Page 69 of Warming His Bed
More? Fuck.
“That was part of what set things into motion, but that’s not why Aileen calls me nonstop around the anniversary of their deaths to check on me.” She rushed on like she needed to exorcise her demons. “I didn’t finish the semester, and spent the summer back at home with my parents, depressed as hell.”
“Understandable.”
“After four months of me never leaving the house and walking around like a zombie, my parents pushed me to go back in the fall and re-enroll. They meant well. They thought the routine and structure would give me something to focus on. Maybe be a distraction, I guess. But it was too much pressure. I couldn’t focus enough to keep up with classes. I just—” She sighed. “I felt like I was being judged for not grieving on everyone else’s schedule.”
“I can’t even imagine…”
The corner of her mouth quirked up. “I think you have some idea what it’s like. Not dealing with loss on other people’s timelines.” Her sad half-smile quickly dropped. “A few months into the semester, I was so underwater I was failing out. I’d started having all these symptoms I’d been ignoring because I thought they were related to the miscarriage. And frankly, I was too depressed to deal with them. But then it finally got bad enough that I made an appointment at the health center and got a bunch of tests done. A week later, I found out I had cervical cancer.”
I wiped my hand down my face. The need to stop her story was selfish and hard to deny, but it was clear she wanted to get it all out in the open. I tamped down on the itch to reach out to her.
“It was…” She stared up at the stars and shook her head. “It was Josh’s birthday. The day I got the news.” Tears streamed down her cheeks as she faced me, and I couldn’t hold back anymore. My protective instinct cranked into high gear at the sight of her crying.
I pulled her from her chair and onto my lap. Without missing a beat, she folded up like she belonged there. Like we’d done this a hundred times before. Her head lay on my shoulder while her knees tucked up under my other arm.
I’d been telling myself I could have her body but keep the rest of her at arm’s length. But here she was, baring her damn soul to me, and I couldn’t distance myself any longer.
“Hey. Shhh. It’s okay.” I rubbed circles on her back as her tears soaked my shoulder.
“It broke me. That night, I couldn’t take it anymore. It was all too much.”
Unease unfurled in my gut. “What do you mean?”
She sniffed. “I mean, I washed down the half bottle of Xanax I had left from the hospital with a bottle of vodka and called it a day. On life.”
Ice settled in my veins at the idea of her not making it. Never stumbling into my town. Into my life. At the thought of a world without Sadie Davis in it.
I took comfort in stroking her hair, reminding myself that she was very much alive and in my arms.
She sat up to face me. “Did you ever think about it? When things were at their worst?” she asked.
“About suicide?” No one had ever asked me so bluntly, although half the town was probably dreading the day they’d find me gone by my own hand with a note telling the world to go fuck itself. But I’d never felt that trapped. That out of options.
Or maybe it was that I didn’t think I deserved the option to attempt a checkout. Like I’d earned this purgatory and was going to suffer through it.
I shook my head. “It was never an option.”
She nodded and stared at me with those giant chocolate eyes that seemed to pierce all the way down to my soul while simultaneously displaying hers for the world to see.
I swallowed, not sure how much more I could handle. “What happened?”
“Aileen found me. We’d made plans to get together on his birthday, and when I didn’t show up and didn’t answer my phone, she knew something was wrong. She convinced my super to let her into my apartment to check on me. They found me unconscious on the floor, barely breathing, and called an ambulance. After treating me for the overdose in the emergency room, I spent a week in the hospital on the psych ward. Got started with some intense therapy and got on an antidepressant for the short-term. All stuff I should have been doing earlier. But my parents—I love them—but they’re not big talk about your feelings kind of people so I wasn’t equipped to navigate all that loss.”
“Who would be?” I muttered, my hands still coasting over her back, her arms. Anywhere to remind me she was solid. Still in one piece.
“Right. I had to have surgery and do chemo and radiation. I’m lucky I’ve been okay since then, but since I had a hysterectomy, I won’t be able to get pregnant again.” She laid her head back down on my shoulder. “It took me a long time to confront what life looked like without Josh in it and the future we had planned out. It took a lot of work to adjust. But I did get there. Eventually.”
Her message wasn’t lost on me. But how did you learn to move on when it wasn’t the events that haunted you, or the loss you suffered, but what those things turned you into?