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Calls and texts have gone ignored, and the only reason I’ve seen Lauren is because she has a spare key to my apartment and lets herself in, uninvited. I’m selfish because they’re worried about me, but I want to be left alone. I asked Dallas to give me some space, and except for a few texts, he has. But no words, no lecture, nothing will stop me from feeling some blame in this. I was too stressed. I wasn’t eating right. I should’ve been resting more. The guilt that my body is the one that lost my child killsme.
I called my mom the day I got home. We cried. She prayed. She begged to fly out here to be with me, and I begged her notto.
I’m reading another article on vanishing twin syndrome when I hear my front door open. I turn around on the couch and shut my laptop at the same time Lauren walks in, wearing her scrubs, going straight to the kitchen like she owns theplace.
“Hey, girl,” she calls out when I meet her. “I hope you have an appetite.” She starts the oven and begins pulling out containers of prepared food. “Tacos are on the menu fortonight.”
I do a scan of all the items laid out on the counter. Meat. Lettuce. Cheese. Salsa. Guacamole. “You made all of this?” I ask. “Didn’t you have towork?”
She laughs, removing the lid from the meat and pouring it into a pan. “Sweetie, you know my cooking is shit. Although my reheating game is pretty good.” She turns the burner on. “Dallas did all of this last night before going to work and asked me to bring itover.”
I snort. “Why? Is he scared I’m not feeding myself well enough, and we’ll lose the other baby?” The words come out before I can stopmyself.
She narrows her eyes at me. “No. And we both know he doesn’t think that, so quit acting like abrat.”
“Excuse me?” Isnap.
“You heard me,” she says, her attention going back to the stove. “Quit acting like abrat.”
I huff. I puff. I want to kick her out of my apartment, but she keeps going, “I get you’re going through pain, but don’t forget you’re not the only one experiencing this loss. So is mybrother.”
I press my finger to my chest. “He’s the one who tried to blame me for losing thebaby.”
“Did he say thosewords?”
“Well … notexactly.”
“The only thing that’s exact about your argument is that he never said you’re to blame. Not once. You’re pissed at him because you have no one else to be mad at—because no one is to blame.No one.You heard the doctor. The miscarriage would’ve happened, no matterwhat.”
“I don’t blame him for themiscarriage.”
“But you blame him for what occurred before the miscarriage. You need something to blame for losing the baby, so you’re blaming it on Lucy’s stuff at hishouse.”
“Don’t do this, Lauren,” I mutter. “I’m not talking to you aboutthis.”
“Then, don’t talk to me. Talk to him.Please.”
“I have. We’ve texted a fewtimes.”
“Maven has a sleepover tonight. Let him comeover.”
“I can’t,” I whisper, and my voice starts to crack. “It’d be toohard.”
“Going through a hard phase in life is a lot more difficult with no one at your side. It starts getting softer, gentler, when you have someone else with you. Trustme.”
* * *
Dallas knowsfood is the way to my heart. The tacos and the slice of blueberry pie he sent over are making me reconsider seeing him. Lauren’s right. We’ve barely said a few words to each other since our argument at the hospital. I’ve run our exchange through my mind hundreds of times, staying up late because I can’t sleep, and I’ve tried to dissect every word that fell from hislips.
I shut my eyes and remember what hesaid.
“Take a step back from the relationship we’ve been building? Take a few steps back from makinglove?”
He saidmaking love. I corrected that and said we were onlyfucking.
I’m the only one being honest with myself, with our relationship. We were both in a sensitive place the night of our one-night stand, and I’m afraid we’re only pulled to each other because of that and mypregnancy.
But bad days, bad months, don’t last forever, and eventually, we’ll get over our bad times and realize we were only using each other as a Band-Aid until we healed. He’ll go back to being a widower mourning his wife but still be getting laid. And I’ll go back to being a woman who doesn’t want anything to do with love but still gettinglaid.
