Blackbird

by SpookyMormonHellDream

Modern AU, E/C. Dr. Erik Riley had always been alone, with few exceptions - he'd expected to remain that way indefinitely. However, an administrative error forced a young medical student into his life, setting in motion a series of events that would change the both of them forever, if only he would allow himself to overcome his own troubled past.

35. She Will Be Loved

Author's Note: Welcome back, and thank you for your patience. Please let me know what y'all think, and remember that there's still quite a ways to go with this story, so stay tuned! The title from this chapter comes from the Maroon 5 song of the same name, or, as we know it from earlier chapters, the-Erik-and-Christine's-first-slow-dance-and-angsty-almost-first-kiss-song! Anywhoodles, that said, let's go and fuck some shit up, shall we? Enjoy!

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Chapter 27 - She Will Be Loved

Christine

Because
I have known despair
I value hope

Because
I have tasted frustration
I value fulfillment

Because
I have been lonely
I value love

- From "A Lifetime of Love: Poems on the Passages of Life" - Leonard Nimoy, ~2002

Bringing Josephine home from the hospital, though exciting in its own right, was still very much an equally daunting task just the same. Perhaps far more so than Erik and I had ever really realized, more so than we thought was possible before she came along - before she had become such a significant part of our lives. Regardless of how much we had both prepared for this specific occasion beforehand, expecting the seemingly uneventful moment to actually be a strange sort of milestone in and of itself, and regardless of its obvious inevitability, nothing that we'd considered in advance had lived up to the reality of preparing to take our daughter out into the world - no matter how briefly she would technically be outside before we got back home. Honestly, it was terrifying either way. Everything from the extremely unlikely potential for harm to imagined glimpses of the smallest problems held on in my mind as we went through the hospital's patient discharge process, and fiercely so, remaining once we'd gotten into the car and then some. And while I knew that this train of thought was normal, and moreover that childbirth had wreaked havoc on my usual better judgment, those facts didn't make preparing for the ride to our house any less worrying. Nevermind the ride itself.

Before Josie was born, Erik and I had practiced putting her car-seat into the back of both of our cars close to a thousand times - or, at any rate, what felt like as much - and each attempt had been as successful as two first-time parents could hope for. We followed every step of securing the seat's heavy plastic and metal base, making sure that the car-seat then clicked into the base properly, and we'd checked and double-checked our work after we had finished each go at it. Like all of the other things that we'd needed to practice, we did this nearly to the point of obsession, but damned if we weren't going to aim for it to be perfect. Really, everything was fine. We were doing fine - we had nothing to be afraid of, at the very least as far as the immediate issue of putting the car-seat in its place was concerned, for God's sake. Dealing with it this time around, with our own sleeping newborn baby swaddled and buckled into her car-seat, however, was an absolutely nerve-wracking experience in spite of our careful practice; as such, I'd made sure to sit in the backseat next to the baby during the relatively short trip home, just in case. Still, I felt immensely better by doing so, further reassured whenever I caught Erik's gaze when he glanced back at us in the rearview mirror as he drove.

That trip, I believe, was in many ways one that served to represent all of the fears that we'd had about parenthood, specifically once the dust had settled around Erik's trauma, and later his desire for marriage, and we began to determinedly shift our focus away from that part of the past; it represented the discussions we'd held over the past several months, conversations mingled with excitement for meeting our baby and all of our dreaded shortcomings - some of which clearly hadn't abated entirely. Part of me often wondered if they ever would, or if lacking a mother during my childhood meant that I would be a poor excuse of one in the role myself by default. It was another problem that was never far from my thoughts, especially in the first weeks of Josie's life, and one that Erik shared regarding his estrangement with his own father. As much as we'd attempted to sway each other to the contrary, it was difficult to maintain that conviction with almost no frame of reference. We were sincere with our words to each other, of course, but couldn't remain convinced ourselves for long. In turn, incidentally, the trip home for the first time was also one that proved to be only the first of many overwhelming experiences that Erik and I would to go through as we settled in as parents, as we learned to see one another in that new light and through the familiar eyes of our relationship, and as we got to know our daughter better all the while.

Upon arriving home, in the meantime, Erik and I first made a point of introducing the pets to the baby, knowing that doing so needed to be handled as soon as possible. So, slowly and cautiously, as I held Josephine, Erik eased both of the now-curious animals closer to the baby in order to let them get a better sense of what they were meeting. They did well with the encounter on the whole. With Erik holding firmly to Rex's collar, the dog responded initially with piqued interest, never aggressive, but bordering even so on overt impatience to befriend the tiny human in front of him. He was eager to see what was going on, to find out for himself what the gurgling and cooing little thing in my arms actually was; but we were able to rein in his excitement quickly, and in no time at all he had resorted back to his usual behavior, whereas Willow reacted more with affronted indifference than anything else. As we meandered around the living room attempting to head upstairs, I noticed her eyeing the baby in her carrier with open suspicion before seemingly deciding that it wasn't worth her time. She didn't like the noises that the baby made, and it would be several more weeks before the cat chose to be accepting of sharing her house with a baby at all, regardless of how much extra attention we'd tried to pay to her to mitigate whatever jealousy she was feeling.

But the first night at home, Willow preferred to stay near me only when I was by myself, which she had too soon discovered wasn't nearly as often as had been the case before. Feeling guilty, I tried to think of another way to soothe her that same evening, coaxing my mind to focus on that problem and only that as I stood in the shower in our en suite, leaning heavily against the tiled wall and allowing the hot water to stream over me. My stance at that point was born of an intention to relax my aching body, and I wished it was more effective. Everything - every single muscle and joint and bone, it seemed - was sore beyond belief, drained of energy and very much matching my state of mind then. Considering that, I was grateful that Erik was with the baby so I could take this chance to decompress before going back to her. He was able to get some time off work to coincide with the start of my maternity leave, but that wouldn't last forever, and I knew I'd be wise to take his offers to help me step away, whenever he realistically could, at every opportunity available. This happened to be one such opportunity, though it still took me several tries to completely relax as I'd wanted to; otherwise, I had called out to Erik more than a handful of times as soon as I'd gotten the water running, listening too intently for any sign that the baby needed me, and each time he reassured me that Josie was doing just fine, that he'd had everything handled.

He was right, of course - he could take care of his own daughter just as well as I could, had learned the exact same things that I had through every book and baby class we'd found. Yet his ability to tend to our baby had nothing on maternal protectiveness, fortified that much more now beyond what it was during my pregnancy, and he was kind enough to validate that drive in me rather than voice any debate on the matter. It was never my aim to insult him, nor to say anything to even remotely imply that I didn't trust him, and I was glad he didn't take it that way.

