Like most mornings for the past two months, Sara's sleep was disturbed by her daughters' chatter. She fell face-flat on the mattress, groaning and moaning so her girls could shut up. She did that almost every morning. During weekends, it was worse, because during weekends she wanted to stay in bed until she had to leave—and that usually would be due to one of the girls asking for food or potty.
Her eyes stung as she attempted opening them since she had spent all night crying…like she did every other night. It had been two months, and Tegan had not allowed any communication to occur. Not even Sonia picked up the phone any longer. Sara wanted to be let out of the darkness; she truly wanted to know what would happen, but no answers were ever given to her.
Tegan was never a social media enthusiast, too. Sara could not stalk her to save her life. However, what was strange was the deactivated Facebook and Instagram. Stacy and Emy were not receiving any messages from her, too. It had been over two weeks since they talked to her. That had alarmed Sara, and she called Stephen who usually was the last resort due to Sara's own inner guilt and embarrassment.
Stephen didn't pick up, too.
She sent a text message.
Nothing.
Her nerves struck her the night before, and she cried herself to sleep.
She couldn't always annoy Stacy and Emy; they, too, had their own issues and life to deal with.
She wouldn't lose it and break down in front of her daughters like she did the first week of Tegan's departure. The kids, though rarely now, still asked and wondered about her, and Sara, sometimes, felt rooted hatred for Tegan for neglecting the chirping birds that ran around her feet.
She also couldn't get them into any pre-school or daycare because everything around was full, so she had to resort to the next best thing she could do…she asked her neighbor to babysit them until she finished her classes in university and picked them up. They loved playing with Stevie but often times Sara would drop them early in the morning when the teenager was in school and pick them up a couple of hours later as soon as she finished her early classes. Whatever work she had, she did at home.
On Saturdays, she cleaned and tidied and the kids helped her around or thought they did. The previous Saturday, Jeremy and Denise came over with pizza in order to occupy Sara's lonely night since Stacy and Emy had a date night. On Sundays, though, she always visited Stacy's place and that's when she took a break from the kids because they would be heavily occupied with Ella's energetic enthusiasm and surrounded by her flooding love. That child had the capacity to tolerate the twins more than anyone else, and the twins almost worshipped her.
"Mummyyyyy," whined one of the girls from behind. Both girls were hitting her back in order to get her to turn around and face them so they could suffocate her with their affection, which she truly loved and always relished.
She just didn't want them to see her red eyes that morning.
"Sasa mummy," screamed one of the twins and Sara screamed along when she felt the two bums on her own back and bum. The girls giggled loudly and started mounting their mother. "Hawwwsieee." That was mischievous Scarlet, of course.
"Girls," Sara whispered. "Mummy is too old for this game on her back."
The girls giggled. She felt her daughter's breath on the back of her neck and was able to hear the soft heartbeat. She titled her head to be met with grinning Scarlet whom she couldn't help not to kiss. She almost cried because she understood Scarlet's affection was fear of being abandoned.
She attempted turning around, allowing the two girls to rest on her torso. They couldn't hurt what was not there, so she didn't mind when they resumed their playing of horseback riding until they lost their breath and crashed on top of their mother, who showered them with kisses as peals of joyous laughter filled the room.
"Wanna go potty, girls?" Both girls tsked, a new habit they had just learned from Ella. "Sure, Soosie?" Sara intended to ask Scarlet first because she didn't want all attention to be microscoped towards Rose since the two-and-a-half-year-old could definitely sense Sara's cautious behavior around her issue.
"No, mummy." Scarlet closed her eyes and put her thumb in her mouth.
"What about you, Rosie?"
"No," shot Rose, who immediately imitated her sister.
"Oh, girls, you're sleepy?" Both hummed in unison and Sara allowed them to squeeze her for a little while as she checked on any hoped-for message from Tegan's family and still found nothing.
She closed her eyes for a little bit, too, until her youngest sprang up crying "Mummy, potty" without being able to control herself.
She wet her pants, and Sara's legs, and Sara's bed.
"Gross, gross," Scarlet exclaimed leaving the bed. "Naughty Woosie." Rose had begun crying when she saw her mother's shocked face and heard her sister's rebuking screams.
Sara had taken her to the doctor and there was nothing wrong. Still, she couldn't tell why her daughter lied about needing to use the bathroom. She had taken both of them to a child psychiatrist in order to know if their issues stemmed from a psychological problem, but the children were healthy and happy. They did mention their birth mother many times, but her departure had not caused the speech issue that Scarlet had and the uncontrollable bladder that Rose dealt with.
They're different people, Sara was told. They were at different paces. Rose needed more potty training, and Tegan had neglected that and treated the two of them the same way. Scarlet's speaking abilities differed from her sister's despite her striking intelligence. Tegan had also not made much effort at home to work on Scarlet's speech. Scarlet also had Sara's jaw, which was the reason for the atrocious lisp that smudged her words. The dentist told Sara that Scarlet would later on need braces to fix this issue or she would end up lisping her entire life. Sara almost laughed but didn't.
