The white envelope looked like paperwork from our earlier appointments.
“You can’t keep doing this to her,” she said.
He was sitting on the floor.
Ben didn’t lift his head.
“I just need a few days.”
“Rachel thinks you’re angry with her.”
“It’s easier if she thinks that, Mom.”
My stomach tightened.
“Rachel thinks you’re angry with her.”
“Easier for who?” Tarryn asked.
Ben looked up.
His face was wet.
I’d seen Ben cry before.
But I’d never seen him look frightened like that.
I’d seen Ben cry before.
“What am I supposed to do, Mom?”
“Start by telling Rachel what the doctor actually said.”
“And then what? Sit there while she tries to convince me none of it matters? And that we’ll find a way to have a baby anyway?”
Tarryn lowered the envelope. “It does matter. That’s why she deserves to know.”
“What am I supposed to do, Mom?”
Ben stood and paced toward the fireplace.
“She wants a baby.”
“She wants a life with you too.”
“What if I can’t give her both?”
My fingers tightened against the window frame.
“She wants a baby.”
Tarryn watched him carefully. “Did the doctor say you couldn’t?”
“No.”
“Did they say there were no options?”
“No. They want more tests.”
“Then why are you treating uncertainty like a verdict?”
Ben dragged a hand through his hair.
“Did the doctor say you couldn’t?”
“Because I know Rachel. She’ll stay. She’ll tell me we’ll figure it out, and five years from now she might wake up furious that she gave something up for me.”
“So your solution is to leave before she gets a vote in her own life?”
His face crumpled.
“If I go now, she still has time.”
My stomach dropped.
“If I go now, she still has time.”
Tarryn stood.
“Ben, she’s thirty; she’s not standing at the edge of a cliff. Stop planning her future like she’s already lost it.”
“I don’t want her trapped.”
“Then stop making choices because you’re scared.”
I stepped back from the window.
My hand was already on the spare key.
“I don’t want her trapped.”
I could walk in.
I could demand the envelope and force everything into the open.
Instead, I stopped.
If I walked in crying, we’d comfort each other and make the pain quieter without facing it.
I didn’t want temporary peace.
I wanted the truth.
So I went home.
I didn’t want temporary peace.
***
At eight, the front door opened.
“Rachel?”
I sat at the kitchen island with an untouched cup of coffee.
Ben stepped in.
“Can we talk?”
I looked at him.
“Can we talk?”
“We’re going to. Start with the test results.”
He froze.
“I was at your mother’s house last night.”
His hand tightened around his keys.
“How much did you hear?”
“Start with the test results.”
“Enough to know you’ve been planning around me instead of talking to me.”
Ben pulled out the chair across from me but didn’t sit.
“How long have you known?”
His fingers tightened around the backrest.
“About three weeks, Rach.”
“Enough to know you’ve been planning.”
Three weeks.
That explained every time he’d changed the subject.
I looked at him. “What did they actually tell you?”
“They found problems with my results. They want more testing.”
“Did they say we could never have children?”
“They want more testing.”
“No.”
“Did they say there were no options?”
“No.”
“Then tell me why you’ve spent three weeks acting like our future is already over.”
Ben finally sat.
“Because I heard enough to know this could be hard.”
Ben finally sat.
“It was already hard, Ben. The difference is, you knew why.”
His eyes dropped.
“And I didn’t.”
“I thought I could get more answers first.”
“But you weren’t waiting for answers, Ben. I heard you talking about leaving.”
“And I didn’t.”
He pressed his palms together.
“I kept thinking that if the next tests were worse, you’d look at me differently.”
“So you started planning for that version of me before I even existed?”
He didn’t respond.
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