Still, the fact remained that I simply wanted to be with Josie all the time, was at that point exceedingly unused to not feeling her inside of my body, kicking and wriggling around where I felt that I could best protect her. The first time I saw her, held her in my arms, I couldn't begin to describe the happiness that I felt in meeting her, and yet rivalling that happiness was a distinct fear that she was suddenly too far away from me, and therefore she was inherently at risk for facing all the harms in the world. More than anything, I'd wanted to shelter her from those harms, real or imagined. I loved her so much that it made my heart seize, and I was certain that time would only take the sharpness from that feeling, but that it would never fade entirely. Erik understood that mindset, felt that keen protectiveness within himself as I did, but he also knew when attentiveness was blurring with anxiety, and that anxiety could be destructive; he knew when to pull me into moderation. I loved him all the more for it - this wasn't a balance that either of us could find alone.

Even so, that changed nothing about my wanting to be with my daughter right then; everything else, those wild and unreasonable and decidedly less manageable ups and downs in my emotions, would equal out with time and patience. I was reminded of that more than once by my friends that had their own children. Forgetting in that instant that I was trying to distract myself to a degree in the first place, though, it was with no small relief that I noticed the water losing some of its heat, letting me know that it was time to get out of the shower, preferably before the water abruptly turned to ice and forced me out instead. Beyond going to my daughter, that threat was all the prompting I'd needed to finish up. Dressed in pajamas and feeling about as at ease as I could achieve under the circumstances, I was stepping into the cooler air of the bedroom, now darkened with the exception of one of the bedside lamps, the purpose of the dim lighting to keep us calm, when Josie began to cry. Erik had been sitting on the bed then - leaning over his phone and appearing to finish up a message, most likely sent to check in with Nadir about how we were faring so far - but he'd made it the short distance over to the bassinet we'd set up in our room before I did, and I sincerely appreciated that his quick reaction to the baby's cries meant that I didn't have to rush to her, that I didn't have to risk aggravating any part of my body that wouldn't have responded well to my doing so.

"It's alright, babydoll," he murmured as he lifted the baby into his arms, easing one hand to cradle her head as he moved her up to lay against his shoulder. Patting her back while she continued to cry, he went on talking to her in a consoling tone, "It's alright, I've got you, Daddy's got you," then, smiling at me, he said, "Hey, beautiful. Are you feeling any better?"

"I'll let you know in a few weeks," I responded, laughing softly as I sat down on my side of the bed, just a few paces from where he was standing with Josie, "She's probably hungry."

He nodded at that, and at my silent cue, waited with her a moment for me to settle into a more comfortable position, before handing her over to me so I could nurse. Although, I wordlessly hoped that I was correct in determining that she needed to be fed, that her crying was actually the result of that physical demand, rather than something that would be a lot more difficult to relieve. It did make sense that she'd be hungry by then, but still I worried.

Not for the first time - and certainly not for the last time, at that - I questioned my ability to do the right thing for my baby, to know what she needed when she needed it, simply for lack of experience and any semblance of parental guidance. And as such, I decided to tread with caution, making sure that I'd had all my bases covered. Almost mirroring my concern, Erik's movements with our baby were incredibly careful then; he seemed so afraid that he'd do something wrong and that she would break, especially in the beginning when she appeared so impossibly small to us, so deceptively tiny and fragile, when in fact she'd quite often proved to be the exact opposite. Erik had never outright said so to me, nor even to Nadir, as far as I knew - he had never admitted as much whenever we talked - but I could see it in his eyes. As always, his eyes betrayed him, now that I knew him so well; his eyes spoke volumes regardless of what he'd tried to hide, whether or my sake or his own. He was able to take care of her, had already established that it wasn't an issue, but that was another creeping doubt that we'd each been compelled to face off with, and though I was hesitant to accept as much, at least part of me knew that it was more a matter of adjusting to this new phase of our lives than anything else.

Once Josephine was secure in my arms, once I'd more or less gotten an arrangement figured out on the bed to be able to support her and still allow myself to lay against my pillows, it was clear that she was hungry after all, and yet it took a few tries to get her to latch regardless; I tried not to worry about that, either, tried not to become so frustrated that she got upset with me, because that was something that we'd been working on with varying outcomes since our stay in the hospital, and something that kept me on edge from the start. But, thankfully, this time around it didn't take her nearly as long to get the hang of it as it had when we'd gone through latching before, which also meant that we wouldn't need the added steps of preparing a bottle for her. It was another small favor that was, again, very much appreciated. Fewer delays to her feeding meant that she would probably fall asleep when she was finished without any fuss, giving Erik and I a chance to sleep as well before the baby woke up again. After moving about the room for a little while longer, putting clothes and baby supplies away and straightening up the space as much as he could, Erik eventually joined me in our bed. We talked for a time then, not counting the minutes, our voices barely above a whisper from sheer lack of energy - but being there with him, sharing those moments with him and our baby while we lay tucked safely in our home, looking down at her as she held my forefinger in her tiny fist, nothing else mattered.

In the months to come, namely when Josie was still waking up every few hours like clockwork, Erik would wake up as well when we heard the baby crying, and he'd stay awake with me for those midnight feedings and changings every now and again. Whenever that happened, we'd sit alongside one another and talk about everything and nothing, just as we had that first night, content and enveloped in a simplicity that adamantly ignored our previous struggles, in a strange and brand-new sort of intimacy from the bond that our baby had forged between us. Life was so much easier there in the darkness. Those kinds of experiences soon became one of my favorite parts - one of so many more - of our ever-developing routine, and before I knew it, they had built memories that would stay with me forever.

~~oOo~~

Josephine, our sweet and stubborn Beanie, grew so fast that I could hardly believe it. Her hair was a darker brown, much like mine, unruly and curled at the ends, and she shared the lines of my face down to so many of the finer details, but she had Erik's eyes - as soon as the newborn-blue had faded, Erik's hazel shone through with absolute clarity, endearing her to me all the more. But admittedly, I hated to see her growing, hated the passage of time on principle, and yet I'd truly revelled in witnessing her every milestone and accomplishment and blossoming personality trait all at once. It was a conflict that I would likely never reconcile with, not entirely, but one that I'd also learned to accept as a fact of motherhood. She was growing every day, little by little, and sometimes even the most near-imperceptible aspects about her, no matter how much we'd mentally prepared ourselves, had still proven to be terrifying in their own ways, simply by virtue of being evidence that our baby was no longer a tiny newborn - evidence that such things were the new normal for us. Moreover, every time we were sure that we'd finally come to understand the rules, the whole game would shift again. One-month-old differed from two-months-old, and three and four and on, and while the majority of those differences were anticipated, to an extent, sometimes nothing made sense at all.