All that Sara learned in the past two months and all she could do was blame herself and excuse her wife. She had wanted the kids; how would a girl in her early twenties know all that? She was never around to help and that was her punishment for life.
That also made her weep in the shower when she thought about how selfish she had been.
"It's fine. It's fine," she repeated endlessly to hush little Rose. She picked her up despite the heaviness her back could not bear and walked to the bathroom with screaming and crying Rose. Scarlet followed.
"Why didn't you tell me when I asked you?" asked Sara, getting Rose rid of her pajama pants.
"I didn't know." Sniffled the toddler and hiccupped.
Sara was soon getting tired of asking Rose to inform her once she felt the need to pee. She was finally able to inform her once she needed to poop, but still struggled to do that when she wanted to pee. Surprisingly, she hadn't ever done it at Madeline's house, which made Sara wonder if her daughter was doing that on purpose and why she would do that when Sara gave her all the attention and affection she required.
That Saturday, Sara decided to do a good cleaning up of her bedroom and bathroom. That was the only thing she had not touched since Tegan's escape. She hadn't even changed the sheets but now that Rose wet the bed, she decided she'd do a full cleaning the way her mother had taught her.
Her mother, God, how her stomach churned whenever that woman came on her mind. She had to lie to her mother the way she lied to the kids, but until when? Her mother had offered visiting to help, but Sara refused. She didn't want her mother to witness another failed marriage. Jack witnessing the collapse was enough.
…
The kids had their breakfast in the kitchen while Sara attempted calling their grandfather once again as she sipped her morning coffee. The call was immediately rejected. She huffed in apparent irritation that caught her kids' attention. A message was sent to Stephen.
"I just want to check on Tegan. Please reassure me."
"Will call as soon as I can. She's alright," came the response a few minutes later. It made her sigh and get up to start the dishwasher.
Wherever she moved, the two girls moved behind. Wherever she stood, their little arms wrapped around each of her legs, holding tightly for fear of departure.
"Ready to help me clean mummy's room?" Sara asked, looking down at the identical pairs of green eyes.
"Yes," shouted the twins.
The mother guided her children to their bedroom, first. There, the tiny girls helped their mother pick up their toys and discarded clothes from the night before and place them all on the rocking chair. Sara began putting their toys back in the shelves they had in the room. After that, she sat on the chair to check if the clothes they had put there were clean or dirty. When she wasn't sure, she decided every item that she had thrown on the floor the week before she would put in the washing machine.
That was another issue she faced with the toddlers; they dirtied their clothes instantly and very quickly. Sara had no time to do the laundry as often as Tegan. Tegan washed their clothes every other day and didn't mind it somehow. Now Sara was suffering with aching back and mind trying to find time to do the simplest chores that she didn't need to do when she was single or with Tegan on their own. Taking care of Ella was one thing; having to raise twin toddlers is another. She did the laundry every Saturday nowadays. All articles of clothing she had to quickly change for them would be discarded and tossed to the floor, something so unlike her nature, but she barely found the time to dwell on that.
The dishes, too, often flooded the sink and she had no time to load and unload the dishwasher. If the kids weren't moving around her seeking for unending attention, she would be working with a glass of wine or relaxing due to a serious migraine the kids would have caused earlier.
How did Tegan deal with that? She often found herself thinking about that at night when she was finally in bed, feeling the ache of her feet and lower back. Her mind, though, would answer, Tegan didn't have a job. She was still determined that they had everything shared fair and square. While Sara was stressing herself to get the best income at work, Tegan was supposed to do the same to raise the children.
Except when she thought that guilt ate her up and she cried herself to sleep…like the night before. Now she would do anything to have Tegan back in her bed even if Tegan didn't want to get out of bed at all.
But that was not Tegan. The Tegan she loved and admired so much used to be so hyper, energetic, and active. She had so many dreams and ambitions and it killed Sara watching her give up and then blame her. Sara wanted her to work but wasn't able to understand Tegan's mind. She wished Tegan accepted marriage counseling. Sara had only asked her twice about it. She herself was a bit hesitant. Perhaps she was just lazy; she really didn't think it would come to that—to Tegan leaving.
She changed for the girls after she was done with their room. Their pajamas had banana and avocado stains on them earlier from when they had breakfast. She clothed them in cute sky-blue onesies that their other mother had recently brought for them as they slightly grew in height and thus grew in size. She kissed both their cheeks before she brushed each one's hair as delicately as possible. She learned, now, that in order to get their hair to do what she wanted it to do, she needed to spay a bit of water on the brush and on their hair in the morning then stroke down as gently as possible while they had their pacifiers in their mouths to soothe them. Emy had shown her the trick; she said she saw Tegan doing that a couple of times.
She styled their hair into little pigtails. They looked adorable that she had to make them stand in an embrace and take a picture of them. She looked at the picture for a little bit over a minute as the girls stood by her side rambling things she didn't care to focus on. Maliciously, she decided to send Tegan the picture. She didn't know whether Tegan was going to see it or not. She just sent it without a caption, without saying anything. She only hoped to stir her emotions. She was willing to do whatever to have Tegan back, even if it were only for the kids.
