They both nod and watch me head upstairs.
I burrow beneath the sheets—sheets I’ve refused to wash—and close my eyes. If I think hard enough I can feel Ben’s arms wrap around me and his lips press to my neck. I smile. I love you, he murmurs. When I open my eyes, though, I’m alone.
He’s gone and he’s not coming back.
Denial is a bitch.
Stage Two: Anger
Two weeks. It’s been two fucking weeks since I sat in front of Ben’s casket. Two weeks since he was lowered into the ground. Two weeks that have passed at a snail’s pace—thanks in part to my refusal to work. I know I eventually have to. I have a car payment and a mortgage and bills to thinks about. I just need time, though.
I close the bathroom door and slip the box from beneath my shirt. I never thought I’d be an adult sneaking in a pregnancy test around my mom, but here I am.
I hold the box in my hands and take a deep breath. “Please,” I whisper. “Please.”
I lift my gaze to my haunted and hallowed reflection in the mirror. I’ve lost weight. Too much weight. My cheekbones are shallow and sharp enough to cut glass now. Dark circles rim my eyes all the way around and my skin has turned a sickly gray color. I don’t look good, not at all. Grief has this way of sucking the life out of you.
I open the box and hold the slender white stick in my hand.
I’d give anything to have Ben here, fighting to be in the bathroom with me. Hell, this time I’d even let him watch me pee. But he’s not here and he never will be. If I am pregnant he’ll never know and our child will never know its father. Maybe it’s selfish of me, but I want to be pregnant. I want to know his child is growing inside me—that I have some physical piece of him left.
I say one last silent prayer and don’t stall a moment longer.
Waiting for the results to come back is some of the most stress-filled minutes of my life. I keep eyeing the timer on my phone, and when the alarm vibrates I lift the directions off the pregnancy test.
<b>Not pregnant.</b>
The words glare up at me. Mocking me.
I inhale a breath, then another, and then I lose my fucking mind.
I scream—a blood-curdling kind of scream. I shove everything off the bathroom counter. Towels, makeup, toothbrushes, lotion—everything, goes tumbling to the floor. I scream and I keep screaming. I can’t stop. I have to let it out.
Knocking starts on the door and the knob rattles. “Blaire? Blaire?” my mom calls, sounding concerned. “What’s wrong? Let me in.” I don’t know whether she’s asking me to let her in the room or to just let her in.
I tear at my hair and I kick the bathroom cabinet.
I’m crying again. I’m so sick and fucking tired of crying and now I’m angry. I never understood the term ‘seeing red’ until now. I seem to see everything through a red-tinged, anger-filled rage. I clench my fists and lean my head back, screaming at the ceiling.
“Blaire?” My mom sounds more urgent now. “You’re scaring me.”
“Let me scream,” I yell through the door.
I hear my dad say, “Let her be, Maureen.”
I wish there were more things for me to shove off the counter, but since there’s not I settle for throwing anything I can get my hands on. I throw a shampoo bottle at the wall and then my makeup bag. I stupidly throw a bottle of foundation at the wall and the glass shatters and makeup splatters everywhere. I can’t bring myself to care. Ben’s gone and I’m not even pregnant. My body failed me again. Or maybe I failed me, because I haven’t been taking care of myself the last few weeks. Maybe this is my fault.
I slide down the wall, sobbing, and wrap my arms around my legs. I’m falling apart at the seams and I don’t know what to do. Ben’s always been the strong one. He always knows—knew—what to do in any situation. I’m not like that. I’m more of a follower, and he’s a leader.
“Kid?”
I can’t answer my dad around my choking sobs. I can’t tell him I’m okay anymore, because I’m not. I’m sad. I’m angry. I’m hurt. I’m confused. I’m tired. I’m feeling a million things and none of them are good. There’s no happiness inside me and that scares me. What if I never feel happy again? What if it will always be this way? Ben was my sun— What do you do when the sun doesn’t shine anymore?
I wipe my tears on the sleeve of my shirt. I’m a fucking mess and now so is the bathroom. It looks like a hurricane hit it.
“Kid?” my dad says again, rapping his knuckles against the door. “Just tap the door or somethin’.”
My breath leaves me in a shaky breath and I lean over and flick the lock on the door. He hears it and slowly eases the door open. He takes one look at me and the mess around me and clucks his tongue.
“Well, Kid, that’s one way to go about it.”
My lips tremble with more tears.