“Can we sit?”
He follows me to a small bench tucked under an archway heavy with purple bougainvillea. The bench is just wide enough for two, positioned to catch the evening breeze while offering some privacy from the rest of the patio. Music drifts from Mason’s speaker.
Callie emerges from the house carrying Zoey, who’s clutching a stuffed elephant and babbling contentedly. She sets up a small playpen in the shade near where Mason tends the grill, then settles Zoey inside with an array of toys.
“There’s my beautiful granddaughter,” Marcella says warmly, appearing with a beer for Mason. She accepts his kiss on her cheek, then moves to sit in a chair near the playpen, her expression serene as she watches Zoey arrange her toys.
The domesticity of it all dredges up shame that just won’t stay buried. This is what family looks like when it works. When the ordinary moments feel sacred instead of suffocating.
Wyatt settles beside me on the bench, close enough that I can feel the warmth radiating from his body but careful not to crowd me. “Nina.” His voice is gentle but firm. “Whatever it is, you can tell me.”
I believe him. That’s the thing about Wyatt—he creates space for truth, even when it’s ugly. Especially then.
“I was pregnant,” I say, the words tumbling out before I can stop them. “After that night. After the wedding. I found out the week after I got to LA. And I—I terminated it. Last week. Callie was with me.”
Wyatt goes still beside me. The confession changes the air between us—everything it means and doesn’t mean stretching in the silence. Ten days of carrying this secret, of trying to find the right words, the right time.
The gate buzzer cuts through the moment. Zoey’s excited voice carries across the patio: “Uncle Chris! Uncle Chris!”
My stomach drops. Wyatt’s eyes widen slightly as he processes what I just said, then his gaze shifts toward the house as he realizes who’s arriving.
“Did you tell him yet?” he asks quietly, urgently.
I shake my head, panic rising in my throat.
Wyatt reaches for my hand and squeezes once.
“It’s okay,” he says, and there’s so much more in those words now. “We’ll talk later.”
But we won’t, not really. Not the way I need to. This isn’t how I wanted this to go. I had a plan—tell Wyatt first, explain everything, then face Chris together. But now I’m caught halfway, the worst possible timing, with the most important conversation of my life interrupted by the sound of the gate buzzer.
The shame of it sits heavy in my chest, which is ridiculous. I know it’s ridiculous. It was my choice, basic reproductive autonomy—except some part of me keeps whispering that I’ve taken something away from them. That I’ve made a decision about their potential future without consulting them.
God, listen to me. “Their potential future.” Like I’m some kind of vessel for their genetic legacy instead of a person with her own?—
No. Stop. This is exactly the kind of internalized misogyny I help other women recognize and reject. I don’t owe anyone my fertility. I don’t owe anyone an explanation for choices about my own body.
So why does it feel like I do?
“Nina. It will be okay,” Wyatt says again, holding out a hand to me. I finally take it and rise, bracing myself as we join the others on the back porch.
Wyatt’s hand brushes mine as we walk toward the house—brief, grounding, a promise that whatever comes next, I won’t face it alone.
At least, I hope not.
22
Nina
Chris looks better than he did last week, but not good. Not really.
He’s traded the severe lines of his work suits for dark jeans and a button-down the color of storm clouds, sleeves rolled to his forearms. His hair is freshly washed but disheveled—I know that pattern, fingers raked through it too many times. He’s shaved, but the shadows under his eyes remain. There’s an effort here, a deliberate attempt to appear put-together, but underneath I can still see the strain.
When he smiles at something Callie says, the expression transforms his face for a moment, offering a glimpse of the Chris I’ve loved since I was old enough to know what love meant. But it doesn’t last. The weight of whatever he’s carrying settles back into the lines around his eyes almost immediately.
“Nina.” He turns when he sees me, and for a breath the distance from my office falls away. He crosses the remaining space and pulls me into a hug—tight, real, the kind he hasn’t given me since college.
“I’m sorry,” he murmurs against my hair. “For the way I left. For showing up at your office like that.”
