miles, and right as Gray goes to chase him, someone taps my shoulder.
“Ladybug?” Francis calls out. I turn and see his big and looming figure. The worry on his face already has the tears rushing out.
“I didn’t mean to show up unannounced.”
“Shh,” he coos and pulls me into his arms. I hug him. Just letting him hold me. After my tears abate a little, he kisses my forehead and then both of my cheeks. It’s so soothing and kind, and when he drags me inside to talk to me and love me in the most mundane way, I feel at peace.
That’s the day my marriage ended.
Somehow, in the short trip to Gray’s home, Toby thought I’d fucked his best friend. How wrong was he?
The door opening surprises me. Though he said we’d talk in our room, I didn’t believe him. He’s a runner—he runs from his problems, commitments, and wrongdoings all the time.
“How are you feeling?” Toby’s voice sounds out. It’s skeptical, the way his words slow as if he’s second-guessing them.
“Do you ever think of our baby?” I deflect, asking him what has been burning into my skin day after day for the past two years. The thing that’s as real as it is painful. It’s an ache that doesn’t ebb; one you don’t heal from, but rather, you learn to live with. It’s the scars on my arms, the visual imagery of sorrow without the memories. Because we didn’t get those did we? Will we ever? Will I be a mom? Will I be deserving? Is there anything I can do to be given such a gift? Am I not worthy? Tears flood me, but it’s not a sob where the body shakes, it’s acceptance as salty droplets trail my cheeks, heating my skin while numbing me to everything else.
“Every day,” he answers, and that’s when I realize he’s gotten closer. His voice is louder than I expected. It’s full of implications—no sadness—almost like he has a filter, not allowing the emotions to bleed through because he’s scared of them.
I’m scared of them.
Imagine losing something vital to you, then deciding that holding it in was the only way to breakthrough it, then to finally let it out and experience it entirely, all at once. With that and his words on my mind, my body starts to shake. The tears come faster, the pain pinches harder, the deadness inside rots with everything I’ve allowed myself to hold.
“Why didn’t we get to have a child, Toby?” Another question. Another answer I don’t want. It’s there, though; these necessary questions that I’ve never allowed myself to truly ask. “Am I not meant to be a mother, too?”
My chest aches. If someone like Lianna Moore could have me, then why can’t I be a mother? What makes everyone else special and not me? Is it my body? Is it not strong enough? Am I too weak to carry something so special?
I think back to Paris. To that alleyway where my life changed entirely. The memory pounds into me, trickling in like a soft drizzle, and as the reality of losing a child flows through me, it turns into a tropical storm, winding me, stealing my breath, and before I know it, I can’t stop the sobs.
“Josephine,” Toby calls out, his hand on my cheek. He cups it, the warmth from him making me feel too hot, on fire, unwelcome and brutal. “I’m not sure why our baby was taken. Life doesn’t always make sense. No matter what we did, it can’t change the outcome.”
“How can you be so calm?” I hiss, pushing his hand away. “How can you think logically and be okay? How is this okay and not a fucking disaster?” My chest heaves as the emotion rips through me, it slices from my chest, searching for the person who hurts me most.
It comes for him.
And I don’t stop it.
“Why is she good enough?” I cry, but as confusion takes over his face, I move from the fetal position and sit up.
He doesn’t know I know.
But DNA doesn’t lie.
“Your mom?” he finally asks.
Immediately, my head is shaking while my heart is trying to calm. “Lo.”
“What are you talking about?” he asks.
If I dye my hair, will I be good enough?
Will I look more like her?
Will you love me then?
“When I stopped you in the coffee shop. That little boy... Leviathan.” I pause to breathe, inhaling deeply before letting it out. “He’s your son.” Toby’s features tighten, his eyes pinched and his