The Way We Feel

Chapter 24

Creaking from the stairs told me she'd headed up, and I hurried after her, not bothering to call her name because I knew she wouldn't answer. She'd already disappeared at the top of the stairs when I made it to the bottom. I cursed under my breath as I situated both crutches under one arm and heaved myself up step by step.

It only pissed me off more, to be honest. Not at her—at me. At this whole damn situation and the fact that I hadn't noticed. I hadn't known.

But I had on some level, which only made it all the worse. I knew that something was wrong, but I'd been too afraid to do anything about it. I should've kept a more careful eye on her. I should've pressed her after she'd told me everything was okay, when I knew it wasn't. I should've trusted my gut.

That's what I was doing now in following her. Panting when I finally reached the top of the stairs, I followed my gut down the hallway, towards our bedroom.

But I froze when I heard something, a dull thump and a whispered curse, coming from the baby's room just behind me.

I spun around as quickly as I could and nudged the door open with my crutch. Mads was setting the box of wipes back down on the changing table beside a bare-bottomed Lila, looking more frazzled than a fallen box of wipes should make her.

Watching her for a moment, I hoped she'd say something. I hoped she wouldn't make me force it out of her. But from the way she fixed her focus on yanking a wipe out of the container, from the way she didn't look at me before wiping Lila's bum, from the way she was breathing, heavy and quickly, I knew this wasn't going to be easy.

"Are you going to speak to me?" I asked, keeping my voice soft. But there was no hiding the frustration in it.

"I'd rather not," Mads said, her eyes on the fresh nappy she was fixing in place beneath Lila. Her hand went to the nappy rash cream next.

The room was such a strange contrast to the tension currently filling it. With light-reducing blinds pulled down over the windows, there was only a soft haze to the space, adding to the softness of everything else. The plush stuffed animals situated around Lila's crib, on her shelves, the soft beige carpet, the soft lavender walls—

We were out of place in this room, where only soft things should be for our child's sake. Because nothing about what we were feeling was soft. It was hard and immoveable and sharp in some instances, and we weren't going to get rid of these feelings without getting them out first.

I leaned against the doorjamb. "C'mon Mads, we've had enough of the silence."

Mads laughed then, but it wasn't the sound I loved. It was darker, less amused, more sarcastic. "Of course we have."

I sighed, not at all ready for the argument ahead of us, but knowing that this was necessary. "What does that mean?"

She hiked the baby's little trousers up around her waist again, and Lila looked at me with her fingers in her mouth.

Mads set Lila down before reaching for the dirty diaper. "You're home for a few days so now we have to talk?" she asked, dumping the diaper into the bin. "You're around for five minutes and that automatically means that I have to forget about everything else, drop everything else, and be ready to talk to you?"

Her voice increased in volume and my heart pounded harder with each second that ticked by.

I didn't know what to say.

"I'm gonna put her down," Mads said when I didn't answer, and I knew dismissing me was the intended effect. But she finally looked into my eyes, and I was shocked to find there was so much hurt in hers. She picked up the baby and turned her back on me, leaving me to digest that, to try and figure out what I'd done wrong.