“When you wouldn’t return my calls, I went to your apartment. Raleigh let me in, she told me you’d gone to stay with friends. I don’t think she was keeping the location secret, even if she did play coy. I know you wouldn’t have told her. The counterfoil on the prescription was in your trash can. I know you took the pill, and I know why. It’s my fault.” He strokes my hair smooth against my head, tears fall like a river, still I shake my head when I look up to explain what actually happened.
“I never took it. It’s possible I was going to; I hadn’t made up my mind, not really. Harper and I were going to talk it through when I got back from the cabin.” He looks down at me with surprise and understanding, fruitlessly wiping my cheeks dry with his fingers. I’m not nearly done with the tears. He’s not the only one that is wracked with guilt over that weekend. “I had cramps remember? I lost the baby that night.”
“Regan…I…” He chokes back the sadness and holds my gaze, pained and broken. “I wish…”
“Yeah, me too. I should’ve told you. I was so fucking angry with you.”
“Where did you go?” He accepts my statement as a given and gently kisses my forehead. He pulls the blanket from the back of the sofa and wraps our entwined bodies in a warm woolly cocoon.
“I had to get away. I was broken, completely devastated, a total fucking mess, and I didn’t really know why. I blamed you for a long time and your leaving was just an easy focus for all my pain. I know it wasn’t right, it wasn’t fair, but I wasn’t exactly in the best frame of mind. Hindsight is a bitch, but right or wrong, I took the decision to ignore the messages you left. I had to try and get myself better inside and out. I was still bleeding when Harper took me to her grandparents in Florida. I stayed with them, well, mostly in hospital.
“I lost a lot of blood and had hypovolemic shock. I was given multiple transfusions, contracted hepatitis, which caused some immune problems. Ended up clean eventually, but it left me anaemic, which I manage mostly with my diet. I still have to keep an eye on my iron levels and red cell counts. That actually helps with Ruby’s check-ups, when I have to have my check-up too. She just has to have more.” I kick myself that I mentioned Ruby’s name. This isn’t really a salt-in-the- wound conversation. Even so, it clearly affected him more than I imagined possible.
“You know when I came back and found out you had had a child, I thought perhaps she was mine.” His wistful intonation pulls at my heartstrings but not his words.
“She’s not.” I snap, and he holds up his hand too late to shield him from the sharpness in my tone.
“I know, I know.” He explains his thoughts. “The dates are close though, from when you were pregnant with mine, I mean.”
“I know, but I would’ve told you if she was yours, no matter how mad I was. If you were her father, you would deserve to know.” He looks down at me and closes his eyes, pain flashing behind the deep gold flecks of his irises. I touch the side of his face, and when he meets my gaze, I tell him the truth. “She’d be lucky to have you as her father.”
“Thank you, Reggie, you have no idea what that means to me to hear you say that.” He holds my gaze and falls silent. After a while, his features change, and I can see the moment wishful nostalgia turns to concern. His thick brows furrow, and he asks in his stern, no-nonsense doctor tone. “What’s wrong with her?”
“Nothing…sorry.” My instant response is always my most aggressive. There’s nothing wrong with Ruby; she’s perfect. I take a moment to calm myself and answer his question as I would if we were both at work. “She was premature and has BPD, which I’m hopeful she will grow out of,” I clarify, and for once, I don’t need to explain what that means exactly.
“Is that what she was having checked at the hospital the other day?” I’ve been trying not to think about it, if I’m honest, and it’s possibly the last thing I want to discuss with him. I’m not sure who I’d be talking to, Joel or Dr Prescott.
“Yes, the first test got lost.” I lie and swiftly change the subject. “What did you mean when you said I have something you’ll never have?”
“I got mumps in New Zealand,” he replies.
“Weren’t you immunised?”
“I was, the recommended double dose, but with prolonged exposure to the disease, there’s always the chance of infection, and we had an outbreak in New Zealand. I had a whole ward of patients to treat. It’s so damn rare I didn’t even think it would be a thing, but there it is.” His voice is deflated, and it takes a moment to click. I shake my head at the assumption.
“But that doesn’t necessarily mean you can’t have children.” I offer with a fresh lift of optimism in my tone.
“Actually, it does. I got tested, my sperm count is non-existent.” His attempt to quash my positivity battles with my mind as it races to find a better prognosis.
“But permanent sterility is unlikely. I mean that is really-“ My mouth snaps shut before I utter the word. Joel finishes my sentence, and my heart breaks.
“-Rare.”
“Oh, god, Joel, I’m so sorry.” I sit up and face him, shaken to my core. A fresh wave of sorrow slams into me as the tragedy of his situation makes my heart bleed for him and our loss.
“Not as sorry as I am that I didn’t keep my mouth shut.” He places his hand flat on my tummy, and I buckle. Tears flood my face, and I sob into his chest when he pulls me back into his hold. “I blame myself for our baby, my view on unplanned babies, and now that I know the truth, I’m sure that my bombshell about moving to New Zealand just compounded stress on top of stress.” I’ve never heard him so desolate and hopeless. I suck back the sobs and want to shake the resignation out of him. I can’t quite sit back, but he’s looking down, and I hold his gaze.
“We don’t know that. I may not be able to carry a baby with my blood problems.”
“Nice try, Reggie, but I think Ruby would disagree with that.” He points out with a sad smile, and I do something I never thought I’d do, not with him.
“Ruby isn’t mine.” I actually feel sick saying this out loud. It feels all wrong.
“What?” He pushes me upright by my shoulders and holds me at arm’s length. “What did you say?”
“I mean she is mine, but she’s Raleigh’s baby.” I explain.
“I…I thought they died in the accident.”
“Raleigh died, Ruby survived.”
“And you adopted her.”
