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Worry lines mar his forehead. “Okay, I won’t be long. They’re just in the hall.”
He leaves the room quietly—he’s done everything quietly, too scared to make a sound. I might not want to see anyone right now, but CJ needs support. I’ve got him here, but he doesn’t have anyone. Watching him break is something I never want to see again.
My dad and Milly come walking in. They force a smile, moving to either side of my bed. CJ stays at the bottom, his hand resting on my blanket, over my feet.
“Are you okay, sweetie?”
I look up to my dad, and the sadness and grief in his eyes undoes me once again, and I burst into tears.
“I lost our baby, Dad. My baby.”
“I know, darlin’. I know. It might not seem like it right now, but it will get better. I promise.”
“What did I do wrong?” I ask, my voice tortured.
Milly places her hand over my bicep, mindful of all the tubes and wires.
“You did nothing, sweetheart. Nothing whatsoever. It’s a tragic thing, but this happens. No one knows why or how, but it does.”
My dad moves aside to let CJ stand next to me. I watch him pinch the bridge of his nose to stop himself from crying.
I wipe my tears, blinking up at CJ. It’s the first time I’ve really spoken about it. A part of me was still in denial.
“How can I miss someone I never even got to meet, so much?” I ask him, my throat raw.
Tears fall from CJ’s eyes as he takes my hand in his. “Because they were a part of you and me. Because you have a huge heart. We will get through this, Allie. She or he may never have taken a breath, but they will never be forgotten. They will always be in our hearts.”
“They don’t even have a name, CJ,” I sob out, clutching my chest. “We didn’t get to see their face, hear them laugh, or hear them cry. We don’t even know if they were a boy or a girl.”
“Shh, the doctor said to stay calm, it’s not good for your blood pressure.”
I still cry, clutching at my chest, over my heart, where it hurts. “We lost our baby.”
He nods, a flood of tears falling freely down his cheeks. He doesn’t even bother to hide them as he holds my hand tighter. “We did, and we could have lost you.” He pauses, running a hand over his tired, worn face. When he looks at me again, the sadness in his eyes is overwhelming. There’s so much torment and devastation, and I can’t bear to see it. “How about we pick a name suitable for a girl or a boy. We can have a stone put in next my great-grandparent’s graves. That way, we have a place to visit, to remember them by.”
The idea makes me love him more. For him to give us a place to visit, to grieve even though there isn’t a body, means everything to me.
“It’s a great idea. I’ll call first thing tomorrow,” his mum says softly, stroking my hair.
“What time is it?” I croak out.
“It’s five in the morning, darlin’,” Dad tells me, rubbing my shin.
The door to my room opens and the doctor who examined me earlier steps inside. The expression on his face is unreadable, but the last time we saw him, he said he’d have another doctor check on me later.
Something is wrong.
I share a worried and concerned look with CJ but face the man standing at the end of my bed, his hands resting on the bars.
“We have the results from your bloodwork. Can we have a minute to talk privately?” he asks.
My eye flick through everyone in the room, before facing him and shaking my head. “These are our parents; they can stay.”
“As you wish,” he says gently, before inhaling deeply and lifting the chart from under his arm. “As you know we ran some tests earlier as procedure. We found large amounts of methotrexate, also known as amethopterin, and misoprostol in your system.”
I’m genuinely confused, and I’m not the only one as CJ gives him the same look. “What’s that?” CJ asks, rubbing his thumb over the palm of my hand.
I notice the doctor grimace, before he recovers. “Methotrexate taken on its own isn’t considerably dangerous. However, taken with misoprostol… it causes miscarriage. It’s what doctors use to induce abortion.”