Because time moved ahead strangely from the day she was born and every day going forward - I don't know how else to describe it. For the most part, our initial exhaustion kept Erik and I almost desperately clinging to whatever routine we'd managed to build at the beginning of our daughter's life, inasmuch as a newborn will ever allow when everything about them changes so quickly, but that also meant that some moments blurred together and taxed our minds. Combine that reality with our work and trying to remain at least somewhat active participants in our own lives, and we felt swamped. And just as the day we brought Josie home from the hospital, there were so many instances afterward that were incredibly overwhelming for the both of us, so many that scared us into genuinely wondering if we really knew what the hell we were doing after all, since it seemed apparent that we didn't actually know as much as we'd once assumed. We certainly weren't perfect, and we certainly weren't above arguing with each other when all else failed - there were times that we couldn't get the baby to stop crying, didn't understand what was bothering her to begin with, couldn't stop her from getting a cold or a stomach ache no matter how hard we tried. All in all, we were quickly convinced that parenting - that first-time parenting, to be exact - was as stressful as it was rewarding.

Although, that wasn't to say that any of what we were grappling with was necessarily negative for us, either. That was too simple, too reductive to adequately describe what we felt and what we were trying to overcome - the notion of failure, of negativity, was instead more of a monster for us than it ever was a reality. We held on to some of our doubts, sure. They were too deeply ingrained to be quickly dismissed, regardless of how tired we were of them. But we'd envisioned them as a whole to be so much worse - so much more authentic - in our heads. We knew that we had to learn to fight against them, or to just ignore them altogether, because that's what our little girl needed from us, first and foremost, and that was what she deserved. And anyway, we were at least moderately aware that our apprehensions besides new-parent jitters were partially the result of memories of parents that, for all intents and purposes, had abandoned us, more than anything substantial. But this notion was something we could tackle successfully, as well, something that would ideally offer us the tangible evidence of our competence that might eventually lead us to believe it, and it seemed important that we let it play out accordingly; with only a few exceptions, this was all exceedingly normal.

Rather than allowing ourselves to get buried by what we couldn't change, we stubbornly took our own titles as mother and father in stride - took everything as well as we knew how - relying either on instinct when it was possible, or on advice from our friends when instinct was inevitably lost on the both of us. God only knows that feeling completely at a loss had happened to us more than once, largely at the beginning when firsthand knowledge was pretty much nonexistent. All of that, though, would unfold in its own time. Otherwise, Erik had returned to work some weeks before my own leave ended, which turned out to be far less of an ordeal than we'd initially expected, at least in terms of taking care of the baby. As planned after that next of many shifts in our schedules, if we didn't have the day off together, I'd spent days with Josie as I simultaneously tried to keep up with the requirements of my internship, and Erik spent nights to let me rest, more or less switching off with each other regularly - at least until Josie had gotten enough vaccinations to her name for me to be comfortable leaving her with a friend, or in daycare when she was a bit older. That arrangement worked out well enough for us; it legitimately seemed as if we were rarely given a moment to catch our breath, but we did manage, and we counted that as another small victory.

Early on, my mother had also called me from wherever she'd settled down by then with her new husband - whose first-name I couldn't even remember, nor did I feel any inclination to ask about - and their prominent lack of children after me. But although our conversation wasn't warm by any means, it remained civil throughout. She asked for the most basic details about the granddaughter that she would likely never meet, congratulated us for the birth, and then simply said her goodbyes and moved on. To be honest, though, while I could bring myself to appreciate her words as much as I'd appreciated her brevity, in general I really had no interest in engaging with her for any longer than was necessary. Erik's father, on the other hand, kept silent. He never called, even though we knew that he was aware that the baby had been born. Gene had acted as the messenger for us on that front, volunteering to do so in order to save us from the extreme unpleasantness of talking to Nick when we would otherwise have been content to keep our distance. But we weren't surprised by the lack of contact, either, admittedly preferring it instead. Erik didn't want his father involved with our family whatsoever, wanted to offer nothing beyond the minimum courtesy that we'd chosen to extend through Gene.

It was enough just to have his grandfather on our side, and to have our friends nearby - it was enough to have Nadir and Sahra and Meg and Samantha, everyone whose well wishes were genuine, and whose presence was welcome in our home. Even Meg and Erik made amends over time, and luckily without any more major arguments taking place between them. Somewhat selfishly, their reconciliation was a substantial relief to me just the same. The first time that Meg came out to Schaumberg to meet the baby, in spite of the sentiment of that particular event, the tension that she and Erik continued to share was almost palpable. They had behaved themselves altogether that day, at least - they didn't give their opinions quite so vocally as they had done in the past, and for my sake they'd left even that at a minimum.

Still, it wasn't until several weeks had gone by after the fact that they'd seemed to call their official truce at last, on one of the occasions that Meg came to visit again and to update me on what was happening in our department during my absence. It was only then that they finally appeared to put their disagreements to rest once and for all, and I was grateful for the ceasefire, even knowing that a part of its existence to begin with was for my benefit more than theirs, just as their mutual decision not to make their fighting obvious while I was pregnant had been. But that was better than them being at odds indefinitely, and at any rate, I'd suspected that Meg's change of heart had much to do with seeing Erik with the baby for herself, with witnessing how he and I coexisted within our household and knowing all at once that it wasn't just a facade built for her sake. She had seen our home in complete disarray more than a few times, had watched us handle some of Josie's worst moments while we were in our own state of chaos, and she'd applauded us for how we worked together in spite of our inexperience and mounting stress levels. From there, Meg was far more generous with her assessment of Erik, and vice-versa, from what I could tell, and their friendship gradually began to resemble what it was before the baby, before the almost-breakup that Erik and I had dealt with the previous year.

However, the same couldn't be said for my own already-strained friendship with Raoul. Aside from occasional nods of acknowledgment or socially-scripted greetings when we ran into each other at work, he and I hadn't spoken to any meaningful extent in quite a while. He refused, and after the way he'd confronted Erik about the baby all those months ago, I couldn't build that bridge for us, either.