“She’s mine.” I state like the proud momma I am.
“Wow.” He flops hard against the back of the sofa and exhales loudly, shock fixed on his face and silencing him until the inevitable questions kick in. ”What happened?”
“Raleigh was brain dead when I got to the hospital. They kept her alive and did an emergency C-section to get Ruby out. She was so tiny, just under two pounds.” I hold my hands just so apart to the rough size Ruby was when she was born.
“How far along was Raleigh?”
“Seven months.”
“That’s a pretty good weight,” he muses, and it feels strange to be having such a normal conversation, surreal and yet familiar.
“I know, and I’ve cared for smaller. It’s just different when it’s your own.”
“You thought of her as your own from the start.”
“Without question.” I screw my face up with the ridiculousness of his question.
“Did Raleigh even have life insurance?”
“No.”
“She left you nothing, nothing for her baby?” His tone is harsh, irritated at my sister’s irresponsibility. It’s amusing, as he was the same back then.
“She left a letter.” I tell him and watch his eyes roll.
“Because that will pay for Ruby’s college.”
“Actually that’s covered.” I dismiss a subject I have no intention of sharing. “The letter broke my heart and healed it a little too. I will show it to Ruby when she’s older.”
“What did it say?”
“Hang on, it’s easier to just read it.” I wiggle from his hold and go to fetch the letter from my bedside drawer. I remove it from the envelope, hand it to Joel, and climb back into his embrace as he sits back and starts to read the letter I could recite by broken heart.
My baby,
Why would I even write a letter like this? I asked myself the same question many, many times, as I felt you swell and grow inside me. I think I wanted to make sure you knew that however your conception was orchestrated, you were wanted. I didn’t know how I would feel about having a baby, and honestly I didn’t care, not until I felt that first flutter inside, where I couldn’t be sure if it was you, the feeling was so faint, yet in my heart I knew it was. You were growing inside me, all on your own, strong, and no doubt beautiful.
If you’re reading this, it’s because I did one good thing in my life. I left you to the best person to raise you. I don’t know why I’m not doing that myself, but I do know even if I was alive, there’s no one I would trust more to raise you as their own, love you, and care for you better than I ever could. Oh, I would’ve loved you more than my own life, I think, at least I hope that would be the case, but I’m a selfish person, always have been, and I come first, ask your aunt. She has my permission to tell you all the dreadful things I did to her as long as she tries hard to remember some of the good stuff too, although there isn’t much I’m proud of. I am proud of you, though. Even so, I also know I would’ve failed you somewhere down the line, and not in a small way, like forgetting to pack an apple in your lunch, I’d probably forget life-saving medicine or deathly allergies.
Regan will never fail you. She says everyone deserves a second chance, yet she gave me endless chances, and I never once thanked her. Even now I doubt I’ve put in place anything to make her life easy. I plan to, but I also plan on being around and making amends with the shit I’ve done in my life, with you, with her. I hope I get the chance, and that this letter never sees the light of day.
If I really believed that, though, I wouldn’t have written this. I don’t know why I feel my life will not be long and happy. I hope it will be happy, at least, and I know with you in my life, it will be better than I deserve.
Even apples with rotten cores can look perfect on the outside, and that’s all I’ve ever been, hollow and superficial. You made me whole and good. You are the best thing I ever did, and I know Regan will know that too, and she will be the best mother an innocent like you could wish for.
I love you, and Regan, because you will have had to read this too, I’m sorry. You were always the better half of our mother’s womb, and as much as I hated you for that, I loved you fiercely too. I’m just sorry I never got to tell you. Stubborn to the end.
Above everything, though, I’m sorry…it doesn’t matter for what specifically. I’m sorry, and I hope you never find out why.
Take care of my baby.
Ray
P.S. I like the names Ruby and Reece.
“She left this for you? Like she knew she was going to die? Didn’t that freak you out?”
“Oh, just a little.” Thick sarcasm coats my words, and he has the grace to look sheepish. “I was clearing out her apartment after receiving an eviction notice for unpaid rent, and Ruby was still in the NICU when I found it. I think the fact that I had so much to deal with was why it didn’t really register. Honestly, I was actually mad at her when I first read it. After, though, after I got Ruby home, and we settled into our routine, I read it again, and it helped. She was a fucked-up mess, and not a great sister by any stretch, but I have to believe her intentions and that what she wrote in the letter was real, that being pregnant changed her, and she was going to be a better person for Ruby.”
“What did she mean, ‘Hope you never find out why?’ What did she do? I mean apart from not providing for her own child and leaving you to deal with all her shit, what else did she do?”
“That has kept me awake for more nights than I care to think. I have no idea. I believe she just meant she was sorry for a lot of things. Dying kind of trumps any grudges, and as angry as I was, I had to forgive her, or I’d never be able to tell Ruby about her real mother without my jaw aching from the fake smile.”
“Does she know?”
“I told her she has two mommas, and one’s in heaven. She doesn’t need to know the truth right now.” I shrug, happy with my decision.
“I guess she doesn’t really need to know the truth at all,” Joel comments, but it sounds like an open-ended question..
“That Raleigh is her real mum?”
“That Raleigh is probably somewhere a little hotter.” He quirks his lips in a knowing grin, and I crack the first smile since Joel crashed my date. Talking of hotter,
“How are you feeling?” He’s clearly up to cracking jokes.
“Better than I deserve. Can you ever forgive me?” His throat bobs with a slow swallow, and I can see his eyes hold the edge of apprehension and hope.
“Can you?” I counter. I never realised I even needed to hear this until I said it out loud. My breath catches as a slow confident smile illuminates his face.
“Forgiven,” he says. Emotion mixes with my words, clogging in my throat, and I have to mouth the same words back to him just as his lips crash into mine.