"Ready for milk before so we can clean mummy's room after?"
"Yesssss," shouted the girls, throwing themselves at their mother in hopes they would be picked up. Sara kissed both of them but couldn't pick them up. Instead, she held their hands and walked out into the living room outside. She didn't have to go downstairs since she had their essentials in the minibar next to her coffee. She had just started getting them used to the sippy cup with Stacy's help. Stacy bought them two sippy cups that had their favorite Cocomelon characters on them to convince them to leave the bottle since their teeth were getting messed up, and they were already too attached to the pacifier or their thumbs at night before they slept.
Sara also prepared a cup of jo for herself. She switched on the morning news and had her coffee calmly while her girls sat next to her. The three had a crinkle cookie each. It was Denise who had baked them and delivered them the day before. For the past two months, Sara had not baked and had barely cooked. She only baked when happy; she only baked for Tegan.
"Mmmm," Scarlet said, swaying her head in excitement.
"Is it yummy?" Scarlet nodded with a big smile. Her eyes closed and her cheeks reddened as soon as she smiled. Sara couldn't help not to lean down and kiss her cheek. She was lucky to have them. Despite everything, she was lucky. "Rosie, you like the cookie?"
"Yes," Rose exclaimed. "Cookie cool," she said and her sister laughed. They loved saying "Cookie cool" the way their other mother had taught them whenever they had a cookie. Tegan would ask. "Is the cookie cool?" And they would answer, "Cookie cool."
Then she would ask, "Is the cookie cute?" so Sara asked instead.
"Cookie cute," both girls chanted with laughter.
"Is the cookie called Soosie?" Sara said, getting her older toddler to squirm in giddiness. "Is the cookie called Rosie?" The girls knew what was to come, so they ran as far as they could with squeals and laughter and Sara ran behind them to her bedroom. They fell on the floor laughing maniacally as their mother hovered over them with palms open and digits fiddling with the air, ready to tickle and squeeze. That was their favorite game with Tegan, and Sara couldn't deprive them of it. She tickled and squeezed and kissed and loved them until all three ran out of breath. The twins' cheeks were ruddy with excitement and Sara's ears fired due to the sudden serotonin that made her body spring up and forget about her usual late-night misery.
"Now mummy should also get changed so we can clean her room and bathroom. Okay, girls?"
"Okay," both said in sync.
The two girls stood next to one another and watched their mother change her clothes. At first, when they did that during the first week of her wife's departure, she would tell them to turn around so she could change. They always did at first until one of them would forget and face Sara to tell her about something that was "veyyyy imotant, mummy."
Later, she gave up and just started getting dressed and undressed in front of them, especially when she was in a hurry. She had wanted to teach them about boundaries, but they didn't understand it that way. Slowly, she started telling them who was allowed to see them naked and who was not allowed. Stacy had also told her to teach them young because Tegan hadn't done that, and Sara hadn't even thought of it until she was concerned that her girls didn't mind getting naked in front of any of her friends. She remembered clearly how Ella didn't allow anyone but her and her mother to take her to the bathroom at that age. Later on, she allowed Tegan to do that.
"Sitez?" Rose pointed at her exposed stitches and asked. Scarlet was the one to notice first only a week before. The toddler traced her tiny index against the stitches on Sara's lower abdomen and asked her mother what they were. Sara told her they were called stitches. Sara thought the girls would bring up Tegan because she had those stitches, too. They didn't.
"Yes, stitches," Sara affirmed, bending down to pull up her trousers.
"What it means, mummy?" Rose asked. Scarlet walked up to her, ready to place her hand on the lines and follow them again. "I want. I want," screamed Rose so she could put her hand there, too.
"Girls, let mummy get dressed, please." The girls were in wonder as they traced the two lines of stitches that hadn't ever disappeared. "What did we say about touching people? We should ask them before we do."
"But you're mummy," Scarlet interrupted. "Sasa mummy yes…you said. Soosie, yes. Woozie, yes." Sara laughed and nodded. "Do they huwt?"
"No, baby," Sara whispered.
"Why are they here?" Rose asked. "Why not here?" She patted her chest which made Sara almost gasp before remembering that Rose's chest also had a scar she had previously asked about.
Sara bent down and squatted so she could be in eye-level with the girls. She was still in her black bra and pants. She took their hands in her own and smiled to them. "Mummy had a baby in there and in order to take the baby out, they had to open up her tummy and take the baby out." The girls gasped and giggled. "What is it?"
"We were in there?" Rose asked, one of her eyebrows raised in humorous curiosity.
"Ummm…" She truly didn't know what to say, but she certainly didn't want to lie. The girls had stopped bringing up Tegan's name a week before and that had definitely concerned Sara. It was one of the reasons she was crying at nights.