Although, I would be lying if I didn't admit that I missed him as well, that I missed our friendship for what it used to be. But I also had to accept that what I was feeling such nostalgia for was long-gone now, and that too much had taken place in the intervening years to allow it ever to be the same again, or even close to the same. The friendship that I was actually missing, I realized, existed before we'd become a couple, before the tragedy of losing our baby, before everything went wrong that ultimately forced us apart. Yet whenever I'd considered the bigger picture, I knew that each of those tough roads were leading me to something better all along, leading me to the man that I truly loved, leading me to my daughter, to a life that made me the happiest I'd been since my father died. By then, I had lost track of how many times I'd entertained those kinds of thoughts, deliberating over what was bittersweet and what was meant to be, wondering if Raoul would ever find that same peace of mind himself. I sincerely believed that I had come to terms with the way our relationship devolved - but I also believed that he had not; I wished that we hadn't gotten into so many fights in the meantime, but until he accepted what I already knew, we could never salvage and rebuild the foundation for our friendship.

Frankly, though, I didn't like to think about Raoul often if I could avoid it - his place in my life had become too complicated even in its forced distance on his part, and as it stood, I had my own relationship to consider. That, more than tentative friendships and misunderstandings from the past, needed to take priority. Because Erik and I had shared more than one heated argument that, beyond being as counterproductive for us as humanly possible, had also marked the passage of time that should have been dedicated solely to our daughter, despite the relative improvements that we'd made to our relationship before Josie was born. The conversation we had in the hospital, the one that I had so abruptly steered us away from, had never been worked out in any concrete sense, and when all was said and done, its source was something that nagged at us both long after that day was over. To our shared dismay, even though in everything else Erik had behaved in ways that showed that he was happy - and even though he had been confident in the beginning that he could resolve himself to be satisfied with what we had - so many of our conflicts thereafter were borne of the ever-lingering disagreement we held over the official title of our relationship, of where it should eventually lead.

Where Erik wanted to somehow prove that he was going to stay with our small family, wanted to do so by moving forward with me in the most unequivocal way he knew, I in turn argued for more time to determine if that was the right path for us to take anymore at all, or if we needed to decide upon staying together only as a couple instead, bypassing any kind of formal engagement; I'd consistently argued that moving slowly would benefit us both, we just had to be patient. But, for all that he tried, he just couldn't accept that perspective in the long-run. No matter how many times we attempted to be rational and address the issue, we were still unable to move past what he'd done to hurt me. He was remorseful, he honestly hated that we were in this uncertain situation because of his actions, but while I didn't want to keep holding them against him, I also couldn't let them go entirely, and in turn I was silently afraid that he would come to resent me for that.

That undercurrent of distress wouldn't settle down, and it followed us both for so long - it steadily chipped away at what had otherwise been such a strong bond, and that was the last thing either of us had meant to happen. It was forced to live within that unreliable state of mind that we both felt destined to stay for the foreseeable future - always adrift between something that would help and something else that would do more harm, always trying to figure out how to escape the intangible frustration that either option caused, yet never able to do so entirely. Erik wished that he could be more for me, for our daughter - he had only ever wanted to do the right thing, because, at the heart of it all, he loved us. It was as simple as that, and I knew that, of course I knew that. I was still his girlfriend, in every way that mattered - except that was what I would remain indefinitely. That was what he took issue with, what he wanted to change, and what he could never seem to fix whenever the subject arose between us. And as much as we'd both tried to avoid the fight that came along with any and all discussions surrounding the idea of getting engaged, we never could. Something always reminded one of us not only that we weren't getting married, but of why we weren't getting married, and that would then spark the same damn argument we'd so badly wanted to prevent all over again. We never set out to antagonize each other, but that was impossible to prevent just the same.

Even during the best of times, the engagement dispute stubbornly lingered, punctuating events that would otherwise have been completely normal, that would have been positive. The first time Josie stood by herself, when she was around eight months old the following January, was one instance that pulled me away from her achievement and left me feeling an emptiness for what could have been.

~~oOo~~

I'd had the day off when Josephine stood up on her own. That morning, as Erik kissed me goodbye at the front door and left for Chicago, I had decided that I was going to take advantage of spending that rare free-time with my daughter; even if my doing so meant ignoring the fact that I had to divide what little I'd gotten of it with the journal assignments and charts and study guides I'd needed to bring home with me the previous afternoon, I would still make sure to have that time with her. My workload was bothering me, though, was making me anxious when I should have been enjoying my day alone with the baby. Unfortunately for me, the final exams for my internship were coming up in the spring, and while I'd initially gotten ready for them during that first official year of the internship, I'd gone on maternity leave just before I could actually go through with those qualifying exams. Essentially, I had to start all over again.

So, taking that alongside my time away from my work in the hospital before and after Josie was born into consideration, I was currently a full year behind my colleagues - my internship and promotion to my residency program had been delayed for longer than I'd ever physically been away, but exams notwithstanding, some work, some skills, couldn't be acquired outside of oncology. There was no way it would've been possible for me to learn everything that I needed to learn unless I was doing so firsthand with my mentor, nor was it reasonable to have other arrangements made to resolve the scheduling constraint. I knew as much early in my pregnancy, knew what headway I would lose when Dr. Tavade and I spoke on the matter, when she'd offered me a straightforward explanation about what I should expect from then on. But still, to think about the time I'd lost and to feel the effects of losing it in reality it were two entirely different concepts, and when the latter came to pass, I don't think I was as emotionally prepared as I'd once thought. It quickly became necessary to work twice as hard as I would have without a baby underfoot, and as much as I loved my daughter, some aspects of what I was doing snuck up on me sometimes, made me feel so overwhelmed by my life, by my chosen career and everything else I'd had to balance as a result, that I just wanted to sit down and cry.

My day off happened to be one of those exact situations. After several hours of working and reading and trying to pay equal, if not decidedly more attention to Josie, with little to show for it besides a fussy baby and a stack of useless notes - when I realized how much work had piled up, and how few of the tasks related to it I'd gotten done, or even glanced at by that point - I was sure that I would collapse under the weight of my obligations. In fact, I was very near actual tears of forfeit later that same day; I was only barely able to hold them back entirely as I sat huddled on the couch with Rex.

While he nudged me and carefully rested his head on my lap in an obvious attempt to lessen the uneasy energy that I was feeling then, I absently wondered to myself if I should turn the Sirius system's volume all the way up, or just say fuck it and leave the setting alone before I screamed into the void. Rex and Willow would probably leave the room, if that were the case, but Josie wouldn't mind the additional noise to go with the classic rock station - really, she could join in if she wanted. That was also when I'd noticed her moving around in her playpen more than usual, though, and jokes aside, my full attention went to her immediately, now worried that something was wrong, that she was about to start crying herself. But when initially I'd forgotten all about the work strewn across the floor in front of the couch in favor of baby-problem-solving, that mentality was instantly replaced altogether when my mind registered the image in front of me. What I'd heard was probably the sound of her scrabbling up the mesh siding as she got her balance, because what I saw before me then was Josie was standing upright, albeit not entirely steadily. She stood right there in the middle of the playpen, arms raised and hands reaching out to me, as if she was announcing what she'd just done and wanted me to recognize it at once.

