Page 57 of The Lover
She didn’t want to see me. Okay. I got it. That made sense. Maybe it was a good thing. We were both a little raw.
“Jake, she’s a young, healthy girl. Miscarriages happen. She’ll pull through this.”
“Yeah.”
Dazed, I made my way outside and back to my truck. I had left the keys inside and the back door open. I suppose that was some luck thrown my way. That some passing car thief hadn’t stumbled across it.
I sat for a moment and tried to deal with what had just happened. Then I saw the ambulance, which was always parked behind the clinic, pull out and instinctively I knew I had to follow it.
The whole time I kept my eyes on it, wondering what Ellie must be going through.
She thought it was her fault. Because at first she hadn’t wanted to be pregnant. Of course she hadn’t. It’s not like we had planned this. I knew she wasn’t happy with the idea of having to get married, but in the end she’d come around. These past few days…
We had been so damn happy.
I lost the ambulance when it pulled into the Emergency Room entrance way. I had to go around back to visitor parking. I entered through the front doors and the first thing that hit me was that smell. Hospital smell. A combination of sickness and antiseptic. I hated that smell. That was the smell of Ernie when he died. Sam too, although Sam had been dead long before he reached the hospital.
Now it was the smell of Ellie and our lost baby.
I asked the receptionist for Ellie’s room, but they said it would take some time to process her. She asked me about health insurance and I shook my head. Neither Ellie nor I had it. We talked about signing up for one of those self-employed insurance plans, but we were probably both too young and too stupid to think we needed it.
The last thing I cared about though was the money. I just wanted to see Ellie. Finally, after what felt like forever, the receptionist gave me a room number. I made my way up two floors and down the hallway and turned a corner. I stood outside the door, wondered what the hell I was going to say to her, and then took a deep breath.
I knocked on the door to give her warning, but she didn’t look at the door. She was in the bed closest to the window and was staring out of it. The other bed in the room was empty.
I walked over and slowly sat down in the chair next to her. She still wouldn’t look at me. I reached across the bed and tried to take her hand, but she made it a fist.
“Ellie…”
“I can’t, Jake,” she said and I could hear her voice cracking. “I can’t talk to you right now. Please don’t make me.”
Make her? Hell, I wasn’t going to make her do anything.
“Can I get you anything? Something to drink?”
She shook her head tightly.
“You don’t have to talk to me, Ellie. But I need to be here. You need to let me stay here. Is that okay?”
She nodded.
“Okay.”
* * *
Ellie
The next day
Maybe the hardestpart was the car ride home from the hospital. The two of us in this tight space. I still couldn’t talk to him. I didn’t have any words.I’m sorrywasn’t enough. I didn’t know if he was sad or relieved or what he felt.
I was numb. Full-on numb.
As upset as I had been about finding out I was pregnant, the miscarriage should have meant nothing to me. If anything it should have been a relief. Now we didn’tneedto get married. I should be happy. That only made sense.
Except as soon as the cramping started I had this bolt of fear and I prayed with everything I had in me that it wouldn’t happen. This dot that I hardly let myself think about became the most important thing in the universe in that moment, and I didn’t want to let it go.
Only I couldn’t stop it.
