Page 19 of Brood (After the End #5)

“No! Of course not.” I’m relieved—amazed—that I get the words said with only a small break on the final word.

He hears it.

“Cadence,” he mutters, a clear warning in his tone. He takes a step closer to me.

“Stop acting like this! I told you nothing is wrong, and I told you nothing happened. We don’t know if I’m pregnant or not yet. There’s nothing more to discuss.” I whirl around and head for the bedroom, mostly to get away from him.

“Cadence!” His voice still isn’t loud, but it’s commanding.

Despite my desperate need to get away, I stop walking. Don’t turn around.

“I’m really sorry I couldn’t be there today. I tried. But Brody—” There’s a beeping from his belt. His radio.

“Brody what?” I turn around, suddenly irrationally hopeful.

Maybe there’s a real explanation for his failure to follow through on his promise.

Maybe it’s not because something else was more important than me.

“Brody—” He breaks off again with a frustrated groan when the radio on his belt beeps again with a different sequence of chimes. “Hold on. I’ve got to take this.”

He barks out, “Will here,” as he takes several long strides away from me. He’s holding the radio right to his ear, so all I can hear is a garbled mumble.

After a minute, he turns his back toward me. Whatever his reply is to the other speaker, it’s too soft for me to make out. But the vibes are tense. Because I’m watching, I can see Will’s shoulders slowly stiffening.

“Okay.” He sounds both subdued and angry, if such a combination is possible. “I said okay.”

When he reattaches his radio to his belt and turns around, he’s changed. The bristling intensity from before has chilled into a stone-cold composure.

“What happened?” I demand, crossing my arms over my chest. “What was that?”

“Just a work thing.” He blinks like he’s coming out of sleep. “What were we saying?”

“You were saying something about Brody? Why you couldn’t make it to the appointment?”

With a guttural sound, he wipes at his mouth with the back of his hand, ruffling the hairs of his beard. “Oh. Yeah.”

“What was it? Why couldn’t you make it?” I’m scared. Deeply upset. And still have no idea why.

“Oh. Yeah. It was…” He shakes his head hard. “I got busy and decided it was better not to make waves. You did fine without me. I figured you would.”

I don’t believe him. My first instinct is not to believe a single word he’s just said or the overly casual tone. “What?”

“You know how they are about spouses being clingy.”

Clingy. Nothing could have pierced a hole into my heart like that one word.

I’ve never been that way. I’ve always stood on my own two feet. Bella and I were right earlier. I’m relying too much on Will.

And he’s obviously starting to recognize it too.

It hurts like an open wound, but I draw all that angst into a tight little ball where I can control it. Where I can pretend it doesn’t exist.

“All right,” I say, only slightly shrill. “That’s fine, then.”

It’s not fine. At all. But I can’t let myself feel again like I felt this afternoon. Like I feel right now. Helpless. Abandoned. Devastated.

“I’m sorry, Cadence.”

“Don’t be. Everything is fine.”

“No, it’s not.”

“I need to go to the bathroom.”

He lets out a hoarse exhale, almost a groan, and gestures toward the bathroom door.

I do need to pee, but mostly I use the time behind the closed door to regain my composure.

It’s not Will’s fault. He’s being smart and making good decisions—ones not based in emotion.

For once in my life, I’ve got to do the same.

It’s early for bed, but I go ahead and get ready anyway. Will is waiting when I emerge in my underwear. He steps out of the way so I can get to the closet to dump my clothes in the hamper.

He’s watching me, but I ignore him. I sit on the side of my bed.

Eventually, he disappears into the bathroom too and comes out in just his underwear.

He sits on his bed across the room from me. Stares at me soberly.

“We can have sex if you want,” I say at last.

He flinches like I punched him.

Neither one of us says a word for the rest of the night.

* * *

The following morning Will is silent and bristly, and I’m still so hurt, I can’t unclench enough to even pretend to act normally.

On my way to the kitchen for my morning shift, Dr. Cameron catches me in the hall.

“Good news, peaches.”

I blink up at him, momentarily bewildered since my thoughts have been focused on Will.

“You’re pregnant.”

I’m hit with a wave of excitement followed immediately by another wave that’s bitter and heavy. I’ve wanted this for so long, but I always thought it would feel different. And lately I assumed Will would be with me in the process, but that assumption wasn’t based in reality. “Oh.”

“You’ll need to make an appointment with me in the next day or two so we can make a health and behavior plan for you.”

