"So you still know. Everything you read, saw, heard. It's all still in your head."
"Yes."
At least he's honest. The mag makes me feel floaty, disconnected, but also somehow clearer. Like I can see through to the bone of things.
"The war really stopped?"
"Forty-eight-hour ceasefire. Renewable if..." He gestures vaguely at my belly. "If needed."
"And Miguel?"
"Hasn't left the hospital. His car's been in the parking garage for two days. Can't come up, can't leave." He takes a half-step forward, then stops. "Carlito says he cries. Alone in his car, he cries."
"Good."
"Lena—"
"No." The word comes out sharp enough to raise my blood pressure—I can feel it in the sudden head rush. "You don't get to 'Lena' me. Not yet. Maybe not ever. You violated something fundamental. You took my agency, my privacy, my trust, and you twisted it into some sick version of love."
"I know."
"Do you? Do you really understand what you did? Every patient who trusted me with their darkest moments—you made me complicit in violating them. Every time I thought I was alone, processing, healing, being human—you were there, watching, judging, cataloging."
"I wasn't judging—"
"You were CONSUMING. Like I was content to be devoured." The baby's heart rate jumps—170, 175. I force myself to breathe, to calm. "And the worst part? The absolute worst part? You did it AFTER I loved you. Like my love was a trigger for your need to own me completely."
He sinks into the visitor's chair—the same one Sister Margaret just vacated—and puts his head in his hands. When he looks up, there are actual tears.
"I was terrified," he says, so quiet I almost miss it. "The moment you said you loved me, I was fucking terrified. Because love means loss in my world. Everyone I've loved has been taken—by violence, by betrayal, by death. And you... you were this perfect, clean thing in my dirty world, and I thought if I could just know everything, control everything, I could keep you safe. Keep you mine."
"But I wasn't yours to keep. I was my own person who CHOSE to be with you. And you turned that choice into surveillance."
"I know. I know. I destroyed us trying to preserve us." He looks at the monitor, at our baby's heartbeat. "And I almost killed our child doing it."
The truth of that sits between us, heavy as the magnesium in my veins.
"Five minutes are up," I say.
He stands immediately, no argument. But at the door, he turns back.
"The chapel thing tomorrow. Sister Margaret's service. Will you... would it be okay if I went? Not to see you, just to pray. For the baby."
I want to say no. Want to punish him more. But I think about broken glass trying not to cut, about our child growing between sharp edges.
"Noon is Coyote Fangs. Stay with your club."
He nods, understanding more than I'm saying. I'm giving him permission to exist in the same building. To pray to the same God for the same child. It's not forgiveness—not even close. But it's a crack in the wall. A finger unclenching from a fist.
After he leaves, the baby settles. Heart rate dropping to 155, then 150. Still high but better. Like maybe they feel the difference when both parents aren't drowning in cortisol and rage.
I close my eyes, hand on my belly, and try to imagine a future where trust rebuilds, where surveillance doesn't mean love, where our child grows up free to have secrets, to make mistakes, to exist unwatched.
It feels impossible. But then again, so does keeping this baby inside for twenty more weeks.
Sometimes impossible is all we have.
Chapter thirty-eight