That's it? She had to lie to them now? She had to let them know their biological mother had deserted them? What would she do? She hadn't even thought about what she would tell them. When she talked to Adam about it, he told her that she shouldn't lie. When she talked to Jack about it, he told her she should tell them she's their birth mother. Stacy and Dana didn't agree with such an advice.
"Well, you were in Teetee mummy's tummy." She smiled, but her lips quivered when the girls looked at her dumbfoundedly. "I had some…other baby and she's not here."
"Is she with granny like Teetee mummy?" Sara shook her head. It wasn't like Rose to ask, and Scarlet kept staring at her with those Tegan eyes she feared so much. "Where is she?"
"She's umm…in a different place. You don't have to worry about it." She smiled and winked, standing up to avoid the questions. "Umm, Scar, baby, can you hand mummy her T-shirt?" Scarlet looked behind her at the recliner and quickly fetched Sara's wide white t-shirt with a cherry on the front. "Good job, baby. Rosie, now I want you to get me my socks please."
"Okaaayyyy."
She was finally able to distract them, so she didn't waste time giving them orders in the bathroom as she put both of them on each side of the sink while she did her skin-care routine. "Hand me the grey tube, Soosie."
"Hewe."
"Thank you." She dabbed underneath her eyes with the white creamy substance that left the grey tube. "Now the pink one, Rosie." Rose handed her the pink tube in order to moisturize her face. "Thank you, my love."
Her eyes scanned the pairs of greens staring in utter wonder at her. They loved that part of the Saturdays because on regular days she did it so quickly while each one was seated on a different toilet right before she went to work.
"Put, put," Scarlet begged, extending her neck so her mother could look at her cheek. "Pweeze, mummy."
Sara giggled and opened the drawer underneath the basinet in order to take the kids' moisturizer out. She rarely used it for their skin because she rarely had time. Tegan used to give them all that luxury. She was now trying to teach them how to brush their teeth in their own bathroom and that, on its own, was a job. She moisturized both of her daughter's faces and put the bottle back inside. Upon closing the drawer, she noticed a certain glow from Tegan's makeup bag. It was one of the things she had forgotten and Sara hadn't a mind to look inside of it.
It was half zipped, so Sara took it out and unzipped it only to find Tegan's marriage ring inside. She shook her head and almost laughed even though her eyes stung with tears. "Of course," she whispered. She hadn't forgotten the bag; it was empty. She had only put the ring in there because she knew Sara was going to find it.
She wondered what Tegan left as well. She knew her laptop was there. It was left there untouched. Perhaps she needed to search in every nook and corner of the room. Maybe she was supposed to switch that laptop on.
She was going to once she was done cleaning the bathroom. That gave her motivation. The kids helping and singing along to music she had playing also encouraged her to be quicker. Once she moved to the room, she took a long look at her naked mattress. She had already ridden the bed off its sheet and cleaned the pee stains with hot water and soap. It was barely dry, so she couldn't do anything until the wet spot was gone. She wanted to open Tegan's bedside drawer in order to fish for items which might have been hidden inside. However, Tegan herself interrupted her endeavor with an unexpected call.
She picked up the phone with fidgeting hands. Her voice almost caught when she heard her wife's voice.
"Hello," she said in response shakingly.
"Uh…hey, Sara." Tegan cleared her throat. She looked at her parents each on a different side of the room, standing by her bed and looking at her. She wanted them to leave her bedroom. She did what they wanted, now she wanted them to leave.
It's not like she didn't want to talk to Sara or hear her kids' voices. That picture Sara sent earlier made her weep like she did every day. That time, she wept for other reasons, reasons she was not sure she was ready to tell Sara.
Her father, though, insisted she would talk to her wife. Now she had no excuse. The surgery was over. She survived. She was alive. It had been two weeks and she recovered just well. Although she wanted to sort the issue of her breast, but another surgery at the same time wasn't recommended. Plus, that was a problem for another day, a problem the heart surgeons that her father's clinic employed didn't deal with.
She had to make a decision. She had to decide. She'd been going to therapy, too. A new therapist in a semi-new place. She'd been doing all the medical checkups and work. She knew how lucky she was for the support system she found in her family, for the money, the status, the connections. If it weren't for her father's connections and position, she would have had to wait months before the surgery. The uncertainty had been killing her.
But there she was, with a stitched-up chest, lying in bed after two weeks of recovery. Every other day, her mother drove her to therapy and waited for her. Her brother and his wife would bring her ice cream at nights whenever they visited. Whenever she saw her nephew, she cried by herself in the bathroom. She missed her children. God only knew how much she missed her children.
She wrote most of the days. She had passed by the book store before her surgery to get some books to pass the time, and on her way to the cashier she saw notebooks decorated and adorned in black and white print; they looked similar to her wife's. She bought colored pens and a notebook. She started writing her feelings almost every day, and during her hospital recovery she wrote twice a day.
She found it healing. She found it comforting. Better than typing in her blog. Nobody could see it. She didn't write it for anyone.
Some entries were sad. Some were boring.
She was becoming a lot like Sara as she grew older. She found herself picking up her words, using her sentences, reading her literature.