And I absolutely had - beaming at her, I rose from where I was sitting with a burst of surprised laughter, effectively displacing Rex in the process. I apologized in a haste to the dog as I rushed over to the playpen and picked Josie up, saying enthusiastically as I did so, "Beanie! Look at you! What a great job, my big girl, you did that all by yourself!"

Still smiling and adding more gentle praises as I held her, I moved so I could sit down in the middle of the floor with her, then settled her in front of me to get her to stand up again.

As I played with her and talked to her and coaxed her to use me for balance, I kept a running list in my mind of the details of this experience that I would need to add to her baby-book - one of my many keepsakes, and one which Erik still scoffed at good-naturedly about owning, even as he'd written in it himself after the handful of occasions he'd seen Josie do something notable. I laughed inwardly at the thought of him coming home to find me scribbling the newest entry about Josephine standing up, imagining the banter that would follow. My own work abandoned, it was easy to focus on sentimental daydreams, and I was thankful that I hadn't felt guilty for leaving that work to play with the baby. Guilt might come later, when I reapproached my work-related tasks and remembered the time I could have dedicated to them before, but I knew even then that it would be worth it. I would much rather have dealt with that kind of stress than miss these important moments with my little girl. Those firsts would only happen once, and I wasn't willing to trade seeing them for anything. It didn't escape me that had it not been one of the days I wasn't in Chicago, I could've missed this event completely, and in realizing that, I was that much more grateful for the chance to have witnessed it at all. As time passed and I gradually began to come into my own as a mother, I knew that much to be true.

Kismet continued its work not even an hour after Josie and I had gotten comfortable, after I'd decided to lay down a blanket and bring out some of her toys to our spot in the living room. For the time being, the uneasiness that I was carrying earlier had faded, and I was happy not to work; I could get back to my medical journal readings and everything else later in the evening, once Josie was asleep for the night in her bedroom and Erik and I had the downstairs to ourselves again. In the meantime, I was perfectly content to watch while Josie played with her toys, presently a combination of antique-style wooden blocks that she loved knocking over, and a brightly colored, flashing miniature keyboard, courtesy of her father. Yet soon enough, I heard the telltale sound of the garage door opening, followed quickly by the squeaking hinges of the door off the kitchen, and it was clear that Erik had gotten back earlier than planned; it was only later that I saw the message he'd sent on his way home detailing as much, but I was so distracted by Josie's latest antics that I hadn't even noticed the text alert from my phone. He ran into the living room when I called out to him, likely mistaking the shrillness in my voice as an indication that something was wrong, but I didn't think I needed to correct myself then; I'd always reacted with excitement whenever Josie added something new to her growing list of talents and traits, and anyway, Erik was about to see what was going on for himself.

"Come watch, you'll love this," I said hurriedly, gesturing for him to sit on the blanket with us; after several poorly-executed attempts, Josie stood up once more, gaining self-assurance for her efforts with each successful try. Erik smiled proudly when he saw what she'd done, and although a part of me assumed that he regretted not seeing the first time in-person, I was also fairly confident that his regret would be short-lived. To him, anything that Josie did was important to see, regardless of whether it was a milestone or not. After everything that we'd gone through together, after he had very nearly lost his life, all that occurred now was significant.

"This is great," he said, still smiling. Then, after pulling Josie over to his lap, he asked, seemingly trying to remember which developmental trait corresponded with her current age while he spoke, "So, does this mean she'll be walking next?"

"Not just yet, but soon."

A pause, then, "Too soon, for my liking," he murmured, almost to himself. Beyond that, he didn't say anything aloud as further explanation, but he didn't really need to, either - I felt what he felt then, understood the internal conflict he was experiencing between wanting to see our girl continue to grow up as strong and smart and capable as she had been already, and yet all at once wishing fervently that time could stand still for a while, just for our sake. Erik sighed as if in silent agreement, then, moving the baby to stand from his support, said to her in a lighter voice, "You're not allowed to grow up yet, you know. We just got you."

She laughed and babbled along with his voice when he bounced her and kept speaking to her in that manner, deeming then and there that his babydoll was still far too new to the world to grow into it yet, while he got her to move her legs and keep finding her balance. I simply sat back and watched their interactions, captivated by everything they did together - Erik would stop for a time to let her try standing on her own again, and every time she lost her footing, he was there to catch her, talking to her all the while with approval and encouragement. As vehemently as he had sworn that he wouldn't know what to do with a child of his own, that he didn't know the first thing about belonging to a family, he was completely in his element when he was with Josephine; he had stumbled more than once as a parent, we both had, but it was impossible to ignore the dramatic shift in perspective that developed between then and now. There were so many misgivings on his part at the outset, so many junctures wherein he'd lost faith in himself, but in the end he had never faltered irreparably, never gave up. He was such an amazing father.

Honestly, during moments like this, I could see us getting married, could see myself accepting his proposal and stepping forward with him without any doubts or regrets.

But then...then my thoughts would turn right back to everything that had gone wrong when we'd needed to find strength in each other the most, to that instant just before the shooting when it was over between us, or so we had both claimed in the aftermath of our hurtful words. Whenever we'd gotten distracted and inadvertently let our conversations drift backward in time, to that point in the past, I heard it all again - when we made love, whether under the cover of darkness or not, and I saw and felt all of the scars from that day which were now permanently driven into his chest, I couldn't stop myself from remembering their origin, everything that came along with it; even when we were simply waking up and getting ready to leave the house together in the morning, part of me would balk at the notion that I might have been doing all of it completely alone instead, one way or another, in a different life. Somehow, without warning, my thoughts always returned to that single instant that defined us as we were now - regardless of how unwilling we were to allow that to happen - altering what we could be every day since.

