I tremble uncontrollably, my lungs burn as breaths still come out in rapid bursts with no signs of stopping. He wipes my eyes, my cheeks, brushes the hair out of my face, gentle in a way that hurts after how absent he’s been.
“Emma, what’s going on?” he whispers, cradling me tighter against him.
I want to scream. I want to throw the clothes at him. I want to make him feel everything I amfeeling, even just a fraction.
“You weren’t here,” I whimper, too tired to say or do anything else.
I feel his fists clench against my back, but he doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t have to.
Because there isn’t a single thing he could say that would make this hurt any less.
Chapter thirty-three
Emma
“Howareyounotsobbing right now?” Shayna whimpers at me, pulling Sawyer tighter into her side.
We’re sprawled out in the living room, watchingTarzanin the middle of the day. The boys are wedged between their aunts and cousins on the massive sectional. Me, Tamara, and Eli—India’s oldest, at sixteen—are camped out on the orange shag carpet Tom is weirdly obsessed with. My head rests against Donna’s knee, who is snoring softly in her brown recliner. She’s had a good day so far, not fully lucid, but content enough to let the kids entertain her.
Steven and his dad skipped the movie, which is honestly for the best. It’s giving Tom a chance to do something other than take care of Donna and giving Steven the chance to steer the ship. Whether it’s driving the truck, deciding where they’re eating, or simply which animals to feed first, Steven will get to make the decisions and regain some sense of control on his routine. His dad will let him do just about anything to avoid conflict. And after yesterday, Steven’s been a wound-up ball of irritation. If someone so much as sneezes too loud, he bristles. So doing farm chores with Dad seemed like the best option to get it worked out.
It’s all too much, though. Too familiar. Normally, I wouldn’t mind missing the movie for some alone time or cleaning up around the housefor Tom. But not this time.
The last thing I want is to run into Steven in the hallway. Or worse, to stupidly hope he’ll come find me and go back to Last Week Steven.
On screen, baby Tarzan gets swept away from the jaguar and into his new mother’s arms. Tamara sniffles beside me. This scene used to wreck me—the entire movie did. After I became a mother, everything did, really. Movies, dog commercials, spilled coffee, a missing sock. Small things felt enormous.
I’d love to blame hormones, but it’s really because being a mom is so achingly beautiful it splits you open. Everything you feel is at its tipping point at all times, and it makes it impossible to hold yourself together. Lately, though, that beautiful mix of emotions has twisted into something sharp. I was soft and sensitive before; now I’m on edge. My joy and anxiety now walk hand in hand, neither willing to let go.
“Who wants popcorn?” Jay asks as she scoots off the couch. Easton pauses the movie and scrambles after her.
I check the baby monitor. Josie’s still asleep, but we’re past nursing time. The realization hits like it always does, a burning rubber band pulling taut across my chest. I wince and fold an arm across myself.
Josie is almost five months; you would think I’d have this feeding thing down to a science. Still, I check the time, the monitor, the time again, painstakingly calculating her feeds, her diapers, her moods, everything that can impact the rest of the day.If I wake her now, she’ll be cranky. If I don’t wake her, she’ll still be cranky.
It’s a lose-lose.
I groan and haul myself off the carpet. “I’ll be back.”
Tamara, ever the saint and mom of five, says, “I’ll give her a bottle if you pump it.” She offers a lopsided, knowing smile that instantly loosens the tension between my ribs.
I shoot her a grateful look and slip into the guest bathroom down the hall. My pump supplies are stashed in the closet, away from the chaos of the family bathrooms upstairs.
Once I’m set up, it dawns on me how depressing it is thatthiscounts as a break for me. A moment to myself, attached to tiny suction robots. I look at myself in the mirror, and I don’t know if it’s the dark circles, the spit-up stain from breakfast, or the days-old makeup smudged across my eyelids shining back at me, but I burst into a fit.
A gasping, teary, hysterical fit. I chortle and heave and cry and chortle again. It definitely sounds like I’m being tickled to death inside this bubblegum-pink bathroom. By the time I manage to breathe, my face is a shade darker, and my stomach hurts. Still wearing the pumps, I straighten my ponytail, wipe under my eyes, and inhale the deepest breath I can manage.
When I open the door, Jay is standing there.
“I thought you were dying,” she says dryly.
“Sorry.” I grin uncomfortably.
She double squeezes my arm—the same, encouraging way her mom used to—a wordless reminder that whatever it is, it’s going to be okay.
“Come on,” she says, looping an arm around my waist. “Let’s do lunch.” She leads me into the kitchen. The movie is playing again, with some of the kids now outside, screaming over a game of freeze tag.
“So…” Jay says, pulling out bread and turning on the stove. “Are we going to talk about it?”