She was becoming her wife's clone.
Maybe because she missed her.
Because she wanted her embrace.
She craved for her tender love.
She wanted the professor and the mother. She missed the guidance of Sara, the hands of Sara, the sweet timber that whispered in her ears.
God, she hated the Sara that had emerged out of stress, the angry one, the mean one, the one that made her feel so little and stupid. She hated her.
The one that took her femininity away and made her feel ugly.
She knew Sara didn't ever mean to do that, but she did.
And so she ran away because old Sara wasn't ever coming back.
That's why her father wanted her to talk to Sara. Before ending it, she had to talk to her, to explain.
Her therapist advised just that.
She also had to decide whether she wanted to stay in the kids' life or not.
God, she was just not sure.
She was still hesitant.
Still angry.
Still sad.
She was about to cry when she heard her voice. She hadn't heard it in three weeks. Whenever Sara called after the first month of the escape, she would remove herself from the room. She didn't want to think of her or hear her voice. Her fear prior to the operation was insurmountable and Sara was a bug infecting her thoughts.
Now she hadn't an excuse. It had been two months. She had to decide.
"Umm…" She looked at her parents again and motioned for them to leave the room. Her mother almost rolled her eyes, but she was the first to leave. Tegan sighed the moment her father walked out.
"Hello? Tegan?" Sara repeated again.
"Yeah…yeah…" What would she say? She didn't know.
"It's really you." Sara's voice seemed surprised. It seemed bewildered, but also happy.
"Yeah," she said once again, more assuredly this time.
She heard the kids' voice beside Sara. They were calling her name. "They still remember you." Sara laughed. "I thought they forgot. They haven't brought your name for over a week. I thought…" Sara's voice broke. Tegan's tears fell.
They both began to cry at the same time.
"Why?" Sara asked when she heard the sniffles.
"I…I don't know what to say," Tegan finally said. "I just wanted to let you know that I am fine because…umm…dad told me…he told me about…" She couldn't stop crying.
"My concerned messages and calls."
"Yes." Tegan sniffled. When she looked up, she saw her mother's foot by the door. She had been behind all that time, eavesdropping. "And the picture you sent just…"
"I'm glad it did something. They're your kids, too, you know. They don't deserve this."
"I want to…I want…" She couldn't even say it. She truly wanted to talk. She had to explain. She had to end it well at least.
She wasn't sure if she wanted to end it, though.
What did she want?
That's why she was crying. She truly didn't know what she wanted.
"I just want to know if you're willing to stay in their life or not." Sara's urgency took her aback. She thought Sara would beg. She thought Sara would cry for her and ask her to come back. Sara only cared about the kids. Her sweet Sara was gone. "Are we getting a divorce? Like…I just…why?" But Sara seemed pained. Right? "I never wanted to hurt you."
"I…I can't. I'm sorry. I can't." She hung up.
She had to hang up. It hurt her so much to hear Sara's voice and her kids calling her name. Her mother was watching her now, full silhouette by the door with angry arms folded.
"Mum, please leave me," she whispered.
"Grow up," her mother said sharply. She walked out and slammed the wooden door.
She heard her father's angry voice rebuking his wife's way of communication. She heard her mother's insane outburst. She had always known that running to her parents' house was a temporary solution. Everyone knew she and her mother were not supposed to stay in the same place. The apartment she owned was rented to two roommates. She didn't know where to stay, and she certainly needed her parents by her side then.
Only then, though. Because now her mother started to return to her irritable self, picking a fight over anything that she could possibly imagine. Tegan wondered how her father was able to live with such a persona. Maybe she was only like that with Tegan because she adored Ted and his wife. Tegan had never even recalled Sonia and Ted fighting. Maybe a few times when he was a reckless teenager and he would get back home drunk, but Ted was just a sweetheart. Always had been. A nerd. Gentle. Loved his family and friends. Rarely rebelled. Loved his school and was loved by his teachers. He even went to college in California and then got an apartment close to his parents' place.
That didn't work for Tegan though. Her relationship with her mother had always been rocky. She was either attached or fighting. To her father, she had always been the little girl. Problem was that she had always seen herself as such even around Sara.
Maybe she needed to grow up.
She was forced to do it, though. She really…no, she wasn't. She wanted it. Who was she lying to? She ran behind Sara's back and got herself pregnant when Sara insisted on calling it quits after the miscarriage. She wanted to make her happy. She thought her happiness wouldn't ever reach its peak until she granted Sara what she had always wanted.
Then Sara gave up on her, and she gave up on her career. Everything crumbled, so she ran away.
To start everything over again? God, she didn't want that. What would she do? What options did she have? How could she even decide when she didn't even know? All she knew when she ran away was that she wanted to make sure she would stay alive. She really thought she was going to die. How dramatic. Goddamn it. Now she wanted to get out of her mother's house, to live on her own, to be on her own, to discover.
She wrote all those feelings instead of crying them. Only when she wrote them, she knew she was doing something right for the first time. She couldn't wait to tell her therapist about her thoughts. Maybe she needed to...A notification abrupted her chain of thoughts, a notification from Sara.