Not for lack of trying, I couldn't let go of what Erik had done, nor could I let go of the apprehension that followed his recovery, when I'd find myself debating if it was only the fact that he'd survived that had compelled him to stay with me and the baby, rather than any genuine desire to have done so in the first place. It truly seemed that I'd gone over it all a thousand times in my head; I wanted to trust that he was telling me the truth when he insisted upon the latter, but the former held on intractably. I loved him more than I could say, and I knew that he loved me just as fiercely - but the effects of the shooting ran deeper than either of us could ever have anticipated, and so often, too often, I'd suddenly realize that I'd been thinking about that day in the ER, that I'd been remembering holding fast to his hand as he tearfully begged for forgiveness from behind the ventilator, and wondering if he meant it when he promised to stay, or if the mental and emotional impact of nearly dying had been his sole influencer. If he wasn't sincere, then it felt impossible to try to build from that insincerity. It wasn't responsible. What would become of us in the future if that was the case, if he hadn't actually wanted to stay before his life was in danger? I wasn't sure if that wound, cut so deep from his abandonment, could ever heal. I wanted to forgive him, already had, in some ways, but not in the way that we needed the most. Not in the way that would save a marriage that had once waited in the wings for us.

I would always love him, and I loved the little family we now had, the life we were building. Even though I had never questioned whether or not he loved me - and though in the nearly two years or so that separated us from his decision to walk away we'd remained a couple, stayed committed to each other, lived together, raised our child together - in the end, I could no longer trust him enough to accept his proposal. Love wasn't enough; we weren't ready to get married, because our fragmented past couldn't be forgotten. I wouldn't bring it up then, wouldn't do or say anything that might tarnish this experience with Josie, but I knew I was right.

I won't ask again, Christine, he'd promised once, in the wake of the same fight that we'd already held countless times by then - although, in that specific instant, his words had nearly sounded like a threat, rather than anything that could've been considered more reassuring. After that particularly bitter argument on the subject had left us admittedly furious with each other, with our circumstances as a whole, that biting tone had been the outcome; it had taken several attempts to speak calmly to each other once again before he was able to continue coherently, and, to his credit, apologetically. We'll both know when we're ready to get married, he'd sighed, I'm sure we'll know...So I won't push it sooner than that. Yet I still hadn't responded immediately; if there was a lesson to be learned from past experiences, then I didn't want a mistake or another misspoken concession to force us to learn that lesson the hard way this time around, not before I'd had a chance to process, and so I simply nodded and agreed to these new terms. But as he spoke those words to me, I'd known with perfect clarity just how desperate he was for everything to be different for us - and how desperately I wanted the same thing, even as I couldn't bring myself to take that step. We weren't ready, despite what he said, despite what he insisted. However much we wanted to be, we just weren't ready to get married.

I wasn't ready.

Resigned and alone with my reflections, I remained determined that I wouldn't say anything toward those thoughts as I continued to watch Erik and Josie together. But even then, I knew what our marital status would be, and I had no idea when, or even if that would change.

~~oOo~~

Some weeks later, near the middle of March, my old car finally decided that its life was over. Although for once, it at least found a shred of decency to make that choice while I was still safely parked in my garage, rather than somewhere out on the road during one of my long drives into the city. Erik and I certainly had reason enough to be grateful for that happening to me in the past, all things considered - so much had developed in our relationship as a direct result of him having to come rescue me from one issue or another related to that damn car - but now that we had Josie, I didn't like to take the risk of having her with me if there was a breakdown, especially in the winter, when both traffic- and roadside-conditions were at their worst. So when the car was officially put out of commission and hauled off to be junked, I felt that it was reasonable to breathe a sigh of relief at its departure from my daily life, both literally and figuratively. But the problem remained that, until it could be replaced, Erik and I only had his car between us, one functioning vehicle for two working and regularly-commuting adults, which was all well and good when we had shifts scheduled on the same day - but otherwise, we were left either giving each other rides to Chicago whenever it was necessary, or taking the train alone when the weather was tolerable enough for that kind of trip.

Around that time of year, though, doing so proved impossible more often than not, and so there was one distinct occasion that I'd wanted to spare Erik the hassle of public transit combined with the inclement weather when the issue came up. Yet, in hindsight, I seriously wish that I hadn't, and not for any reason that I could've ever anticipated.

That evening, I was able to meet him in surgery near the end of his shift; with Josie in tow, my journey to the hospital had taken a bit longer than usual, but altogether I didn't mind. It was nice to be out of the house, namely after the weather had forced us to take cover for the better part of the day. But beyond that, I was just looking forward to seeing Erik. He'd left so early that morning that I'd hardly gotten a chance to see him off before he needed to catch his train, and I was only vaguely aware of the message he'd sent shortly thereafter informing me that the rainstorm we'd been tracking overnight had arrived in full-force. Upon reading that message once I'd woken up entirely and had gotten Josie from her bedroom, I decided to go get Erik from Chicago myself at the end of the workday, rather than have him make his way back home in the downpour. Wearing his surgical mask in public was still a requirement in his mind, and I knew that he hated having to interact with other passengers on the train, some openly staring, others more subtle, but many of them equal in their intrusiveness regarding his appearance. That scenario worsened tenfold when the weather was bad, because that meant there would be significantly more people riding the train than might have been the case without the storm. Bearing all of that in mind, he was visibly happy to find me chatting with Belinda, the receptionist for the surgical service that day, as I held Josie in my arms when he passed the admit-desk; seeing that expression made the drive worthwhile.

By that point, he had already finished up with the last case of his shift, although apparently, he'd also had his schedule thrown off to a substantial degree well before then; the way it was explained to me later, multiple victims of a severe incident from somewhere downtown had come through the doors after a lull in patient intake that afternoon, and casualty after casualty had required everyone available to drop anything inconsequential that they were doing to tend to the critical patients. That in itself obviously wasn't unusual for surgeons, namely ones that specialize in trauma as Erik did, but ordinarily they would only have one or two emergency cases to prepare for and see through at a time - having more than that as today always proved to be more difficult as a rule. Ultimately, those involved in whatever accident had brought them to the hospital to begin with had survived, but just barely, and so many of the physicians assigned to them had exited the hours-long surgeries exhausted and understandably agitated; as it happened, Erik had been the one placed in charge of leading the team performing the surgery for his own case, and he would later described how overwhelmed they had all been throughout by the challenging operation and its aftermath. But once the patients in question had been transferred to recovery, the doctors were able to disperse again, and as such, in turn Erik only had a few more things to handle before he could officially leave with me for the night. Waiting for him wouldn't be long - he'd said as much after a rushed greeting, when he gave me a quick kiss in passing as he explained what the rest of the shift entailed for him.

