by Marah McCarty
(This story contains themes of miscarriage.)
Blood stains are on her fingers. Suppressing feelings, she moves methodically. Flush, turn on sink, scrub her hands clean. She is now only a series of dreams. She is no longer supposed to be observant to her heartbeat or the pull that exists in her abdomen. He is waiting for her outside the bathroom, his forehead pressed against the door. She thinks of his eyes and how they glazed as the doctor spoke that morning. She thinks of his hands on her hands as she accepted the documentation.
They talked about the hospital bill on the walk to the car. They talked about stopping to buy a new dog toy on the way home. They talked about anything but what they were thinking. Maybe they shared the same avoidant brain. After seven years and wedding rings, she is sure it is a possibility.
The mirror is unkind to her. She looks the same and yet she is different. How does it not show the truth? She knew something had changed when her steps became normal again—no longer reflecting a slight bend in the spine and a widening of the hips. The female form is magnificent, except when it isn’t.
There were so many subtle changes that she could not categorize. He would never understand even though he sat there and tried.
She opens the bathroom door and his forehead nearly falls on hers. They exhale at the same time.
“You okay?”
“Just some blood,” she says.
“That’s normal,” he says, matter-of-fact, as if he has experienced it himself. She knows he is just saying what the doctor said.
They stand there, half in the bathroom and half in the hallway on some cusp of a moment. She remembers his eyes alight in some terrified joy as she nervously offered it to him one morning. Some women plan it out and buy little shirts and little shoes and make baskets or cakes or fucking printed signs that say “you’re gonna be a daddy!” But she had been scared and when she was scared she went to him.
She is scared now too. Only this time there is no joy visible on the horizon. There is nothing to look forward to. There is no investment anymore.
They go to the kitchen because they don’t know where else to go. She looks at the little trinkets they have collected over the last few weeks strewn across the table. They had left the items out as evidence—a pride in their achievement and a reminder that it is not a dream. Now, it is a hurdle to overcome and clutter to clean.
“We could return it,” he says. He is pained. He cannot stand to look at it any more than her. He cannot stand to pack it all away.
“No,” she says. He is relieved.
The dog is upside down on the kitchen floor asking for belly rubs. The dog does not understand the significance of the last weeks although he heard their giggles, their whispers, and their fears.
She is glad that only the dog knew.
He reaches down to offer belly rubs. She watches the two of them. These moments are where she had, only weeks ago, found contentment. Their little family, wrapped in a house of blues and grays on the edge of a lake on the outskirts of a town that had raised them from birth. Here, they had plucked off the last of their baby feathers and figured out how to make life work.
Now, something that did not yet belong is missing.
“I know,” he says, proving they do share a brain. She tries to smile. “I’m glad we didn’t tell anyone,” he goes on. “It’d be a lot harder.”
Twelve weeks was the suggestion. They had taken it to heart, although it seemed such a long time to wait when they found out so early. They had sat on the couch that evening and looked online for fun ways to tell their parents. She knows there are so many bookmarks to unmark. The app on his phone telling them how big their baby is today was already deleted. She thinks it was a sesame seed the day it stopped growing.
“Do you want to do something tonight?” she asks impulsively. Sitting here with all the stuff just thinking about blood doesn’t sound like a good evening.
She is the homebody. She is worried that they have switched roles and he will wish to stay on the kitchen floor with the dog all evening avoiding looking at the little shoes on the table.
But instead he nods. He stands and gets his keys like her question has finally given him permission to give in to the urge to run away. At least he wants to run away with her.
They go to the little brewery in town. It is the end of September and there is pumpkin beer on tap. She waits for him at a little table. He only brings one beer first, forgetting somehow. She doesn’t blame him. When he returns with another, she can’t bring herself to drink it.
Their friends come in with their new baby. The baby is two months and smiles now. She holds the baby while she sips her beer. She smiles at him from across the table. He relaxes in his chair. Their friends casually bicker, passing chips across the table. Maybe she is different, but this is the same.
She is glad that only the dog knew.
When they get home she’ll get a box and fill it. They’ll cry and laugh and give in to some things they can’t yet. Then, finally, after a few days, he’ll put the box in the attic.
Maybe next time she’ll make him a little basket.
Category: Featured, Short Story, SNHU Creative Writing, SNHU Student