She put the pen down and closed the notebook. Sara had sent a voice message. She took a minute staring at it, but eventually clicked play. Sara's voice was still broken, her hiccups greeted the message.
"I don't even know what to say, Tegan. This is…this is the first time I clean the room and the bathroom since you left. Leaving the ring hurt me, but, honestly, never thought I'd be so hurt by this…God, you have a hidden sex toy collection. A literal collection hidden and I…It's your life, of course, but now it makes sense. I've always known you're addicted to sex. My God…was I that bad? Was that the problem? That's why you left me? Why the fuck did you leave me?"
There, she had it. Broken Sara asking for her. Broken Sara, she had it. Sara was bound to find out. She was bound to discover. She was going to go on her laptop and find the subscriptions she had to porn sites, subscriptions she stopped the moment she got on the plane. They shared a card; Sara was bound to find everything out.
Let her do it. Let it burn. She didn't care. She had to come clean. Everything had to be known.
Sara looked at her confused children with bloodshot eyes. She didn't expect Tegan to respond to her, but she had to send that message. She didn't expect to find all that hidden and more in Tegan's nightstand drawer, something she hadn't ever thought she would open. When she saw the variety of vibrators and the small dildo she had never seen before, her face was struck with heat and attacked by redness. She immediately closed the drawer so her girls wouldn't see it. She snooped again when the girls were on the toilet in two different bathrooms. Tegan had three different clit stimulators hidden in a small black bag that Sara had never thought she would unzip and see what was inside. She had always thought that bag held Tegan's medication. A soft blue dildo and a medium length white and pink vibrator were also stashed in a mint-green gift box, covered by a couple of papers and notebooks. She knew that gift box. It had some gifts from Emy given to Tegan two birthdays ago, so once again, she didn't think much about it.
Until now…she couldn't stop thinking about all these options Tegan had stashed in her nightstand. Why hadn't she told her? Why hadn't they tried them together? Sara loved sex toys and Tegan knew it. Was Tegan into someone else? Was she sick of Sara? Maybe that's why she left. Maybe it was the sex. Maybe Sara sucked. Could be a huge part of her departure.
Therefore, Sara sent the text message because she couldn't even tolerate holding her words inside any longer.
She prepared lunch with shaky hands. When she sat down at the table by her girls to have lunch, her legs shook as she stared at the phone. Tegan had seen the message, but had not responded.
She gave the girls blueberries and yogurt after lunch and made herself more coffee. It was too early to start drinking. She grabbed Tegan's laptop and opened it. The girls were watching cartoons, so she freely navigated through every folder and website, discovering new aspects of her wife and crying more on the inside.
The porn didn't bother her. Everybody watched porn! Right? It was the fact that her search history was full of it that bothered her. It was the fact that Tegan had paid so much for it, and she hadn't ever noticed bothered her. She never wanted to know how Tegan spent from her card. She was sent the invoice every month, but never thought about tracking Tegan's transactions. She wanted her to have the freedom to buy whatever without feeling like her wife was watching her. Sara could get stingy, and she knew that about herself, so she didn't want to annoy Tegan with it and worry about her expenses. As long as none of them were going over the monthly budget, she didn't need to worry.
Maybe she was supposed to fret and worry and check the bank's statement. Maybe Tegan wanted her to notice, and that's why she was freely subscribing to porn from the shared account. Goddamn it, maybe her lack of attention was the reason Tegan left.
She hadn't ever thought about it.
Not at all.
Maybe it was everything? Every little thing. She felt exhausted thinking about it, so she took a break and decided to take a nap with the girls beside her on her mattress. The girls immediately fell asleep; that was their nap time and they got aggravated if they didn't have one. That helped Sara wash away her distress for a little bit.
Only for a little bit, though. Her need to find more about Tegan's hidden life tickled her into wakefulness. She didn't leave the room that time. She switched on the laptop and fished through more websites Tegan used to visit. Most of them were online stores that sold kids clothes, but many of them were motherhood blogs. Most of her search was about mothering kids when she felt that her life was over. Sara's tears fell down because she realized then that it wasn't just an escape. The reddit articles that Tegan had accessed were heart wrenching. She realized Tergan hadn't posted on reddit, but she had upvoted many posts.
"I feel like a bad mother."
"I wish I can stop it now!"
"I regret motherhood."
"My partner doesn't help me at alllllll!"
"I feel like I'm raising the kids alone…"
"too young to be a mother, too scared to leave."
Those were some of the notes Tegan had upvoted and Sara read. God, she was stupid. Fucking stupid.
What hurt more, what killed more, what made her sob was Tegan's own blog that she had found right after. The last post was a day before her birthday and two days before Tegan's departure.
