back to your place and forget this ever happened.”
The broom isn’t where I thought I left it, and I try the bedroom next. James follows close at my heels.
“Kendall, can you please talk to me?”
“What?” I demand. “What do you want to talk about?”
“I-I don’t—I don’t know,” he sputters. “Let me take care of you.”
“I can take care of myself.”
He cups my face in his hands and I watch him cry. We both cry. Our sobs and sniffles mix together, and I don’t know what sounds come from who. But it doesn’t matter that we’re bothmourning like this. I can’t sit here and let my loss mix with his. If I do, I’ll never move on.
I bury my face into my hands and cry into my palms. “I just want to be alone,” I finally say through my tears. “Please. Just let me be by myself.”
James lets me go. He mumbles something I don’t quite hear, but it must’ve been some despondent goodbye whispered through tears. Because through the shiver rattling my chest, I hear footsteps fading into the background. The door opens and closes with a quiet, courteous click. And the next thing I know, I’m all alone in my apartment, surrounded by the rubble of what I thought our future was going to be.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
James
NOW
There area lot of things I wish I could change. I wish I had handled things differently. I wish I had fought harder. I wish I pressed, been more insistent when she pushed me away. I wish I told Kendall how much I needed her even though I wasn’t sure whether or not it was okay for me to need her. She needed me. My own grief felt…unimportant. Silly. Irrelevant. Our world flipped completely over, and I had to go on as if I was fine for her sake. I had to be the one to keep it together or else…
By the time I get home, Sophia’s asleep in the back seat. Her head lolls side to side, balancing on the seat belt strap while her shoulders sway with each turn. It’s an unexpected change from our usual interrogative drive. I turn down the music and drive with less haste, hoping I can drag out her sleep until we get home. When I pull into the driveway and open the garage door, Kendall is there.
“Hey,” I say, getting out of the car.
