Chapter 4: The Worst Part
It was an email.
Not a text message.
An email, which was why I hadn't seen it when I'd occasionally glanced at Rick's phone over the past year — I'd never thought to look there.
The sender was Diane.
The date was two weeks after our wedding.
*Rick — I need to tell you something and I need you to hear it clearly.
I'm pregnant.
I don't know yet what I'm going to do.
But you need to know.
Please call me.*
My hands were completely still.
That was the strangest part.
My hands were still and the rest of me felt like it was falling from a very great height.
"Did you know?" I asked.
I was looking at the email but I was talking to Rick.
"Yes."
One word.
Just yes.
"How long have you known?"
"Since three weeks after the wedding."
I did the math without meaning to.
We had been married for a month.
He had known for over three weeks.
"Is she—" I stopped.
Started again.
"Does she still—"
"She lost it," Rick said.
"About six weeks in.
She told me in October."
October.
Two months ago.
He had been carrying this since October and every single morning he had kissed me goodbye and every single evening he had asked me how my day was and every single night he had slept beside me.
"You were going to tell me." It wasn't a question.
I didn't believe it.
I just needed to hear what he would say.
"I was trying to find the right time."
Anna made a sound — not quite a laugh, not quite a sob.
"He's been trying to find the right time since before the wedding," she said.
"That's what he told me too.
He said he just needed more time.
He said everything would work out.
He kept saying it like it was true." She looked at him directly.
"How many times did you say that to me, Rick?
How many times did you tell me to just wait?"
Rick stood up.
"Anna, I was trying to protect your mother—"
"You were protecting yourself." Her voice didn't waver.
"You were scared.
That's all it was.
You were scared and you used me to buy yourself time and when I couldn't take it anymore, I ran.
Because I didn't know what else to do."
She turned to me.
Her eyes were full.
"I didn't know how to tell you, Mom.
I didn't know how to say it without breaking you.
And then the wedding happened and you looked so happy and I just — I couldn't.
I left because I couldn't stand being in this house knowing what I knew and watching you not know it."
I stood up and crossed the hallway to her.
I put both arms around her and she went rigid for one second, like she was bracing for something, and then she folded and started to cry.
Really cry.
The kind that had been held back for a long time.
"I'm sorry," she kept saying into my shoulder.
"I'm sorry I left.
I'm sorry I didn't tell you sooner.
I'm sorry—"
"Stop." I held her tighter.
"You have nothing to be sorry for.
Nothing.
Do you hear me?"
Over her shoulder, I looked at Rick.
He was standing in the middle of the hallway.
He hadn't moved toward us.
Maybe he knew better.
Maybe some part of him understood that this moment did not include him.
"I think," I said, keeping my voice level, "you should go stay somewhere else tonight."
He blinked.
"Ellen—"
"I'm not asking."
He looked at Anna.
Then at me.
Then he nodded once, slowly, and walked toward the stairs to get his things.
Anna pulled back and wiped her face.
"What are you going to do?" she asked.
I looked at the hallway.
At the coat rack with his jacket on it.
At the shoes lined up by the door — his on the left, mine on the right, the way we'd arranged them without ever discussing it.
"I don't know yet," I said.
"But I know you're not leaving again."
She shook her head.
"I'm not leaving."
May you like
Upstairs, a drawer opened and closed.
Neither of us moved.