September 18, 2019
While she's healing, I'm only getting worse…relapsing. I feel myself vanishing the more I spend time stuck between these four walls. I love my children and I love my wife, but I don't think I love myself enough to put up with them. I don't know myself enough. I didn't know that a few therapy sessions could open up such wounds and send me back to stage zero. I truly detest the fact that I am rethinking every decision I have ever made, and I truly don't want to act upon what my therapist is suggesting, but what if it becomes my last resort and my only option? I truly can't take it here. I can't take being a mother anymore…not right now, not today. I don't want to be her wife. I don't even know what I want. I don't know who I am. I don't know anything. I am just lost and I don't know what to do. I wanna escape, but how? How does one escape a life they have chosen and a responsibility they have created?
They're her kids, too. Maybe I could just disappear and nobody will know.
Shaking her head and wiping a single fallen tear, Sara finished reading the last entry on that blog. There weren't any comments since it was one of the very few private posts that her wife hadn't offered for the public to see and feel free to provide an opinion regarding.
She looked at the two sleeping figures beside her and sighed while more tears escaped her lids. She pulled up the covers to prevent any unwanted cold and closed her eyes, blocking any unnecessary sound.
She didn't want the girls to wake up and see her cry. She had to stop and start on dinner. She walked out of the room and started cooking. She thought that the best distraction would be music, but she wasn't feeling it, so she started a podcast that discussed the possible film and music trends that were about to emerge in the upcoming decade, the new roaring twenties as the podcast called it.
That took her mind away from Tegan's words a little bit until Scarlet was out of the room, rubbing her eyes and asking for the bathroom. Rose awoke after a little bit and, thankfully, also asked for the bathroom.
She and the girls had rice and peas for dinner. She also made a simple salad that Rose loved so much and kept asking for more whenever her plate finished. The twins were beginning to learn how to hold the spoon in order to eat, but it angered them when the food flew everywhere, and they often gave up after a few minutes, surrendering to using their own tiny hands to eat.
She gave them chocolate milk after dinner while she cleaned up. They were hyper and excited. "Mummy, do you love chochy milk?" Scarlet asked.
"I do," Sara answered while cleaning the kitchen table. She laughed a little at Rose drawing the last bits of the carton with eyes wide open and full of energy. "Rosie, bit by bit."
"It's so yummy," Rose answered, beaming.
"Yes, mummy, so yummy," Scarlet confirmed. "I wish all milk was chocolate milk."
Sara listened to more rambling until she was done with the kitchen and it was time to prepare the bath for her children. That was one of the fewest activities she found healing for her and the children. During bath time, she sometimes joined them. The girls would ask all sorts of questions and Sara would educate. Sara didn't mind it when they asked about bodies or body hair or any other spontaneous question that came up on their minds when they were in the bathtub. Other times, she would let them play in the bath before she washed their bodies and then took her own shower while they waited in their towels.
That time, she joined them with a wine glass in her hand. She closed her eyes a little bit while hearing the girls chatter about some character in some show. Sara couldn't understand what they were talking about, but she knew they were making up their own narratives about one of the characters; they had a wild imagination like their birth mother.
She opened her eyes and smiled at Scarlet who sat on her right. Scarlet looked at her for a bit and then down at her chest, she put her palm on her mother's breast, which made Sara flinch. "Scarlet, what did we say about touching people without asking them?"
Sara also taught them about boundaries during the shower. She taught them about consent, who was allowed to see them naked and who wasn't. She taught them lessons she remembered receiving from her own mother when she was a young child, just a tad older than the girls, when her mother was sweet and lovely. Sara promised herself to remain that way, to always teach them, to talk to them as much as she could. Maybe it was a blessing in disguise that Tegan had left her; maybe it wasn't but her mind liked to believe that to make herself feel better.
"Do you have boobies because you had a baby?" Sara's furrowed brow only lasted a second before realization hit her when Scarlet asked again, "Did you give hew milk from youw boobies, mummy?"
"Oh…I…" Sara looked to her left, where Rose sat, calmly waiting for the answer. "Well, I…I did, but every girl has boobies not just mummies."
"How?" Scarlet asked.
"Yeah. How?" Rose asked, too.
Sara laughed a little before clearing her throat. "Didn't we talk about hair?"
"Yeah, it grows on your vagina when you're older," Rose filled in the words. The girls giggled sheepishly. When they asked Sara why she had hair there and they didn't, Sara was shocked they knew what that part was called. They told her that TeeTee told them.
"Yeah, boobies are kinda the same. You two will have them when you're older."
"Big boobies like youws?" Scarlet asked with a grin. Sara couldn't help but laugh.
"Maybe." She laughed again, giggling this time. "Do you want to have big boobies?"
"Yes. I want to have big boobies that have milk." Sara raised her eyebrow. "So I can feed all the babies in the world." Sara nodded with a smile she couldn't help but have on her face. "Fowevah and evah."
"But babies become older, Soosie," whispered her mother, stroking her damp hair. "And they start biting and that would be hurtful."
"Eww, mummy, no," Scarlet wrinkled her nose. "Only little tiny babies." She giggled.
"I want to have chochy milk in my boobies," interjected Rose. "Only chochy milk, mummy." Sara's laughter was loud and sonorous.
"You can't have that, honey."