I’m feeling so much, my hands are shaking. I hide them by hugging my arms to my chest. “O-okay. I will.”

“Good job, peaches. I’m proud of you.”

For some reason, the words make me sick.

* * *

Three months later, I wake up with my stomach lurching.

The nauseated panic hits me even before I open my eyes. I sit up, gasping loudly, slammed with waves of heat. On the first heave, I scramble out of bed in the dark and run for the bathroom, making it barely in time to vomit painfully into the toilet.

Everyone told me that the morning sickness should get better after the first trimester, but it hasn’t improved in the last two weeks. At all.

I’m still as sick as I was two months ago, and there’s no end in sight.

My body is wracked with each heave. My hair has slipped out of its braid overnight, and strands are sticking to my face, getting in the way. My throat burns, and my arms and legs shake. When I’ve emptied my stomach, I manage to reach over to flush before I slump to the floor.

Life was supposed to get better after I got pregnant, but it’s been infinitely worse.

Will is still asleep. It’s probably at least an hour before wake-up time.

For a couple of weeks after that terrible appointment with Dr. Cameron, Will tried to act the way he used to and get me to do the same. But I stayed strong, and he finally gave up.

He’s been brooding ever since. In that same tense, quiet way he did when we first got married.

We’ve fallen into a workable pattern of interaction, but it’s not the same as it was.

It makes me tired instead of happy. He’s been helpful with this pregnancy.

He’s performed even gross duties without complaining.

But he’s back to being guarded like a fortress.

And so am I.

I’m trying anyway.

We haven’t had sex since we found out I was pregnant the morning after that terrible day when everything changed.

Even though we don’t need to have sex for breeding right now, I would have been willing if he’d asked. But he hasn’t. Maybe he’s lost interest. Or maybe he doesn’t like my new detachment.

Either way, he hasn’t said a word about it, and neither have I.

So it’s been nothing but three months of fatigue and nausea and a loneliness I never experienced before.

I hate it.

I hate everything.

My stomach starts lurching again.

This time, it’s nothing but agonizing dry heaves. Halfway through, a presence approaches me from behind. Will. He doesn’t say anything. Just leans down to pull my hair out of the way as I manage to wretch up a little bit of bile.

When it’s finally over, I almost collapse sideways, but he holds me up.

Flushes the toilet and then lifts me into his arms to carry me back to my bed.

He’s illuminated the room in the dim magenta light I’ve discovered helps the most with nausea.

He’s also increased the airflow. I can feel it blowing against my clammy skin.

When he’s laid me down, I burst into messy tears for no reason at all. His sober expression flickers slightly. Then he returns to the bathroom to get a damp washcloth.

He sits down on the side of my bed and cleans my face with the cloth.

Something about the gentleness of his touch makes me cry even more.

He keeps wiping my face as I sob and gurgle. Finally he murmurs, “Cadence, is this something other than the morning sickness?”

Of course it is. It’s everything. It’s what my life has become.

But it’s also my choice. My attempt to do what’s best for me rather than place my heart in his hands. So there’s nothing he can do to fix it.

“I’m…I’m fine.”

He smooths my messy hair back from my face with the damp cloth. “No, you’re not.”

He’s not wrong, so I don’t bother arguing.

* * *

Pregnant women in the Refuge are treated like royalty, so my work shifts have been cut in half since my pregnancy was confirmed.

I work only two hours in the morning and two in the afternoon, and even that feels like too much a lot of the time.

Today, I don’t go to the kitchen until seven thirty, and I can still barely make it two hours. It feels like I’m going to fall over. Bella fusses, insisting I sit down as I work and sneaking me a small bag of crystalized ginger she made for me.

There is nausea medication that might help, but I’m not allowed to take any sort of medicine while I’m pregnant.

Dr. Cameron explained that any of it might potentially harm the baby.

He wouldn’t want me to even chew on the ginger, but Bella says it was the only thing that saved her during her one pregnancy.

If no one else knows, they’ll have no objections.

I was hoping to start working longer shifts soon, but at nine thirty, I’m forced to admit defeat. My stomach is churning again, and I can barely stand. I trudge my way back to our quarters.

I’m throwing up again twenty minutes later when I realize Will has returned for some reason. He’s gone back to exercising and showering midmorning like he did originally—since there are no more extra sex sessions in the afternoons—but he never shows up for his shower until after ten.

He’s here now, though. Just in time to hear me vomiting.