“But we have a son. How does this happen?”
“Mr. Cooper, many women go on to have healthy pregnancies post-miscarriage,” Anne explains. “Now, please schedule an appointment as soon as you can.”
Presley removes her hand from mine, not saying a single word. She grabs a tissue from the box, wiping the gel as she pulls up the waist of her pants and drops her blouse back down.
“It’s not meant to be. A lot of my friends have had miscarriages, so I understand it’s a possibility.”
I’m trying to rein in my anger, my body tensing as I sit here, legs planted wide while I try to grasp what’s happened. This isn’t fair. I don’t care what happened to other people. Fuck everyone else. I only care why this happened to us.
“Is there something we did wrong?”
“Of course not,” Anne reassures us. “Like I said, it’s quite common. I’d like you to take these home.”
In my hand, sits pamphlets on coping with pregnancy loss. I scrunch them up as the anger pours through me, pacing the small room until I stop at the wall. With my fist clenched into a tight ball, I’m desperate to connect it with something hard in an effort to relieve the escalating rage within me.
We walk back to the car, sullen and without a single word. As we both stop in the parking lot waiting for the car to unlock, my eyes wander across to Presley. In my fit of rage, I hadn’t stopped to think about her or how she is feeling, blinded by my own feelings to such a loss.
Walking around the car, my arms wrap around her, pulling her in for a warm embrace. I instantly notice the distance, the cool temperature of her skin, and the way she allows her arms and hands to fall by her side instead of around me.
A pained smile graces her face as she reaches out and caresses my cheek.
“It’s okay,” I tell her. “We keep trying, right?”
“I don’t want to talk about it now.” The smile on her face disappears in a fleeting moment. “Let’s just get home and spend time with Masen.”
Back at home, we do just that. We cook in silence together in the kitchen—pasta primavera just like Mom used to make it when Dad was alive.
The three of us sit at the table, eat dinner as Masen speaks about his day. He rambles on for a good hour about some drama that happened in the sandbox. This kid can talk, oblivious to our silence beside him.
Presley drinks three glasses of red wine, and I chose not to comment nor berate her for drinking so much on a Wednesday night. I nurse a beer for the whole night, barely able to think about anything else besides today’s event.
My phone rings off the hook, voicemails and text messages sitting on my screen demanding attention. Perhaps I need a distraction, but the thought of trying to be professional when slowly my heart feels like it has been torn apart seems like an impossibility.
Together, we
clean up, bathe Masen, and read a story to him in bed. He has been our saving grace, a reason to continue on when neither one of us feels like functioning.
When Masen’s gentle snores echo in the room, Presley retreats to our bedroom, and I follow her like a robot. She quickly gets changed into a pair of sweats and tee, then leaves the room toward the study.
After drowning my sorrows in a long, steaming hot shower, I make my way toward the study.
She’s immersed in work, two screens open and a phone call. I don’t recognize the voice until minutes later when I realize it’s one of her senior editors. I stand at the door waiting for her to finish, but the call seems to drag on. What feels like an hour later, she finally hangs up the phone.
“How about we watch a movie? Or better yet, come to bed?”
She shakes her head. “I’m busy. I need to be prepared for tomorrow’s meeting.”
“Don’t you think you should take the next few days off? I’ll stay with you.”
“I’m fine.”
“Presley…” I croak, struggling with my emotions. “It’s okay not to be fine.”
She stops typing but keeps her eyes fixated on the screen. “Haden, Anne gave us the statistics. There’s no point dwelling on this. When the time is right, it’ll happen.”
Her voice is devoid of emotion, again. She’s trying to control the impossible. Yet, maybe she’s right when the time is right, it will happen. However, it doesn’t erase the sadness that consumes me. Somehow, I feel like a failure for not protecting our baby. This feels like it is my fault, and I can’t shake the guilt.
“Okay, I’m heading to bed.”