The Woodlands

“A spider?” I raised my eyebrows dubiously.

“Yes,” he said ru

“Is this supposed to make me feel better?” I asked, scowling.

A warm smile spread across his face and I felt my temper calm. He tipped his chin, “You asked me, remember?” His voice was the timbre of honey, slow, deliberate. Sure. I crossed my arms and listened. “Joseph would never have seen it. They are translucent and live inside the rings of the tree trunks.” Guilt stabbed me, jagged and pulsing. It must have come out of one of the trees I had asked the boys to fell for the cabin.

Matthew moved to Joseph and pointed to his ragged arm. “The venom started here, eroding the skin as it went.” I covered my mouth, feeling the heave of a cry creeping up my throat. They had left it open so the wound could breathe. The muscle was gone and it was a concave mash of red flesh. It hurt me so much to see him this way.

Matthew returned to me. I watched his lips moving, the way his mouth turned up on one side as he spoke, “The poison worked its way through his system, arriving at his heart. Usually it takes a long time to get to the heart, but because he ran so far, the blood was pumping faster around his body. It sped the whole process up.”

“So he should have died,” I said, feeling deadened myself.

Matthew nodded, his hands clasped across his lap. He lifted his hand and I thought he was going to touch me but he just rearranged the covers around my knees. “We got to him in time,” he said.

While I was in labor, Joseph was in the other room, close to death but fighting. They administered the anti-venom and began the process of cleansing his blood of the poison. He was awake. He had asked for me and they had told him I was safe. They didn’t tell him I was in labor.

Then I’d screamed.

“They tried to hold him down. The nurses were swinging from his arms like pendulums,” Matthew said with humor in his eyes, “but he’s strong. He was too strong.”

I winced as I heard how Joseph followed my screams; unaware of how sick he was or what damage he was doing to himself, dragging monitors and bags of blood and fluid with him. It was so hard to hear. If I had just kept my mouth shut, maybe he would have been ok. It made me feel sick to think of the choices I had made and what they had done to the people I loved.

Matthew moved to check Joseph’s monitor, putting a stethoscope in his ears and listening to Joseph’s heart. “Adrenalin makes the heart pump blood faster,” he said with his hands on Joseph’s chest. “It pushed the leftover poison straight to his heart, causing the second heart attack.”

Heart attack. He was nineteen, strong and healthy. He shouldn’t have had a heart attack. He never would have if he hadn’t met me.

Matthew put his hand on mine. “So now we just need to wait. His body needs time to repair.”

I looked over at what was left of my Joseph. His strong jaw looked hollowed, his sun-kissed skin was now pale and yellow. He looked ten years older than he was. All the same, he was beautiful.

“But he will wake up?” I asked, although it sounded like pleading.

“I don’t know, but there is hope,” Matthew said with a reassuring smile. He made me feel comfortable. His ease of talking, the way he planted himself on the end of the bed without asking, was unlike any doctor I’d ever met.

“What can I do?” I leaned in, my eyes exploding out of my head with desperation.

He smiled gently and patted my hand. “Just look after yourself and your baby. Joseph’s going to want to see you both happy and well when he wakes up.”

I sunk into my pillow, which smelled like mildewed feathers. Was that all? I had tried. But for me, the overwhelming feeling I’d had after giving birth was release. I’d spent the last four months dreaming of having the thing out of me. Now that it was, it was hard to feel anything other than relief. My worry for Joseph took up most of my time—there was little room in my head or my heart for the baby.

“Have you thought of a name?” Matthew asked as he paused in the doorway, his hand wrapped around the scuffed yellow doorframe.

I shook my head. I’d always thought Joseph would name it. He was the one who wanted the baby. I reached over and touched Joseph’s hand. It was warm. I wondered if that was all we were going to be allowed. Just those short two months together. It had gone so fast. I wish I had taken the time to appreciate it while I was there. But then I didn’t know it was going to be ripped out of my shaking arms.

I pulled myself back in time and dreamed of his hands touching my face, his lips caressing my neck. Where did it go? It disappeared like a wisp of smoke disturbed. I reached out to grab it but it was nothing and slipped through my fingers. I rocked back and forth, hugging my knees. I ached, thinking I might never get it back.

Every day they brought the baby in to feed. Which I did. I wasn’t a monster; I didn’t want him to starve. Feeding was a strange feeling and I wasn’t entirely sure how I felt about it. I imagined Joseph would laugh at my awkwardness, my shyness about people seeing me with my shirt up. The baby fed well but screamed every time they took him away. I closed my ears to it. I couldn’t be what they wanted me to be.

I focused on co

When Careen bounced into my room, I was surprised. I hadn’t seen her since the day the baby was born and I thought maybe she’d left. She swept her hair behind her ears, the fluorescent lights streaking it the color of autumn leaves, and said flatly, “Where’s your baby?”

I sighed, my own hair swung like a ragged curtain in front of my eyes, the color of dull dirt. “I don’t know.”

Her eyebrow arched, but for once she didn’t blurt out whatever she was thinking. I waited for it to return to its normal position over her stu

She flinched at my emotional tone and moved away. Seeming unaware of Joseph in a coma next to my bed, she plonked herself at his feet and put her hand on his leg. I resisted the urge to slap her because I wanted to hear what she had to say.

She paused, her eyes dancing about in her head like she was searching for the answer up there. When she finally opened her mouth, I jumped. “The trip there was pretty boring,” she said lightly, “Your Joseph was a complete gentleman.”

“He always is,” I snapped.

She smiled to herself, twirling a strand of hair around her finger. “On that rainy night, he gave me his blanket.” I gathered the sheets in my fists, trying not to turn her from a strawberry blond to a patchy bald girl. “He was scratching his arm a lot but I just thought he was nervous.” I rolled my eyes, wondering how someone who’d survived on her own for so long could be so blind to her surroundings. I cursed myself again for not being there. I would’ve known something was wrong. I squeezed my fists tighter, my nails digging into my palms. It was a good pain, a distracting one, but it wasn’t enough. I knew something was wrong before he left but I let him go.

Careen’s eyes swept over my hands, which were attempting to turn my sheets to dust, and said, “The place was swarming with soldiers. We nearly walked straight into some but Joseph saw them and pulled me behind a wall. They were talking about us.” She stood up straight, imitating the conversation they’d overheard. “Stupid kids. They must have switched it from reader to communicator.”