"No, I won't divorce you. Natalie, I won't say I was wrong because I wasn't. I'm sorry… The vasectomy hurt, but I couldn't bear to see you suffer. And yet… I still made you suffer."
Bitterness spread across my tongue, the taste no different from the tears that blurred my vision. The past and present bled together, indistinguishable.
"Charles, let's leave, okay?"
"You love children. We can have one of our own, okay?"
"Why? Why didn't you tell me when you wanted a child?"
A heavy silence settled between us, thick and suffocating. It crashed over me like a wave, dragging me back to reality.
Slowly, mechanically, I turned to look at Charles.
As I followed the hesitation flickering across his face, I realized he hadn't come back alone.
This was my first time meeting Eleanor.
Just like in the videos Leah had posted, she was young, poised, and exuded a soft maternal warmth, graceful in a way that made it impossible to look away.
And I turned toward the mirror by the window. My swollen, red-rimmed eyes stared back, puffy like walnuts, the wrinkles at the corners deepened by days of relentless tears. I looked utterly miserable.
Something unfamiliar twisted inside me.