"Oh, they're with Mark's parents. His mom and dad are retired, and they like to get the girls every other weekend for family trips and mini-adventures." She air quotes the last part and laughs a little. "Mark’s mom is a hippie, and his dad is a retired marine. Their ideas of adventure are unlike anything you and I could conjure up."
We both laugh as she tells me some stories about Marks parents and their unorthodox ways. But I can tell she has a soft spot for them. Even before she tells me so.
"But don't get me wrong. They're great grandparents, and my girls adore them. Plus, it gives Mark and I some adult time. So long as I'm not on call, that is." She smiles.
I know her job is hectic, and the schedule she has to keep is ungodly, but Abbi loves her job, and I couldn't picture an OBGYN that I would entrust more with the baby I'm carrying. She's great at what she does.
"What does Mark do?" I don't know why it hasn't come up in conversation before now, but I don't have the slightest clue as to what her husband does for a living.
"Oh, he's a divorce attorney." My stomach sinks, and the buttery popcorn suddenly feels like a lead weight settling in the bottom of my belly.
"Are you okay? You look a little green. The bathrooms are right over there if you need to use them." She gestures with a concerned look on her face.
I hop up and head that way.
"Do you need my help?" Abbi calls out.
I throw my hand up and shake my head.
By the time I close the door to the portable toilet behind me, I'm gagging trying to hold the vomit back.
I puke ... and puke ... and puke.
When it feels as if I've puked up vital organs and there's nothing left in my abdominal cavity, I puke some more.
Finally, I'm able to wash my hands and wipe my face down before returning to my seat next to Abbi.
The thought of her husband bumping into my attorney and maybe finding out that I'm in the process of filing for a divorce is enough to ruin my good mood. I don't know what information is public and what's considered attorney client privilege.
If Will found out, he'd never forgive me. He'd assume the worst. I know he would.
"Are you all right, Kara?"
I nod, reaching for my lemonade so I can rinse my mouth out. I gurgle and then spit in the grass before taking my seat again.
"Well, your color looks a little better. Must've been the oily butter that didn't sit well with you. Do you need me to prescribe you something for nausea?" Abbi goes into doctor mode.
I smile and shake my head. "I'm all right. I don't have spells that much, and I'd really rather not become dependent on medication to keep my lunch down."
"But you don't want to get dehydrated either. If you are vomiting more than once or twice a day, then you need to come and see me at the office so we can get you something to ease your symptoms. Dehydration is dangerous during pregnancies."
"It's nothing, Abbi. I promise."
She stares at me for a minute, quietly accessing whether I'm downplaying my symptoms before she gives a reluctant nod.
The loud sound of a bullhorn has me turning in my seat to see the runners taking off.
Abbi yells and claps when Will and Mark make their way past us. They don't turn to look at us, but it's hard not to look at all the muscle on display in Will's sleeveless shirt and running shorts.
Abbi elbows me and gives me a knowing smirk. "We'll sit here until they make it through the woods and to the other side. No need to move our stuff just yet."
My stomach starts to cramp again, and I get the feeling that I'm not going to be able to sit here for much longer any way. I haven't had many bad days yet, so I guess I'm overdue.
"Are you sure you're all right?"
"Yeah. I guess I've been lucky so far to have mild morning sickness. Must be catching up with me."
"Are you cramping or spotting?"
I think about it for a minute and then shake my head. "No, just indigestion type cramps. Nothing like period cramps or anything."
"Okay. That's normal. But we'll keep an eye on you throughout the day, and if you start feeling worse, just let me know."
"I will."
We move around several times throughout the day and eventually take our places next to the finish line.
By the time Will and Mark cross, they're both covered with mud, sweat, and even a little blood from cuts they managed to get throughout the course.
A woman with a water hose flags them over and then proceeds to hose them down until they're cleaned off—soaking wet but clean nonetheless.
Will walks over to us with a huge grin on his face. "I finished tenth, and Mark finished twelfth. Not bad, huh?" He reaches out a wet finger and playfully chucks my chin.
I wrinkle my nose and step away from him. "You smell," I tease.
"Oh, really?" He gets a look in his eye that has Abbi and Mark laughing before I realize what he's about to do.
Big, sweaty, wet arms wrap around me as he lifts me up and spins me around.
I squeal and giggle so hard that I nearly pee on myself. "I have to pee. Put me down. I have to pee," I yell out between fits of giggles.
He finally relents and sets me back down on my feet.
I shoot him a glare filled with mock anger and then take off toward the porta potty.
No sooner do I close the door than I throw up again.
I'm retching so hard that I have to sit down for fear of peeing on myself. I lean over to the side and puke in the small sink as I pee. When I'm finally finished peeing, I wipe ... and that's when I notice the blood.
Will
"Look at you two," Abbi teases.
I smile but shrug off her insinuations.
When Kara walks back toward us, I can tell something is wrong. I stop talking and rush over to her. "Is everything okay?" I ask, my heart racing.
Her expression says it all. She's sickly pale, and her eyes are filled with tears. "I'm bleeding, Will."
