fifteen

Tessa

It’s been a week since I’ve been back in Charleston. My parents tiptoe around me like they’re afraid I’m going to break. Luckily for them, you can’t break what’s already broken. I’ve taken a leave of absence from my job, and I’m not sure if or when I’ll go back to Chicago. Dante hasn’t called or sent a text. I told him to leave me alone, but I miss him, and I’m still pissed.

I need to get out of my head, so I reach for my car keys and proceed out the door. Driving through town does nothing to clear my head. One thought bleeds into the next, and before long, my mind careens out of control, like a derailed bullet train.

How many times?

How many women?

How’d they meet?

Did he know her?

Was she a whore?

Whore.

The word sinks gnashing teeth into my flesh.

Whore.

It burrows beneath my skin like a parasite.

It runs on an endless loop until my thoughts tunnel, settling on three letters.

STD.

I fixate on them. An all-consuming, bone-deep paranoia squeezes my airway, a vise suddenly making it hard to breathe. Overcome with a sense of urgency, I make a U-turn at the next stoplight and drive toward the county health department.

In less than twenty minutes, I pull into the lot, park, and shut the engine off. Fear drives me forward, and I make quick work of the seat belt before grabbing my purse and then exiting the car.

Once inside the building, I approach the counter in front of a large sliding window. My hand shakes as I scrawl my name on the sign-in sheet, and then I take a seat in the waiting room.

Several minutes later, a loud feminine voice calls out, “Tessa Salinger.”

I rise and walk forward.

“Here you go,” the receptionist says, passing me a clipboard with several sheets of paper affixed to it. “Just fill these out and bring them back up here when you’re done.”

“Thanks,” I say, accepting the paperwork and returning to my seat. It takes effort to write legibly as I fill in the blanks and check off boxes. When I’m finally done, I return to the counter.

“You can return to your seat. We’ll call you back as soon as we can.” She takes the clipboard, and I do as I was told.

My stomach clenches. All the what-ifs run rampant and send my nerves skyrocketing. I keep my gaze cast downward, not wanting to make eye contact with the other patients and needing to avoid the posters displayed on the walls.

Fifteen minutes pass when I hear my name again. This time, a nurse stands with a folder in hand, holding the door open. She’s petite with mousy-brown hair and friendly eyes.

I move through the open doorway, and she falls in step behind me.

“My name’s Danielle. Please step on that scale for me, so I can get your weight.”

I stop short and step onto the platform while Danielle moves the mechanism.

Then, she writes down the number and says, “We’re going to the third door on your left.”

I walk into the exam room, unsure if I should hoist myself onto the table or sit in the chair.

“Go ahead and sit down.” She points to the armchair and unfastens the blood pressure cuff. “I’m just going to check your vitals, and collect a urine sample, then we’ll do a blood draw before your physical exam.”

“Okay.” I turn my hand, palm side up, laying my arm against my leg.

Danielle’s cold hand meets my skin, and I can’t help but flinch. She fits the blood pressure cuff over my arm, and I will my racing heart to calm. Danielle compresses the bulb, and the fabric tightens, pinching my skin.

When Danielle finishes, she frees my arm and smiles reassuringly at me. “Let’s get your urine sample.”

She leads me to the restroom. “Just a second. I need to get a collection cup,” Danielle says, moving around the corner. She is back in a matter of seconds, a small sterile container in her hand. “When you’re finished, open the metal door, and place it inside. Then, go back into the room we were in before, and I’ll be right in.”

“Thanks,” I say, taking the cup from her. I turn the knob and walk inside the restroom, locking the door. As I set the cup on the counter, I catch my reflection in the mirror. My hands grip the edge of the sink, and my knuckles go white.

All those years of marriage, and this is where I’ve ended up. Widowed. Standing in a clinic and trying not to freak the fuck out. Because my husband…my dead husband might have given me a sexually transmitted disease.

How did I get here? How is this my reality?

The nights we lay awake in each other’s arms. All the countless hours Trevor spent buried inside me. To know he shared that with someone else makes me sick. Every memory we ever made is tarnished. Covered in sludge beneath a wasteland of lies and broken vows.

I unfasten my jeans and shove them down along with my panties. They’ll run a routine pregnancy test, and I already know it will be negative. Still, it makes me feel utterly alone. An eternity passes before I finally manage to piss into the cup. I wash my hands and go back to the exam room where I find Danielle standing beside the counter.

“Tessa, you can have a seat.” She motions toward the exam table.

I place my foot on the small stool in front of the table, turn slightly, and sit down. The hygienic paper crumples beneath me as I shift to Danielle.

With latex-gloved hands, she lightly grips my wrist, adjusting my arm so that my hand is facing up, and then presses her fingers at the bend of my elbow. She grabs a rubber strap and ties it around my upper arm. “Make a fist for me.”

I feel the cool press of the alcohol pad, and when she reaches for the needle, I turn away, not wanting to see it puncture my flesh.

“You’re going to feel a slight pinch,” she says.

My nerves jump in anticipation, and I suck in a breath, wincing when the sharp, thin metal pierces my skin. I glance down at my arm, watching blood flow through the tube, filling the vial. I see everything as though I’m viewing it from a distance. Like I’m wide-awake in somebody else’s nightmare. I bite my lip to keep from crying. I’m more alone in this moment than I’ve felt in months.

“You did great, Tessa.”

Danielle’s voice startles me, and I flinch.

She smiles apologetically before continuing, “I’m going to step out. Undress from the waist down.” She opens a cabinet and removes a paper drape. “After you’ve undressed, lie down, and cover your lower half with this.” She gives me the folded material. “I’ll return in a few minutes with Dr. Nash.” Danielle steps out, closing the door.

With a deep exhale, I climb down from my perch and strip out of my jeans and underwear. Goose bumps prickle my exposed skin, making my soul feel as naked and exposed as the lower half of my body.

I conceal my panties in the folds of my jeans before placing them on the chair. I clamber back onto the padded bed and cover myself with the drape. The material is rough against my flesh, offering no warmth or comfort.

I lie back and stare up at the ceiling, observing the tiny white plastic birds hanging from a mobile above my head. They sway ever so slightly in the breeze of the air-conditioned room. I shift against the paper, and every crinkle of the sanitary sheet rips through the layers of my heart, charring the jagged edges.

I’ve moved beyond sadness. Transcended anger.

A burning sensation travels through me, and I savor it.

The only force on earth more powerful than love slashes its claws into my core.

In this too-cold sterile room on a fucking tissue-paper-covered exam table, whatever love for Trevor left in my desecrated heart goes up in smoke.

“I hate you, Trevor,” I say with quiet vehemence.

There are no tears. The bastard doesn’t deserve them.

“I fucking hate you.” I hope like hell, wherever he is, he can hear me. “And I will never forgive you.”