‘Three months. It was ten days after the first scan. I... I started to bleed.’
‘Were you...okay?’ It wasn’t what he meant, but she seemed to understand anyway.
She squeezed her eyes shut.
‘It’s been five years, but even now, remembering that day, I can still recall exactly how I felt in that instant. Blind fear and...and...utter sorrow. There’s no way to properly articulate that.’
He should have known—should have been there for her.
‘I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry,’ he whispered, but he didn’t think she was even hearing him. ‘Time heals,’ he offered helplessly, but it sounded hollow to his ears. It hadn’t healed the loss of his own mother, and it hadn’t with the loss of Dan. Or was that his own guilt?
Thea shook her head, swallowing hard.
‘I’m not so sure about that. With my parents, with Daniel, certainly the edges have dulled. Slightly. Given enough time. But the pain has never gone away completely.’
Ben nodded. He knew that feeling well.
‘But with a baby it’s different, somehow. Every year I think about what could have been. Every year, when I see a child the same age as...as ours would have been, I imagine whether it would have been crawling, walking, talking, playing, jumping, laughing.’
A sob suddenly escaped from somewhere deep inside her, tearing at Ben’s gut.
‘I can’t even say he or she. I have to say it.’ She looked up at him with an expression of pure anguish as she asked helplessly, ‘Does that make it better or worse?’
He shook his head, unable to speak. Reaching out, he placed his hands on her shoulders and pulled her, ignoring her resistance, until she was in his arms. Rigid. Unyielding. But there, none the less.
‘It doesn’t make it anything,’ he whispered hoarsely. ‘It just is.’
They stood like that for a few moments, Thea still stiff in his embrace, before she pushed herself out of his hold, crossing her arms in front of her chest protectively.
He wanted to stop her...wanted to offer her more support, more relief—more. His head felt as if it was too small for his swirling emotions.
He took a step back. ‘You never called me. You should have called.’ He hadn’t intended for it to sound like an accusation.
She squeezed her eyes shut, willing herself to keep control.
‘To say what?’ she asked flatly.
‘To tell me about it. To say you needed me, that you weren’t okay—anything.’
He practically shouted the last word and Thea winced as people in the street turned in their direction.
‘Thea, I didn’t mean that—sorry.’ He raked his hand through his hair as he turned in a circle. Then turned to face her square-on. Her eyes were filled with torment.
‘You should have called me, Thea. I would have come back in a heartbeat.’
‘What would have been the point?’ She hunched her shoulders. ‘We weren’t together. You’d walked out on me.’
‘I didn’t abandon you,’ he hissed. ‘We’ve been through this. You told me to leave.’
Why were they attacking each other? He needed to end this. Now.
‘I take that back unreservedly,’ he said immediately. ‘We’ve been through that already. But, Thea, you still should have called me.’
‘And said what? That I had been pregnant, but not to worry because I’d lost it?’
‘Thea...’ he growled in warning. ‘You should have called me before then. The moment you knew you were pregnant. You should have called me then.’
‘You were...busy,’ she muttered weakly.