“Hurt of this magnitude is like menopause,” Phyllis tells me. I’ve just wiped my nose with one of the hats. She takes it from me and hands me a tissue. “Comes in hot flashes. Just when you feel like you can’t take it anymore, it passes for a bit. But it comes back, boy does it.”
I nod, but Phyllis is wrong. It never passes, and it never pauses. It’s like a fist clutched around my heart, squeezing all day long. The only thing that eases the pressure is when I’m working. You can distract a mind for a little bit, but when the heart and mind work together, they’re cruel. Phyllis sends me off with the hat I used to wipe my nose—as a gift. It takes me a few days to notice the glances. People in town seem to know. I’m in the Conservatory picking up something to send to my mom for her birthday when the owner touches my hand. I look up, startled. I’m hardly ever touched nowadays. I almost cry because everything makes me cry.
“Just so you know,” she says, “we were all rooting for you.”
I blink away the tears. I can’t speak. I don’t know whether or not to thank her, so I grab my purchase and nod at her before walking quickly from the store. When I mention it to Greer later that evening, she frowns at me.
“Did you really think that no one knew? This is a small town, Helena. When a golden boy like Kit follows a girl around town with a bottle of wine in his hand, people get excited.”
“He wasn’t … he didn’t…”
Greer rolls her eyes. “He’s clearly in love with you. Too bad he knocked that girl up.”
Her words take my breath away. Kit … in love with me? No. That is laughable. I do laugh a little bit. I haven’t heard from Kit or Della in weeks. As far as I know, they are painting their nursery some puke shade of gender neutral. I’ll just be over here in magic town licking my wounds. Drinking my wine. Slowly dying inside. Being melodramatic. Clinging to a dream I had once that changed everything I thought I wanted. I miss him so bad. I am too afraid to look at pictures. Too afraid to remember the way he sucked on my lips like they were candy. It is all a slippery slope. Me sitting in the dark with wine dribbling down my chin. Hating Della for touching him. Hating him for letting her. Where does it end? It doesn’t. That’s why you have to put it away.
News of the Della/Kit wedding comes five months later via Instagram (surprise, surprise!), where Della posts a picture of her freshly manicured hand with the caption: He put a ring on it!
Also, their baby’s lungs are developed, and she can open and close her eyes. We know it’s a her because Della hasn’t stopped announcing it … also on her Instagram.
I feel sick. Also, stupid caption. #realoriginaldells
I also feel sick because I’m so mean-hearted. #imsorry
Della will not get married until she’s had her baby and is back to a size two. I feel comforted by this. It’s not imminent, and I have time to adjust. As for Kit: fuck you, you fuck! I make to delete his number from my phone again, then I start to type a text. I want to send him something angry and mean. Coward! Fool! But I can’t find the words to express how I’m feeling. How am I feeling? I touch the patch of skin that rests over my heart, massaging it. It aches right there. I almost had something, and now I’ll never know it. I’ll never know what I want most. I do text him.
Fuck you, Kit.
It doesn’t take him long to respond: Helena…
The text bubble appears and disappears. I wait, but it doesn’t come. I feel disregarded. Used. And then my phone rings. A chill runs through me when I see his name. I have never spoken to Kit on the phone. I answer.
I don’t say a word, though he knows I’m there because he says my name.
“Helena…” I can hear him breathing into the receiver. Harsh breath. I cover my mouth with my free hand so he can’t hear me crying.
“Helena,” he says my name again. “I’m so sorry. Please believe me.”We sit in the middle of that for a few seconds. My heart shakes off the day’s numbness and begins to ache.
“It’s not what I wanted. I wanted you. I can’t run away from this. This child is part of me.”
His voice breaks, and I wonder where he is. In the storage room at work? In his car? At the home they’ll share with their child? I can’t hear anything aside from the roughness of his voice as he speaks those words.
“I know,” I say.
“I’m a coward,” he says. “I’ve wanted to talk to you every day since I left, and I haven’t known what to say.”
“There really isn’t anything to say, is there, Kit?”
“There is. That I’m sorry. That I had no right to pursue you and then hurt you. That it wasn’t easy for me to walk away. I ignited something in your heart, and then left you to burn on your own. Forgive me, Helena. I wanted to protect you from the world’s cruelty, not become it.”
I can’t. I bend over, wrapping my arms around my belly. There isn’t a way to stop the grief. I’m going to have to let it take its course. I need his words to seal the wound.
“Thank you,” I say softly.
And then I hang up.
I wake up. My phone is ringing. I fumble for the light, knocking things off the nightstand—my water bottle and my watch hit the floor. I reach for my phone.
Kit
I sit up, swiping hair from my face. I can’t find my ear! Where is my ear? My topknot has fallen to the side of my head and is covering my ear like a giant fur earmuff.
“Hello?” My voice is thick, filled with sleep. I look for my bottle of water, but it rolled under the bed.
“Helena…”
I get chills at the sound of his voice. When someone calls you in the middle of the night it’s never a good thing.
“Yes, what’s wrong?” I’m suddenly wide awake, standing up and walking over to the window.
“It’s Della,” he says. I hear a lot of words after that. I can barely make sense of them before he’s said something else that has me reeling. But the thing that stands out most is, “We don’t know if she’s going to make it.”
I go to them—all three of them. After stuffing clothes into a bag, grabbing deodorant and contact solution, I wake Greer to drive me to Seattle. I take the first flight, and don’t sleep a second of it. I clutch my hands between my knees and bounce my feet on the floor until my seatmate asks me to stop. I can’t throw the feeling that this is all my fault. It’s illogical, but if I’d been there, maybe…