My heart feels like it's sinking to the pit of my stomach. "Oh, god. Abbi!" I yell for my sister who comes running over, Mark right on her heels. "She's bleeding."
"Mark, get a paramedic over here," Abbi calls out.
Luckily, there are ambulances and police officers here to support the event, and it doesn't take a minute before an EMS team and an ambulance is there to load her up and take her to the hospital.
Abbi hops in the back with her, and Mark pulls on my shirt for me to follow him to his SUV. The whole trip to the hospital feels like I'm in some kind of fog. My mind can't process what is happening even though my heart is fully aware.
She's lost the baby.
I know it. I feel it deep in my gut.
And when we pull up to the ER, and Abbi rushes to me with tears in her eyes––it's confirmed.
Kara
"I feel like I've failed him," I tell Abbi. My heart heavy with grief for the baby I miscarried yesterday.
There wasn't any need for a DNC or any other procedure. I passed everything that needed to be passed, and they allowed me to come home this evening.
Twenty-four hours ... that's all it took to rearrange the small semblance of happiness I was just starting to find for myself.
"Don't think like that, Kara. Will doesn't blame you for the miscarriage; if anything, he blames himself. He keeps thinking that it was because he picked you up like he did and spun you around."
I shake my head. "I wasn't feeling right all day. I don't think that's what caused it."
"Of course, it wasn't. Sometimes, these things aren't meant to be. For whatever reason, your body decided this fetus wasn't healthy or strong enough to carry full term. Don't beat yourself up over it. You didn't do anything wrong."
I give a nod, but the expression on my face feels all wrong. Even though I'm trying to give her a grateful smile, it feels like I'm about to puke.
"You look like you're about to be sick. Do you need me to get you anything?" Abbi asks, reading my mind before I had even come to the conclusion.
"Some ginger ale would be nice." She pats me on the knee and hops up to head to the kitchen.
My body is sore, and my heart is heavy. I stare out the sunroom, feeling maudlin and beat down. I don't know why I can't catch a break. Will and I were finally becoming friends, and now it's all come to an end. I don't know how long he'll let me stay here. Since I failed to carry the baby past the first term of the pregnancy, our contract is officially null and void.
He never came to my hospital room last night.
He never called.
And he hasn't been home all day.
Abbi thinks he's processing everything that's happened and said I needed to give him time. The problem is, I feel like my time here is running out, and I don't want to leave yet. Whether I want to admit it, I've grown to care for Abbi and Will. They're like the family I never had.
I sniffle, succumbing to the depression threatening to pull me under. I sit up, curling into myself as I grieve for what could have been.
Even though it's a pipe dream, I thought that maybe ... just maybe Will was starting to care for me too. Not just an attraction but actual feelings. The kind where he would have been there to hold my hand last night as I cried myself to sleep. Even though this wasn't my biological child, it was still my baby. I never even got the chance to feel it kick or wiggle in my expanding belly.
I feel cheated. Robbed of something I only recently realized I aspired to have.
A family.
I hear Abbi approach but stop in her tracks when she sees that I'm falling apart. When she begins to move again, I hold up a hand and wave her off.
"Please. Just leave me alone. I need to be alone," I whisper through broken sobs.
I don't raise my head to see her go, but I can feel it when the air shifts and a sense of loneliness engulfs me.
I let the tears fall.
My shoulders shake and my heart feels as if it's being ripped from my chest. And then––he's there. Pulling me onto his lap and into his strong arms to hold me tight against his chest.
I sob harder. My chest cracking wide open and everything I feel pouring straight from my soul. "I'm so sorry. So sorry." The words come out garbled as I struggle to get them past my quivering lips.
His body shakes as he cries with me. "Shhh ...” He rocks me as we grieve together. My arms wrap around him, and I let him hold me. Let him take my pain as I take his. I've never had anyone be there for me like this, and it only hurts that much more to know that such a good man has lost so much. I only wanted to give him one point in his life where he was given something without having to lose so much in return.
"I tried. I'm so sorry," I cry.
"Shhh ... I know, baby. It's not your fault." I feel the heat of his breath on the top of my head and then the gentle press of his lips as he kisses my hair. "It's not your fault," he whispers brokenly. His own words caught between heart-wrenching sobs.
We hold each other like that until we both fall asleep in each other’s arms. It's a turning point for us. I don't know which direction it will take us, but I know deep down that nothing will ever be the same after this.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Kara
In the weeks that follow the miscarriage, Will and I have pulled together. He insisted that we would try again after my body had time to heal. Dr. Carter and Abbi have both assured me that since I had a natural miscarriage, it would be okay to try again after one cycle.
It's now been three weeks since I miscarried. Will has been working long days at his clinics and taking on extra duties with his clinical trials. I know he's not trying to pull away, but it feels like it. He's assured me that we'll try again, and that I'm to stay with him until the end, when I deliver his baby.
I'm not so sure that's the best decision, but I'm selfish enough to cling to every moment I can spend with him. Since the night he held me in his arms, I've held on to the hope that maybe something more was developing between us. I can't speak for him, but for me, I feel a connection to him that I've never felt with anyone else.
When he steps into the room, I don't have to see him or hear him to know he's there. I just feel his presence.
