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“What does that mean?”
“We can figure it out later, okay? For now, please talk to me.”
“Why?”
Why, indeed? Why would she trust me with her pain when I guard mine just as tight. A fast breath wooshes out of me.
“Because I wish I had someone to talk to when I was drowning. Because I know pain and see it in your eyes.”
“You don’t know pain, Vassar.”
I cup her face with my hands, rubbing my thumps over her tear-streaked cheeks. “Maybe mine looks different than yours. Maybe it’s not even half as deep of a wound, but I am here to listen. I am here for you, Kira.”
“What if I don’t want to talk about it?” She is not being rude or angry. Kira really doesn’t want to talk about it, and I can understand it. But something prompted me to open my own heart to her.
To show her I am just as broken.
“Then I’ll talk.” I close my eyes, not letting go of her. Praying she will be the anchor I need to lay out my wounds at her feet. “My wife told me she was leaving me and our four-year-old daughter after she just walked out from the doctor’s office where she aborted our baby at twenty weeks without as much as a word to me.”
It’s been a month since Viola took off. After telling me in great detail how horrible of a husband I was. Inattentive, absent, and poor. How much of a deviant, how sick I was for wanting more in the bedroom. And how much better her life with Josh will be.
A month full of haunting phrases lingering in my mind and unanswered phone calls until her line went completely dead.
A month of learning how to be a single parent to the most precious little girl while I work every evening and well into the night.
I still don’t understand what exactly happened. Where was that snapping point when we just found out not that long ago that we were expecting again. I wanted to know how the baby was doing. Did she go to the twenty-week appointment without me? Would I ever see my second child? Would Victoria knowher sibling? Will this Josh guy be raising him or her? Is Viola coming back?
The questions ran on a loop every day until today.
Until I came home to find a letter from insurance notifying me, well her, that they have covered all the costs of pregnancy termination at gestational age–20 weeks.
The letter slips from my fingers. I can’t believe my eyes. She wouldn’t. She wouldn’t do something like this without talking to me! But she did, and rage like I’ve never known before floods me.
She made the decision all by herself when that baby was just as mine as it was hers. When I loved that child just as much as I love Vee. When I heard the heartbeat during those appointments.
Why did she think she had a right to make that decision for the both of us? How could she be so cruel to me? Do I really deserve all this after doing my best for my family? I understand it’s her body, but that was my baby too. I could have raised her or him on my own, just like I am doing now with Victoria.
She left only hours after she had done that. What in the world is going on with her? How did I miss all these signs? But I won’t sit here and lie that I care enough about Viola herself to pay attention. I should’ve, but I didn’t. I never felt like that towards her.
We were married, but we weren’t in love. Yes, this second baby was a complete surprise after one random night of sex, but I never said I wasn’t happy to have another child.
Yet, she waited to kill him now, and this is the way I find out? From an insurance company? As if it hadn’t already hurt to hear her say that she was done with us. Done with this life and family. That all these sacrifices I’d made for her were in vain. That she wants more, and we are holding her back.
I didn’t understand her a month ago because I was sure she had our baby inside her. But she didn’t. She got rid of everything that was holding her back…
I pick up my phone and texted her again without really waiting for a response, but it came through.
Vassar:You killed my child without even telling me about it?
Viola:You already have one. That’s more than enough for a blithering idiot like you who doesn’t have a future.
Vassar:Now you respond? After a month of silence?
Vassar:You had no fucking right!
Viola:Ever heard of it’s my body, I do what I want? And Josh didn’t want any kids, so I had to get rid of your bastard.
Vassar:Jesus Christ!!! Who the hell did I marry? How did I not see it this whole time?
