After Forever Ends

I had carefully crafted the answer so he couldn’t argue it. He nodded and returned quietly to his meal. After a moment he asked, “Do you still want the dog?”

“Yes.”

“Well, I’ve had a time of it getting my hands on a Scottish terrier, but Alex found a breeder in Colwyn Bay. I was thinking that we could give them a call and make a trip if they have any pups.”

“Oh, I don’t care if it’s a pup. An older dog would be OK, too. Not too old, mind, I want to keep him awhile, but a dog one or two years old who maybe doesn’t mess on the floor.”

Oliver nodded, “Right. I’ll give them a ring tomorrow.” He looked down at his plate again and took a half-hearted bite of rice.

“Are you all right, Sweetie? You seem a little gloomy.”

“What’s out there is gloomy,” He jerked his fork toward the open door. “The weather’s affecting me. I’m just thinking, that’s all.”

“About what?”

“Well, I want to talk about what happened to us. I’m just not sure you’re willing to.” He took that moment to look me dead in the eye.

I looked away from him. The pain of the miscarriage was still fresh in my mind and heart. I’d spent days thinking about it, pulling myself back and forth between anger and sorrow, fear and confusion. I had taken the week off of work and school on my physician’s advice and done my best to make things seem normal at home, even though they weren’t. I couldn’t stand the tension between Oliver and me. We’d had our arguments, but this kind of strain between us had never existed before. He was my best friend. We’d always been able to be honest with each other. I had always been able to fling myself into his arms and cry if I was sad or stand in front of him and rant if I was a

Still, the truth was that I really didn’t want to talk about it. But if he felt he needed to I knew I must. I couldn’t let us get any further apart from each other than we already were. We were together, but both of us were lonely. That wouldn’t do for Ollie and me. Plus, I knew that I really had not given him a chance to express anything about how he felt. Honestly, I had never even considered how he felt. I was suddenly ashamed of myself.

“We can talk about it,” I said finally.

“It won’t upset you?”

“It might, but I’m already upset. I’ve just been hiding it from you.”

“No you haven’t. That’s the thing, Sil. You can’t hide anything from me. You shouldn’t try to, either. It doesn’t make me feel better that you don’t want to trouble me. It troubles me more that you push me away.”

“I’m sorry, Oliver.”

“I know. I know you are.” He leaned back in his chair and gave me a careful look, “I thought we’d have had one by now,” He said it slowly as if he were measuring my reaction, “The rate we go and nothing, then,” He paused, “Before we even have the chance to be excited about it, it’s over. I found out I was a father when I found out our baby was dead.”

I looked at my husband with tears stinging my eyes, “It was the same for me. I didn’t know she was inside me until she was torn away. I should have known! Something should have told me I was pregnant! But I didn’t! I had my cycle! Every single month! I was spotting, but I thought it was stress. It was light, it had happened to me before, and I really didn‘t gain much weight…I thought it was just me gaining a bit and losing it like I always do…”

“Silvia, there wasn’t anything you could have done. The doctors explained it over and over. It just happens for no reason sometimes.”

I wanted to believe that they were right. I knew Oliver believed them, even if it was difficult for him to accept, but I felt so guilty about letting that child die. I had been responsible for her. She had lived inside of me. I wiped my eyes with the back of my hand. “I wish we’d talked about children, Oliver. We never did. Not seriously.”

“Yeah, we should have. It’s not like I don’t think about it. I’ve known since the first night we were together that there was the constant possibility we might be pregnant.” He paused, letting his breath escape through his nose, “At first, mind, when Alexander called me I was only worried about you, but now it’s like whiplash. I’m so relieved that you’re here and you’re all right. That’s really the most important thing to me. Really, it is, but I can’t help feeling that I’ve lost someone.”

“You did,” I picked up where he trailed off, “I need to keep that in mind. I keep thinking that it only happened to me.”

“It’s didn’t, Sil. It happened to both of us.”

“I know.”

“It’s just so…and none of it is your fault, mind, but it’s bloody disappointing. I think about things sometimes. I imagine the future. I always pictured us with at least two, but more like three or maybe four children. All of them piled up like a litter of pups on the floor.” He almost smiled, but it flickered away, “And then this happened and I’m sitting here now and truth is I’m shaken to my core.”

“Me, too. I’m so sad. I‘m frightened.”

“I am as well, Sil. Seeing you lying in that hospital…that was frightening. Seeing blood all over Alexander’s clothing, up and down his arms…that was frightening. Losing the baby…that’s just…I don’t know,” He put his arm over the back of his chair and looked away, “It’s wrong.”

I hadn’t realised he was angry about it. I didn’t say anything, though. He didn’t need me to. He needed me to shut my noise and listen.

“There are people out there with children and they ignore and abuse them. You hear about some stupid bint who leaves her kid alone in the car for hours or some cold-blooded bloke who shakes his to its death because it’s crying. And there are teenage girls getting pissed at parties and winding up with a baby they don’t want. Girls are out having abortions because they didn’t have the sense to take the pill or use a condom. And then there’s me and you and we weren’t trying, but we would’ve given that baby everything we got. We would’ve loved her. We’d have cared for her. We never would have hurt her. So why? Why did we lose her? I want someone to tell me why this happened to us. To all three of us. I want someone to tell me.”

He didn’t sound angry to me any longer. He sounded as heartbroken as I felt.

“I wish I could answer that, Oliver. I’d like to know, too.”

“Dad says it just wasn’t the time and that there must have been something wrong. Well, we know that, don’t we? He says it’s better it happened because if she had lived through the abruption she would have lost so much blood and oxygen that we might have had a child who had no quality to her life. He’s all logical about it, which is really fucking aggravating to me right now. I just can’t see a plus sign. And Mum…she just clicks her tongue at me and says nothing. She gets very upset, you know how she is. She wants to help, but she makes it worse because she cries and I don‘t need that right now, then I feel guilty-like because I‘m a