I purchased ten canvases for the paintings that have been swirling through my mind. Ever since the miscarriage, I've been drawn to my art with an almost desperate desire to paint.
That's how I find myself sitting in the sunroom with a canvas in front of me, and sheets thrown over the furniture to protect them from any splatter.
I close my eyes, allowing the strokes to form from the image in my mind. Every line. Every curve. Every stroke of the brush builds the image in my mind. It's starts out slowly, and like the petals of a moonflower reaching out to blossom, it begins to take shape. The canvas morphs into something sprung from the depths of my grief. It's born of pain and isolation but speaks to the heart of inclusion.
I step back, glancing up at the clock only to realize that I've been painting for nearly fourteen hours with nothing to eat or drink and no bathroom breaks.
"Breathtaking." His voice is barely above a whisper, and when I turn to face him, he gives me a pained smile. He walks toward me. Our eyes locked on each other’s as he reaches forward and takes the brush from my hand and places it in the jar next to my easel.
"I'm sorry. I didn't know you were home."
He steps toward me, stroking the side of my face with the backs of his fingers. "I know. I've been watching you, from a distance. I didn't want to break the spell you seemed to be in."
I blush, embarrassed to have been caught in such a fashion. "Sometimes when I paint, I lose sense of time, and everything around me." I give a shy smile, and he smiles in return. "It hasn't happened in a really long time, but this piece was calling to me today. I had to get it finished." I turn back to look at the painting.
The black and white image of two silhouettes curled into one another, one larger than the other and more masculine, holding the small silhouette close to his body in a protective embrace. Their faces cast in shadow with a crescent moon as the backdrop. In the moon’s curve lies the silhouette of a baby cradled lovingly in the moon’s embrace.
It's the image of us the night we lost the baby. Will holding the pieces of me together while the mother moon carries the lost child off to dreamland.
His voice is gravelly when he speaks. "What do you call it?" He knows what it represents, and it's pulling at his heart just as it has mine. To see its physical manifestation is somewhat healing and heartbreaking at the same time.
"Born of loss," I answer.
He nods, his fingers tracing a heated path down my arm before he slowly pulls away. "It's beautiful. You're very talented, Kara. You should never hold back art that speaks to the soul like this piece."
I lower my head. I've never painted a piece that was so close to my heart. And to see him looking at it with a heartwarming appreciation melts any barriers that formed between us over the past few weeks.
"Thank you."
He shakes his head. "No, thank you. You've come to mean a great deal to me. I know I may not always show it, but it's there." He leans down and places a kiss on my forehead. The heat of his lips is there one second and gone the next when he turns and makes his way to his bedroom.
I'm left standing there somewhat dazed and confused. It's so hard to know where I stand with Will. One minute, it's like looking through a glass door. He's easy to read. His feelings transparent. The next, it's like trying to navigate a plane in the dark of night through dense fog.
I sigh. One day, when all this is behind me, I'll look back on this moment, and I'll know what he meant to say instead of what he didn't.
I work on cleaning the sunroom for the next hour, and then make my way to my room upstairs. The light glowing beneath Will's door causes my steps to stutter to a stop.
He's awake. He's hurting.
I shake my head and turn back to my room. I'm covered in paint, and I desperately need a shower. No matter how much I want to go to his room and offer hi
m the comfort of my body and my heart, I know it's not the right time.
He'll come to me when he's ready. Until then, I'll be waiting.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Will
"She's ready."
"Are you sure?" I ask. Not quite sure I'm ready.
"Will, what's going on between you two? You seem to have a rift growing between you."
I huff. "Noticed that, did you?" I run my hand over my face. I haven't slept well in weeks, and my body feels as if it’s been run through a grinder.
"Yeah, I did. What are you going to do to fix it?" Abbi asks, her brow rising in question.
I shake my head, at a loss as to how I'm supposed to fix this. "I don't know. I don't know about anything anymore. I used to have this moral compass that led me in the right direction, but then she came along, and it's not working anymore. Everything is all jumbled and out of focus. I feel something for her, but I can't get past the guilt that accompanies it."
Abbi reaches out and squeezes my shoulder. "Brother, you have to move on. You can't live in the shadow of Sophia's memory for the rest of your life. She wouldn't have wanted that for you. You know that, right?"
I nod. I've told myself as much over the past few weeks, but I still can't get past this gnawing in my gut that tells me this is all wrong. That Kara’s not for me to touch. That's she's not mine to care for.
I groan, my back sliding against the wall as I lower myself to the cold tile floor. "I'm so fucking confused."
Abbi sits down next to me, taking my hand in hers. It reminds me of when we were kids. When I was in trouble, she would come into my room and hold my hand and tell me everything would be all right. That she wouldn't let anyone spank me.
The thought makes me chuckle.
She smiles. "What? What are you laughing at?"
I smirk. "You. I was thinking about when we were kids and you used to come to my room and tell me how you wouldn't let Mom spank me. Even though the woman never raised a hand to either of us." She laughs lightly and bumps her shoulder against mine. "You were fierce."
A Whisper Of Solace Page 10