Page 22 of Maybe in Another Life

But now they are here in my world, in my country, in a city that once was ours.

“The doctor said you’re going to be able to walk again pretty soon,” Sarah says as she fiddles with the arm of the bed. “Which I guess is good news? I don’t know.” She stops and looks down at the floor. “I don’t know what to say.”

I smile at her.

She’s wearing black jeans and a cream luxe sweater. Her long blond hair is blown dry and straightened. She and I have the same hair color naturally, a deep brown. But I see why she went blond. She looks good blond. I tried it once, but Jesus, did you know you have to go to the salon to get your roots done like every six weeks? Who has that kind of time and money?

Sarah’s twenty-six now. I suppose she might look a bit more like me, have some curves to her, if she wasn’t dancing all day. Instead, she’s muscular and yet somehow willowy. Her posture is so rigid that if you didn’t know her better, you might suspect she was a robot.

She’s the type to do things by the book, the proper way. She likes fancy clothes and fine dining and high art.

For Christmas a few years ago, she got me a Burberry purse. I said thank you and tried really hard not to scuff it up, not to ruin it. But I lost it by March. I felt bad, but I also sort of felt like,Well, what was she thinking givingmea Burberry purse?

“We brought you magazines,” she says now. “The good British ones. I figured if I was in a hospital bed, I’d want the good stuff.”

“I’m... we’re just so glad you’re OK,” my mom says. She’s about to start crying again. “You gave us quite a scare,” she adds. My mom’s hair is naturally a dirty blond. Her coloring is lighter than the rest of us.

My dad has jet-black hair, so thick and shiny that I used to say his picture should be on boxes of Just For Men. It wasn’t until I was in college that it occurred to me he was probablyusingJust For Men. He’s been squeezing my hand since he sat down. He now squeezes it harder for a moment, to second my mom’s statement.

I nod and smile. It’s weird. I feel awkward. I don’t have anything to say to them, and even though I couldn’t really say anything anyway, it seems odd for us all to be sitting here, not speaking to one another.

They are my family, and I love them. But I wouldn’t say we are particularly close. And sometimes, seeing the three of them together, with their similar non-American affectations and their British magazines, I feel like the odd man out.

“I’m sleepy,” I say.

The sound of my voice causes them all to snap to attention.

“Oh, OK,” my mom says. “We will let you sleep.”

My dad gets up and kisses my temple.

“Right? We should leave? And let you sleep? We shouldn’t stay, right? While you’re sleeping?” my mom says as Sarah and my dad start laughing at her.

“Maureen, she’s OK. She can sleep on her own, and we will be in the waiting room whenever she needs us.” My dad winks at me.

I nod.

“I’ll just leave these here,” Sarah says, pulling a stack of magazines out of her bag. She drops them onto the tray by my bed. “Just, you know, if you wake up and you want to look at pictures of Kate Middleton. I mean, that’s what I’d do all day if I could.”

I smile at her.

And they leave.

And I am finally alone.

I was pregnant.

And now I’m not.

I lost a baby I didn’t know existed. I lost a baby I was not planning for and did not want.

How do you mourn something like that? How do you mourn something you never knew you had? Something you never wanted but something real, something important. A life.

My mind rolls back to thinking aboutwhenI got pregnant. Rolls back to the times I took a pill later than I meant to or the time one accidentally rolled underneath the bed and I couldn’t find it. I think about when I told Michael we should use a condom as backup for a few days and Michael said he didn’t care. And for some reason, I thought that was OK. I wonder which exact time it was. Which time we made a mistake that made a baby.

A baby that is now gone.

For the first time since waking up, I start crying.

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