He was gone again almost as soon as he'd appeared, and for a time I was content to pick up my conversation once more with Belinda, a young woman that had a little boy of her own just a bit older than Josephine. I truly enjoyed talking to her - she was an intelligent, rational person, everything about her was down-to-earth in such a refreshing way. Even though I would readily admit to being judgmental myself at times, a genuinely easy manner wasn't a consistent quality that I saw often in other women my age that had babies at home out in the suburbs. Months ago, I'd attempted to become active in one of the mom-groups in Schaumburg, but I hadn't lasted long there at all. It was too frustrating to listen to those women pat themselves on the back while touting their beliefs that Dr. Google was more reliable than a seasoned physician, and that vaccines were of the devil. Removing myself from the group had been the only enjoyable aspect of my time with them, and afterward I was far more selective about the mom-friends I made. Belinda had become a good friend in that capacity, initially because she was the polar opposite of mothers following trends for their brand-name babies, and later because she was just a sincerely nice person to be around. And although both of our schedules kept us busy, catching up was always something we'd looked forward to between meetings.

During this particular interaction, though, Josie's increasing fussiness had interrupted us more than once. She was teething then - Erik and I were fairly certain that she'd had two coming in at the same time - and as such, she was absolutely miserable regardless of the relatively uneventful day we'd had up to now. Belinda offered to hold her for a moment while I dug through the diaper bag to try to find her Orajel, but I'd let the bag get so disorganized that looking through it was taking longer than it should have; that delay combined with Josie's prior discomfort only upset her more. She reached for me as she cried, not willing to remain with another person for a single second more, even as I was standing directly beside her and Belinda.

"Josie, alright, I hear you, babydoll. I know, Mommy's right here," I said placatingly to my poor achy daughter as I looked, however ineffectually, through the diaper bag; still, she continued to cry to the point of wailing, the sound muffled periodically when she bit at the mittens that I'd let her hold onto after we'd stepped into the warm building from the parking structure. She looked so beyond fed up with the world and everyone in it. Once Belinda had passed her back to me, I was careful not to bother her any more as I shifted her onto my hip.

Glancing at me with an expression of understanding - one which told me that she'd been on my side of this red-faced baby scene more than enough times herself recently - Belinda then asked, "Do you want me to look through the bag for you?"

Readjusting Josie and the diaper bag hanging from my shoulder opposite of her, I shook my head before responding, "If it's alright, I think I'll just take her to the lounge to wait for Erik," then at her affirmative nod, I continued, affectionately brushing Josie's dark hair out of her eyes as I spoke, "Some quiet time to chill out will probably do this one some good."

Once I'd shared a quick parting hug with Belinda and had gotten to the doctor's lounge, I was able to set the diaper bag down on the table, and in the relative silence of the room in comparison to the rest of the department, I decided to completely unload the bag right there, assuming that I could do so then without having to worry about anything getting knocked over or lost. I was still holding Josie off to my side, and as she continued to whimper and move around uncomfortably, I finally found the little tube of pain relieving gel at the bottom of the bag, near-empty and thus wedged into a corner that made it difficult to find when the diaper bag was full. After rubbing some of the gel onto her gums and showing her the little picture of Elmo on the outside of the tube, Josie gradually settled down in the span of time it took for me to put her diapers and board-books and other supplies away. But at almost the exact instant that I'd zipped the bag shut, she started crying again. Sighing in sympathy for her, I lifted her up to my shoulder and patted her back, taking to walking in slow circles here and there around the middle of the room, weaving my way past the worn couches and gouged coffee table littered with magazines and medical journals. Eventually, as the Orajel combined with my pacing began to do their work, she relaxed once more, wasn't as vocal about her complaints as she had been when we'd first arrived in the lounge, and I was grateful that I could at least do that much for her.

Pulled from my thoughts by the abrupt sound of the lounge door opening and closing again - somewhat aggressively, I recall dimly noting then - the unexpected movement allowing the noise from the department beyond to slip into this room for a beat before fading out, I turned to see who had just entered. And although I shouldn't have been, I was honestly somewhat surprised to see Raoul there, walking in a huff toward the half-kitchen's countertop that held the coffee maker and other such break-room supplies. He'd looked so tense then, upset more than anything, his movements rigid with every step he took and every gesture he made, and I was hesitant to try to engage with him while he was in that state, let alone at all when remembering our current lack of communication. It occurred to me it might be wise if I continued my wait back out by the admit-desk, and I'd almost acted on that instinct, almost gathered up my daughter and the diaper bag and left unseen. But then, I thought better of that plan; it didn't make sense for either of us to have to leave, or to even feel uncomfortable in that communal workspace, and I didn't want him to assume that I'd meant to be petty by leaving without so much as a hello for him. So, knowing that he still hadn't noticed my presence in the time it had taken him to bang through the cupboards and the refrigerator, and not wanting him to later feel awkward because of the level of his distraction, I cleared my throat pointedly to indicate where I was standing.

Jumping slightly from the sound, and likely from the sight of me stepping closer, he finally turned to look straight at me, clearly abashed for having ignored me until then. I wouldn't fault him for it, at any rate. Doing so was nothing short of clumsy and halting, but we did each exchange a nod and a muttered greeting after that unusual start, one that was still moderately distracted on his side, still distant, but at least the greeting for me was offered at all, rather than the long span of nothings or half-hearted obligatory statements that I'd received from him so many times in the recent months. Yet, from what I could tell upon a cursory glance, he was unsettled, maybe even slightly annoyed by my presence just the same - so much so that he'd only seemed to take notice of the baby I was holding after we'd acknowledged each other. Raoul smiled at Josie when his attention was drawn to her completely, the baby now dozing with her head resting heavily on my shoulder, but his expression didn't quite meet his eyes. It was saddening, for my part, to know exactly why he wouldn't have been thrilled to see Erik Riley's daughter in my arms, to be reminded of our tangled past, but at the same time, I also knew that it was important for Raoul to see this sooner or later; he might as well get it over with all at once.

Still, for his sake, I tried to play nice, "I heard you guys had a rough shift."

He nearly laughed, and I prematurely counted that as progress, "Yeah...that's an understatement. Not my finest hour as a resident, unfortunately," he murmured near the end, almost to himself. Then, without preamble, he asked, "How old is she now?"

"Going on a year in May," I said, my tone coming across a shade more clipped than I'd necessarily wanted it to be; but even so, it was strange to hear that question from him, wildly familiar and out of place in the same breath - we'd barely spoken in ages, and he had been the furthest person from my mind in all matters related to my child. He didn't know her as my other friends knew her, and to hear him talking about her now so...so casually was exceedingly off-putting, and without being able or willing to explain the why of it to myself, I was instantly on edge. Going in, I really didn't think he'd intended to do harm, didn't think he had it in his heart to even consider that as an option, but that didn't mean that I wasn't wary over the way he was trying to relate with me in those moments. I just...I didn't want it, not with Raoul. Not anymore. So I turned the conversation in a new direction, believing that his earlier comment had much to do with his mood and therefore aiming to use that information to my advantage, thinking that he just needed an outlet after his demanding shift, "You said this wasn't your finest hour, how so? What happened?"

