But I could fight—
“Ren.” Della noticed my unravelling self-control. How could she not with my pacing and jumpiness and longing looks out the window?
“Ren, come to bed.”
Bed? Lie down? Sleep? Let my guard down when other people slept so close? In the same building as us?
“Can’t.” I flung myself into the high-backed chair with an orchid decorated ottoman, swallowing a cough.
The meagre supplies I’d brought with us meant we’d at least been able to clean our teeth after the landlady kindly brought up some ham sandwiches and a few chocolate cookies as an evening snack.
She seemed nice enough, but so did anyone who wanted to lull you into a false sense of security.
“Ren, the door is locked. We’re safe.”
I narrowed my eyes at the flimsy lock and the flimsy door and its flimsy hinges. If someone wanted to come in, they could. No problem.
Conversation was good, at least. It gave me something else to think about instead of the undying need to scream at Della.
She huffed as if she didn’t quite understand me even though she should. Of all people, she should understand exactly what I was struggling with.
She cocked her head. “You didn’t have a problem sleeping at the Wilsons, and they were just across the driveway.”
I clutched the armrests hard, forcing myself to stay on this subject and not yell a totally different one. “To start with, I was sick and didn’t have a choice. And by the time I was better, I’d learned to trust them.”
“Well, trust that nothing will happen here. We’re just guests like everyone else. We’ll checkout in the morning, and everyone will go their separate ways. No one cares who we are.”
I did my best to relax, but the tingling anxiety continued to zoom in my veins. Needing to change the subject—to prove to myself I wasn’t a monster who screamed at Della when she wasn’t well—I asked gently, “How are you feeling?”
Her face fell as she plucked at the pansy bedspread with its copious amounts of pillows.
“I’m okay. I just keep hearing the words ‘you’re pregnant.’ You know?” She shrugged, a gleam of tears springing from nowhere. “I thought I’d feel happy if I ever heard those words. But all I felt was terror. The pain…if this is what it feels like to be pregnant, I don’t know if I can—”
“Stop it.” I leaned forward, digging my hands into my temples and wedging fingers into my hair as if could prevent her from speaking. “Just…go to sleep.”
Her gasp spoke volumes of how I’d shocked and upset her. “What do you mean? Wait. Are you angry with me?” Shifting higher in the pillows, dressed in just her t-shirt and underwear, she demanded, “Why are you acting like this?”
“Like what? Pissed off that you’re in pain and there’s nothing I can do about it?”
Stop it, Wild.
Just stop it. Before you go too far.
“Forget about it.” I raked my fingers through my hair and let them fall to my knees. I’d been the one to work myself up. I’d made myself feel sick and out of control. Not her. “I’m sorry. Go to sleep, Della. Get some rest.”
A long pause before she muttered, “I won’t be able to sleep unless you get into bed with me.”
“I can’t.”
“You can. It’s just a bed, Ren. They’ve washed the sheets. They’ve—”
“It’s not that.”
“Then what is it because your temper is driving me—”
Swooping to my feet, I growled. “I can’t touch you. I can’t lie beside you. I’m the reason you’re in agony. Why did I put so much responsibility on you, huh? To not even bother supporting you with taking the pill at the right time every day, making sure you were okay, ensuring that things like this didn’t happen. You’re so fucking young. Far too young to get pregnant, let alone a complicated one. What does that even mean? Is it because I carted you out to the wilderness and thought I could keep you healthy and happy? Is it because I didn’t give you what you needed as a kid and your body is all messed up now? What?”
My roar found every corner of the room and bounced back amplified. “I mean it, Della. You’re only nineteen. How did I think it was right to touch you? Let alone sleep with you?! I’m sick. I’m perverted. I’m the reason you’re in agony and…and, I don’t know how to make it right.”
I stalked to the door, then back to the window, needing open spaces and trees. My lungs begged for fresh air. “I’m furious at you for putting yourself in danger this way, but it’s me I should be angry at.”
Punching myself in the chest, I seethed, “All me. I knew getting involved with you would be a bad idea. I’m ten years older. I should know better. Maybe it was me, huh? Maybe it was my screwed-up sperm that made you pregnant where it can kill you. Goddammit!”
Breathing hard and struggling, I stood in the centre of the room, desperate to pick up the confessions I’d just littered all over the floor, but unable to move.
Most of my issues didn’t even make sense. All I knew was I was horrified, terrified, and pissed off at everything.
Della sat stonily in bed, her chin high and eyes bright. “How can you say that? How can you say any of that? Loving me was a bad idea? Screw you, Ren. It’s not your job to make me swallow a damn pill every day! It’s not your fault that the pregnancy is ectopic. None of this is your fault!”
“I didn’t say loving you was a bad idea. I said sleeping with you was.”
“And I said screw you!”
“Della—” My heart punctured for how my worry twisted my words. “Look, all I’m saying is, I should’ve kept myself in check. I shouldn’t need you the way I do. I shouldn’t expect to have you every day. Sex is a health risk. Especially when you’re still so young.”
“If you say I’m young again, we’re going to have a serious issue, Ren Wild.” Della sat on her knees, the blankets discarded. “Girls have babies when they’re fifteen, for God’s sake. Sometimes even younger. I’m not young. I’m fully grown, and you’re forgetting it’s not just you who wants sex every day. I initiate as much as you do. It’s not your job to treat me with silk gloves and hold me at arm’s length when you need me as much as I need you!”
My temper roared back into cyclonic heat. “No, Della, it’s my job never to send you to the goddamn hospital!”
“And you didn’t! What happened is a freak thing. Even the doctor said these things happen randomly with no rhyme or reason. It’s not your fault.”
“Not my fault?” My temper coiled and snapped. “Not my fault? Okay, let’s just see what isn’t my fault.” Holding up my fingers, I counted on them as I spat, “You grew up with no parents. You lived a lot of your childhood totally homeless with a kid who knew nothing about nutrition or health. You trusted everything I did when most of it was wrong—”
“Why the hell are you re-counting the past now? This has nothing to do with any of that!”
“Shut up and let me goddamn finish, Della!” My snarl was the harshest I’d ever been with her, but I couldn’t control it anymore. We’d been together for a year and a half, and in that time, I’d remembered the past often. Most of the time, I loved thinking of her as younger and older. Proud rather than disgusted to have the privilege of loving her in so many different ways.
But now?
Now that reality had slapped me in the face, I crippled beneath blame.
Heavy, terrible blame.
I’d always believed my choices had been made with her best interests at heart. I’d always put her first. Always fed her over me if there wasn’t enough food. Always wrapped her in my jacket if hers wasn’t warm enough.
I’d screwed up many times raising her, but I’d like to think I’d been honourable and true.
But…I hadn’t.
My choices had always been about me.
And that had never been more obvious.