She smiles at me and shakes her head, and I notice she has a brown manila envelope with her. “I’m good,” she says, and then we stop in the hallway in front of the couches.
“Are you as nervous as I am?” I ask as my heart speeds so fast I might have to sit down.
“A little more, I think.” She tilts her head to the side. My hand moves to hold her neck, and I feel her heartbeat with my thumb. “Do you want to sit?” She nods her head and walks away from me, and my hand falls to my side. She sits down on one of the loveseats, and I don’t know if I should sit next to her or not. Fuck, this being on pins and needles stuff is killing me.
Walking to her, I sit next to her, and she holds the envelope in her lap. I’m suddenly feeling like the room is spinning. “What do you have there?”
She looks down in her lap, and her hand caresses the envelope with a soft touch. She brings it to her chest, and the tears come out now. “Shit,” she says, trying to laugh through her tears. “Maybe I should have taken the whiskey.”
“Whatever it is,” I say, “it’ll be okay.”
She nods at me. “Jacob, I’d like to show you,” she says, blinking as the tears come out now, and my hand goes over to hold her knee. The tears falling on my hand, she opens the envelope and takes out a little square paper. “This is Gabriel.”
Chapter Twenty
Kallie
My hands shake like a leaf on a windy day when I take the little black and white picture out. “This is Gabriel,” I say with all the pride in the world. When I went home, the first thing I did was get the envelope out. An envelope that my mother took the day she left me after we buried him. She took all but one picture that I still have in my wallet, and that no one has ever seen but me.
When I hand him the picture, he turns over the sonogram picture, and he puts his hand to his mouth to stop the sob from ripping out. “That was the first time I got to hear his heartbeat,” I say, sitting closer to him so I can see the picture. Jacob just looks down at it and takes his finger and traces the baby.
“He’s so beautiful,” he says, and I just nod.
I open the envelope and grab the other picture, which shows him getting a bit bigger. “He was sucking his thumb here,” I say, my heart feeling so full to share this with him while at the same time feeling the emptiness that always lingers there. The feeling that I’m missing a piece of me.
“Did you used to talk to him?” he asks, and I smile.
“I did. He was a great listener.” I smile, thinking of the times he used to kick me just for fun. “He also loved Coke.” I remember all of a sudden. “He used to go nuts in my stomach when I had it.”
“I’m so sorry, Kallie,” he says, looking down at the picture, and it’s time to show him the last picture.
“This is the day he was born,” I say and pull out the picture of him wrapped in the white sheet. “He was small but perfect.” He looks like he is sleeping. You would never think otherwise.
He takes the picture out of my hand, and his shoulders start to shake as he holds the picture in his hand. His tears are dripping down his chin. “He’s so beautiful.” He looks at me, and I smile at him. “He looks like you.”
“No,” I say, shaking my head. “He looked exactly like you,” I say and then hand him another picture.
He looks at it and gasps. “This is why you had the panic attack?” He doesn’t ask me so much as tells me. The picture is of me holding Gabriel in my arms, my face pale as tears are running down my cheeks with my mother beside me on the hospital bed with her arm around the two of us. Her own tears are on her face. “I want to tell my mother,” he says, looking at the picture. “I want to tell everyone about my son.”
“I don’t know,” I say honestly and put the envelope down. “I haven’t even told my father and Casey.”
“Then we’ll do it together.” He grabs my hand in his. “You don’t have to do anything alone anymore.”
“I just don’t think it’s a good idea,” I say. “Your mother already isn’t keen on us talking.”
“You gave birth to our child by yourself,” he says angrily. “You buried him all by yourself. Our child,” he repeats. “Our son.”
“Okay,” I say, “I just want to tell my father before anyone, please.”