"I'm surprised Dr. Riley didn't tell you anything," he said flatly, then added as an afterthought, his tone more curious than unkind in general, "What are you doing out here, anyway? I'd heard that you had the day off."

"I do, but we're down to one car right now, and the weather sucks, so…" I trailed off, not interested in explaining our situation in any great detail - it was more effort than it was worth, and so I simply opted to continue instead, "So...yeah, I talked to Belinda longer than I talked to Erik. He had to sign his patients over to the resident on-call."

"Ah."

"You didn't answer my question, though. What happened today?"

He shrugged with feigned casualness, leaning against the countertop and crossing his arms over his chest. We'd both paused then, each of us looking away from the other and seeming to need a short breather, seeming to need to take in the sound of the coffee maker, the scent of the fresh brew filling the room. In turn, it was another handful of seconds before he met my eyes again and went on, "I don't know, just...par for the course for a resident, a lot different from the internship, you know?"

"Um, I don't," I responded, trying to laugh off his small misstep, "Not yet."

"Oh...right. I'm sorry, I forgot that you weren't - "

" - It's not an issue, Raoul. I knew I'd have to put my residency off once she was born," I said, indicating Josie and taking her small hand in my own as I began to walk in circles once more, distantly realizing throughout this part of the discussion that she was beginning to stir again, and hoping to get ahead of her tears long before they came, "It's fine."

But to my surprise, and as if from absolutely nowhere, Raoul just...he just snapped at me altogether, rather than speak as civilly as we had been. Any semblance of patience, of lingering friendship that he'd had in the previous instant had evaporated just as quickly, as if everything that had stayed festering between us for months, even years by then, had at last come to a head, and with a vengeance, "Well, the whole things sucks, doesn't it?"

"What?"

"I'm just saying...you should've already been done with your internship. It sucks, you had to give up everything you worked for because of his kid. She was born the same week as the exams, so you've lost, what, a year of your education?"

Taken aback, I could only reply, "It's not quite that drastic."

"Right," he scoffed, a stranger to me now, "I guess you planned ahead for that, though."

"Raoul - "

" - Did you do that for our baby, too?"

Too far...That's too far...

"Excuse me?"

"Did you know you'd lose this much time having a baby? Or were you relieved when you lost it? Maybe you would've been if you'd lost this one, too, if you'd known beforehand what the cost was," he said, bitterness clear in his tone as he gestured dismissively toward Josie.

Stunned initially, as if I was listening from some faraway place, I could only stare, frozen where I stood and open-mouthed during the span of seconds following his cruel words. Despite his bluntness, I still couldn't believe that he'd just said what he had, couldn't believe that he'd essentially accused me of feeling even a single fragment of relief after my miscarriage, nevermind that he could so brazenly suggest that I would have ever felt that same sort of relief had anything gone wrong with Josephine. It was physically painful to think of losing her, to try to imagine a world wherein she didn't exist. My career, everything that I'd earned and everything that I'd known to-date would have been meaningless without my daughter, I was certain that much from the moment she was born; Raoul had to have understood that. How could he have been my friend for so much of my life and not have understood that? This discussion - this all-out confrontation, as it had obviously turned into - was nothing short of disgusting as far as I was concerned. Once I'd fully registered what he had said to me, about me, once I'd processed the meaning and the acrimony behind his unwarranted little rant, I found my voice again and completely lost my temper in return, furious with him beyond words or reason.

"What the fuck?" I yelled, stepping forward to face off with him in only a few short paces, the volume of my tone startling him and, unfortunately, waking up the baby in the same motion as well. But even as she began to cry and wriggle around, I was past thinking clearly enough to do anything then but continue yelling, "What the fuck did you just say? How dare you! What the hell is wrong with you, Raoul? What's the matter with you?"

Wide-eyed, he seemed to realize the extent of what he'd done - and, to his very, very limited credit, he appeared to even regret the decision when he spoke again, "Christine, I - "

" - You know what? I don't want to hear it this time, I don't want to hear a goddamn thing from you, do you understand me?" I raged at him, then shook my head in revulsion, wanting my next sentiments toward him to be sharp, "You want to talk about our baby? Fine, then I think that the one good thing that came out of losing it is that I had a chance to get away from you."

That seemed to hit its mark; his expression morphed from horrified with himself to defensive against me as he took a step closer to me, "Hold on, Christine, stop it!"

"Hey!" Erik's voice sounded over the now-largely one-sided argument, all at once drawing our attention to his swift approach from the doorway, concern achingly evident in his eyes when he put himself between me and Raoul and asked me directly, "What's going on?"

But I couldn't respond - by then, I was crying as well, every breath choked and shuddering as Josephine created a counterpoint to my tears with her own frightened wailing, and still Raoul was attempting to talk over the entire mess he'd just created.

"Chaney, get out," Erik interrupted, deftly taking Josie from my arms to settle her down again, and when Raoul attempted to speak once more, he was cut off immediately, "I said get out!" Erik shouted, and this time, Raoul obeyed without argument. As soon as he was out of the room, Erik turned his attention to me entirely, "What the fuck just happened? Did he hurt you?"

I shook my head, "Not physically."

"What happened?" he pressed.

"I don't want to talk about it. Please, let's just go home. I want to go home," I nearly pled, reaching to take Josie back, to hold her as close to me as possible; I had a terrible thought then, though irrational, that Raoul's words could come back to harm us again at any moment, tangible manifestations of the wrongs he felt I'd committed against him, and that only I could protect my daughter from such anger, and so I said as firmly as I could manage, "Let me see her."

Although Josie was still whimpering, Erik did as I asked, and as soon as she was in my arms again, I began to at least feel marginally better. Holding her, cuddling her close to me as we gathered our belongings and left, I allowed Erik to place his hand at the small of my back and guide me out of the doctor's lounge, ignoring the questioning glances leveled in our direction, only vaguely hearing Dr. Reyes promising to look into the incident further on my behalf as we passed through the department on the way to the elevator bank. But I couldn't bring myself to speak again until we were home, until we were safe in our living room with our pets curled up around us and our baby asleep in her playpen; I couldn't talk to Erik about what had happened until it truly seemed as if nothing in the world could reach us.

I hated Raoul for making me feel so shattered.