Page 10 of The Thinnest Air

I don’t want him to see me like this.

“I’ll be out in a second,” I say, my voice breaking as I summon the strength to clean up and make myself somewhat presentable. I’m not sure if I can walk out of here and sit across from him at dinner like nothing happened, but I’m going to try.

It was early, that much I know.

I hadn’t been to the doctor yet. I hadn’t had an ultrasound or been given the all clear—that appointment was scheduled in the coming weeks. But tonight marked exactly four months since our wedding, and I thought this would be a special way to ring in an arbitrary anniversary.

I’m on my hands and knees, a bottle of bathroom cleaner in one hand and a roll of paper towels under my arm as I scrub at a splotch of dried blood on the tile—the blood that once filled a now-empty womb.

It isn’t fair.

“Meredith.” Andrew’s voice startles me, and I turn to see him standing in the doorway. I didn’t hear the door. “My God, what happened?”

Before I can so much as mutter a single consonant, I’m bawling.

Andrew has never seen me so much as pout, and here I am sobbing uncontrollably, my entire body shaking, my vision blinded with the sting of hot tears.

I feel ... empty.

Literally empty.

All that love, all that hope, just ... gone.

He falls to his knees, his hands on my arms, and then he pulls me into his embrace. “Talk to me.”

“I was going to tell you,” I say, my throat tight, burning.

“Tell me what?” He leans back, though holding me still. His eyes search mine, his words rushed.

“About the pregnancy.” I can’t bring myself to say the word “baby.” Not now.

He’s quiet, and his hand that was once rubbing slow circles into my arm stops. A moment later, he pulls himself away, studying my face.

“You werepregnant?” he asks, his eyes expressionless, all sympathy gone.

I bite my lip so hard I taste blood, but I don’t feel it, and then I nod. “Yeah. I was.”

Andrew rises, pinching the bridge of his nose before exhaling, and within seconds he’s pacing the little section of bleached floor.

“Andrew ...” I dry my eyes on the backs of my hands, pulling myself up to standing. This isn’t exactly the reaction I expected from him.

“I thought you were on the pill?” His hand drags down his cheek. He won’t look at me.

“I am—I was,” I say. “Maybe I missed one here or there? I don’t know. I just know it happened.”

Andrew stops pacing, his hard stare fixed on me. “This can’t happen again, Meredith.”

I’m speechless. Officially speechless. Staring at the man I married, the man I envisioned spending the rest of my life with—baby carriage, picket fence, and all—and I don’t recognize him.

He may as well be a stranger.

A seething, red-faced stranger.

I’ve never seen that look on his face before: pure, unadulterated rage. He’s looking at me as if I’ve just betrayed him, betrayed his trust, and my first instinct is to get the hell out of here.

So I do.

Ignoring the fiery furnace in my lower belly, I push past Andrew and rifle through my half of the closet, pulling jeans and sweaters from wooden hangers and loading up as much as I can carry. When I turn to leave, he’s blocking the door.