Page 30

It’s bullshit. Try ten for me. They should really put that on the bottle. And I should have taken half a pill, or none at all. And the fucking headache I have is insane.
I don’t sleep at all. Instead, I lie awake, staring at the ceiling while Kelly cries. I want to comfort her, I do. But for the same reason I can’t mention Mara in conversation, I can’t hold her. I want to tell her everything is going to be okay and that we’ll get through this, but I don’t know that it will be.
It will never be okay.
We lost our daughter. Nothing takes that pain away. Not time, not change, nothing. Not even fucking Viagra.
Eventually, Kelly gets up to feed Fin. I clean up the bathroom so she won’t cut herself on the glass.
As I get up for work a few hours later, Bonner and Ashlynn have left, and Kelly is in the kitchen preparing breakfast and lunches. Fin is in the high chair, cramming handfuls of Cheerios in her mouth like she’s never been fed before. Sevi’s on the floor drinking milk from a bowl, like a dog, and Oliver is at the table with the iPad, fighting off Hazel as she tries to take it from him.
I watch my family for a moment, my mind stuck between why I couldn’t have opened up to Kelly in our room and said everything that needs to be said, and not knowing how to say it. I don’t want to face reality. I don’t want to have the conversation that leads to anything about the past. Just that little glimpse I gave you into Mara dying is more than I can handle at the moment. There are parts about her death I’ll never talk about.
I know this is why Kelly and I are growing apart, and that’s a hard thing to grasp, let alone deal with. Especially when kids are involved. I watch them all, their personalities so evident in everything they’re doing. And my heart drops because one is always missing. There will always be this void in the house.
“Daddy!” Hazel gasps when she notices me, and then my hand. “What did you do?”
My eyes slide to Kelly. She doesn’t look at me. She’s too busy making lunches.
“Broke it,” I tell her, reaching in the fridge for a protein shake.
“You did? How?” Oliver looks up from the iPad, only to have Hazel rip it from his hands when his attention’s diverted.
“Working on the house,” I lie, walking past Kelly. Our shoulders touch, just briefly. My skin burns, aches to reach out and pull her into my chest. I don’t dare make too much contact though because finally, my hard-on has gone down, and though I wouldn’t mind another round, you can only drown your feelings in sex so much before they start to bubble over the edge.
“Oliver is staying the night at Conner’s house tonight,” Kelly reminds me.
I stare at the plastic carton in my hand. “Who’s Conner?” I ask, unable to recall a face with the name.
“From his basketball team….” She thinks that’s going to help me out. I’m terrible with names. And faces. “The one where you told me to do a background check on his parents because you said they smiled too much.”
Now I remember. “No one smiles that much unless you’re up to no good. They’re probably orchestrating a child trafficking program. You know, I saw a poster in a bathroom at Starbucks the other day that said if you’re a victim of human trafficking, call this number. Why would they have a phone? I’m pretty sure anyone being smuggled to Mexico didn’t think to shove their phone up their ass to call the police later.”
As soon as I finish saying all that, I wonder if maybe I should take a nap. With a blank face, Kelly stares at me like I’ve lost my mind. No sleep will do that to you. Even Fin on Kelly’s hip now looks at me with a raised eyebrow, but then again, that kid hates me.
“They’re nice people. They’re not going to smuggle Oliver to Mexico.”
Just as she says that, Oliver pushes Hazel off her chair and onto the floor. “Stop stealing my stuff!” he yells at her.
“Yeah, because he’s an asshole and they’d bring him back,” I mumble in my wife’s ear, my lips grazing her ear.
She smiles, shivering at my touch and then sighs. “Oliver, don’t hurt her. That iPad is hers too. You guys need to share.”
“I was watching it first,” he snaps, rolling his eyes.
As Hazel’s picking herself up off the ground, refusing to cry over her big brother being a dick, I take a package of fruit snacks off the counter and toss it at Oliver’s head. It hits him right in the ear. He turns to me, shocked I threw something at him. “Lose the attitude, O.”
His eyes narrow, his shoulders tensing, but he says nothing. He knows he won’t get anywhere with me, acting like that. When Hazel’s back in the chair, she sticks her tongue out at him. “You’re so mean to me.”
“Because I don’t like you,” Oliver whispers to her.
I hate how mean he is to her, but nothing Kelly or I say to him changes it. He was never like this with Mara. I’m not sure if it’s his way of coping, or if he’s just going through being a ten-year-old. They’re dicks sometimes.
With my proximity to Kelly, Fin takes a drink from her bottle; I know what’s coming and back up a foot before she can spit on me. “Don’t even think about it,” I warn, refusing to change my shirt this morning. You’d be amazed how hard it is to get dressed with one hand.
“Will your hand be okay at work?”
I glance down at the splint on my hand. “It’s fine,” I mumble and then kiss the kids goodbye. Kelly offers her own mumbled goodbye and a quick kiss on the cheek, but it’s brief and forced. I’ve pissed her off again. Just before I leave, I reach the edge of the counter, the same counter I fucked her against last night and realize I shouldn’t leave like this. Not again. She deserves something even if I can’t offer her much else. So I turn, lean in and whisper, “I love you,” to her, because I know she wants to hear it.