“Alone?” I bow my head, momentarily squeezing my eyes shut against the sight of her loneliness. “God, Bris, you’re killing me. You feel alone? When I’m right here?”
“I didn’t mean it like that, Grip.” She shakes her head and tries to catch the tears sliding over her cheeks, but they’re too many and too fast. “I meant—”
“This,” I interrupt her, holding her ring finger up between us. “Means something to me.”
I caress the word Matty inked into our skin. Still.
“When we are alone, you and I, through years, through pain,” I say, quoting my vows, my voice wilting and wet. “My heart will answer again and again, still.”
S
he looks at me, her eyes wide and wounded, my words seemingly having no effect on her. I can’t do this, not right now. The only thing that hurts more than Zoe being gone is Bristol not sharing this burden with me, not letting me in.
“Fuck it.” I heave myself off the floor, avoiding the pain in her eyes that I obviously can’t comfort. “I’m, uh . . . going to get a haircut and a shave. I just need to get out. I’ll be back.”
“Grip, wait.”
“I can’t. Just . . .” I walk to the door, tossing words over my shoulder. “I’ll be back.”
Before I make an even bigger fool of myself, I get out of the bath- room, out of our bedroom, but I can’t make it to the front door. I collapse onto the couch, drop my head in my hands, and cry like a damn baby, an ocean’s worth of salty tears. I was counting on those vows. That she meant them the way I meant them was my only hope of surviving this. In the hospital, I told her I believed the only way we could survive this was together. If she won’t let me in, I’m out here on my own. I hoped she would trust me with her pain because she’s the only person I trust with mine. If I don’t have Bristol, I ain’t surviving shit.
Chapter 45
Bristol
When we are alone, you and I,
through years, through pain,
my heart will answer again and again, still.
OUR VOWS DROWN out the tortured thoughts that have crowded my head for days, finally penetrating my consciousness the way nothing else has since Zoe passed. Grip wants me to let him in, but stumbling in the dark, I can’t even find my way to the door and its slippery knob. I’ve never told Grip about my nightmare, waking up with our daughter’s heartbeat in my ears. I’m covered in the hot breath of horror every morning and I’ve never told him. The panic that assaults me when I think about the first time I’ll see a mother out with her newborn—at a coffee shop or the grocery store or the park—he doesn’t know.
The hurt in Grip’s eyes, it wasn’t because Zoe’s gone, it was because I’m gone. He misses Zoe, too. As I pull my head out of my own ass for the first time since we came home, I see that, but the hurt I just saw wasn’t about her. It was about me.
I drag myself off the floor, standing as straight as I can. I can’t seem to pull my spine straight anymore. I lean, I bow, my body reflecting my bent spirit. When I step into our bedroom, he isn’t there. He did say he was going out. I’ll at least shower and change these sheets. I’ve negotiated eight-figure deals with ease, but now these two simple tasks daunt me.
When I pull the sheets from the bed, papers go flying in the air. I hadn’t noticed them, and now they’re all over the floor. I bend to collect them, jarred when my daughter’s name catches my eye.
For Zoe, our glory baby.
“What is this?” I ask the empty room, my breath seizing at the dedication.
I shuffle through a few more pages before I realize it’s Grip’s poetry book for Barrow. Maybe I’ll read through them when I’m feeling more myself. Right now, I’m not in the mood for beautiful words skillfully strung together, not even from Grip. I’m stuffing the pages in the drawer of the table on his side of the bed when I see my name.
Not my actual name, but the title I know was inspired by me.
“Pretty Bird”
That’s what he called me, how he teased me when I said my laugh sounded like a bird. That day, years ago, I had no idea how fragile joy is, that in a moment, with just a few words, everything can capsize. You can sink. One day the wind is in your sails then in no time you’re the Titanic. I sit on the bed and read the poem attached to that distant memory.
My pretty bird,
Like a peacock, spread yourself for me.
Awe me with your plumage.
We’re birds of a feather, you and I.