Page 66 of The Long Way Home

“Fine,” I said quietly.

“Any cramps?”

“No.”

“Bleeding?”

“No.” I shook my head.

He pursed his lips together before picking up the wand and moving it around slowly — but by then I already knew.

There was no movement.

None at all.

The doctor turned around to face us. “I’m sorry,” he said.

I shook my head quickly. “You don’t need to say it.”

Beej flopped his head back, looking up at the ceiling.

My heart was racing, palms were sweaty. Suddenly it was like I could feel it. Something dead inside of me and it made me sick.

“How?” BJ asked, eyes glassy.

The doctor gave him a tight-lipped smile. “These things just happen sometimes. It’s—”

The doctor pulled BJ to the corner. They spoke but I couldn’t track what they were saying. I didn’t care anyway. My brain was swirling. I thought I was going to faint.

“There are two ways we can proceed,” the doctor told me cautiously when he and BJ came back into view. I glanced at Beej, his hand pressed into his mouth. “We can induce you or we can do a D&C.”

“People often find inducing gives them more closure,” Anne offered.

Beej looked over at me and I shook my head quickly. “Just get it out.”

That hit him like a train. I saw it on his face. He’ll deny it, say it was up to me, that it was my choice, my body — blah, blah, blah — but I saw it kill him a little that I said that.

But I couldn’t do it any other way.

In the few weeks since I’d found out that I was pregnant, I hadn’t learned an exceptional amount about labour but I knew enough about it to know that I didn’t want to go through that to have no baby at the end. The women who can do that are braver than I was.

After that choice, everything happened so quickly.

They took me away, put me under a general anaesthetic, and then four hours later, our lives — once again — were entirely different than we’d planned for them to be.

Anne was with me the whole time. I don’t remember much else.

I remember she helped me get dressed, walked me slowly back out to BJ in the waiting area, him with his red eyes. He was wearing a grey hoodie, I remember that. It hung on him so big, and as he walked me out to the car, his whole body engulfed me in a way that made him feel like he was my hood.

He put me in the car, walking quickly to the driver’s side.

“Parks?” he said quietly, watching me closely. “Whatever the fuck you need.”

“I don’t care,” I said, barely.

He nodded, started driving. I cried the whole way back. The whole way.

I didn’t even know where we were going.