"Why not?" Rose asked, face full of concern. "I want only chochy milk."
"See, love, milk comes out when the mummy has a baby." Her other hand was now stroking her other daughter's head. She looked into her kids' eyes as she explained, "And it's only milk special for that baby. The mummy feeds her baby until the baby becomes a little bit older and starts having regular food. Then the milk disappears. We can still have milk, but we take it from other…umm places, like the animals."
"Like cows," Scarlet said.
"Exactly." Nodded Sara. "If we want chocolate milk, we have to mix chocolate with milk."
"But I want my baby to have chocolate milk," Rose said, shaking her shoulders.
"You'll get the baby chocolate milk like I get it you to you, Rosie." Rose nodded, finally satisfied with an answer. Sara leaned down to kiss her child's head.
She washed their bodies after and put them in clean pajamas. She brushed and dried their hair then made them milk so they could calm down while she read them their bedtime story. That was their nightly routine that she loved and appreciated. The girls went to bed at 8 and only woke up at 7 in the morning. Sometimes they would wake her up earlier like they did that morning. Sometimes she would wake up before them, which would give her a little time to sit with herself and think.
At nights, when the girls slept, she either cried, worked, or wrote.
That night, though, a surprise text message from Tegan interrupted her thoughts. She was planning to write because her chest was heavy. Right before the girls fell asleep, she received a text message from her wife. "I'm sorry about hanging up. Please call me once the girls are asleep."
Sara couldn't believe it. Her heart rang inside her chest until the girls fell asleep. She kissed both of them and ran out to the living room, dialing Tegan while getting herself another drink. She had to relax.
"Hello," Tegan said.
"Hi," she said back.
"I…I didn't want to talk in the morning while my mom was eavesdropping."
"Oh…okay." Sara sighed. "I don't want to bother you, Tegan; I just need to understand."
"Ummm…I…I want to understand, too. I really do. Why did you hurt me so much? Why didn't you take care of the babies like you're doing now? Why…"
"Tegan," Sara interrupted. "Can we not play the blame game, please?"
Tegan chuckled. "Of course."
"I know I fucked up. I know I was shitty," Sara said. "I understand now; I just don't understand why…why didn't you tell me?"
"Sara, I told you so many times. You yelled at me; you made me feel like shit for not working. I felt so useless. I felt so…"
"Well, I felt useless, too. I still do."
"Is this about the sex toys?" Sara hummed. Her heart was beating quickly. Her ears were red. "I wanted to understand my body."
"Why so secretly?" Tegan didn't answer. "You know what, I don't wanna get into that. I just want to know what will happen. The girls aren't going to preschool. I took both of them to doctors. There's nothing wrong with Scarlet's speech or Rose's health. I'm trying my best to make them both get better. Rose peed herself today, but later on she informed me twice she needed to use the bathroom. Scarlet carried a full conversation about boobs earlier in the bath. I somehow understood every word she said, and she pronounced most words correctly."
"See," Tegan whispered. "You're only doing this now that you have to, Sara. You would have never followed up or cared if I hadn't done this." Sara rolled her eyes. Her tears stood on the rims. She knew every word Tegan said was right, yet she couldn't admit it out loud.
"So you go ahead and punish me and the kids?"
"I'm not punishing anyone. I needed to leave because I couldn't do it anymore."
"Do you still love me?" Sara asked abruptly. She was biting her lower lip. Her right hand holding the wine glass was shaking and so were her legs.
"I love a vision of you that doesn't exist anymore." The glass fell off Sara's hand, and her tears began to fall along. Tegan heard the crash. "What happened?"
"Umm…nothing. I broke the glass." She was sniffling and crying. "I didn't think I had changed that much…I never thought I did." She was sobbing then; she sounded a lot like her daughters when they cried. She looked a lot like them, too.
"It's not just you," Tegan whispered. "Things were rough."
"I just wanted you to talk to me, to tell me."
"How can I talk to you after your outburst on me the last time I needed you for support?" Sara was going to ask when until she remembered and her mouth fell open. "You hurt me so much. You said every word you were thinking of but was too shy to say."
"I didn't mean to," Sara said calmly. "I never meant to. You know how much I love you."
"Of course I know that," Tegan said. "But you also love me selfishly. You love the sex, the good time, the mother of your children…you don't love all that comes with me."
"No, Tegan, of course not."
"Please, Sara, even if you think you do, your actions prove otherwise."
"I really don't know what to say." She felt lost. She was happy Tegan was talking to her, but it didn't seem like Tegan was going to forgive her ever.
"Don't say anything," Tegan said. "I just wanted to talk to you because it's not fair for you or for them that I left that way."
"Then why did you do it?" Sara asked instantly. "Are you ever coming back? Do you still want to be in their lives? Do you want a divorce? Please tell me what is going on."
Too many questions were asked, and Tegan remained quiet because she still hadn't made up her mind. It wasn't a decision to be made over the phone. It wasn't supposed to be spontaneous. No matter how much she loved and missed her kids and Sara, she knew that they needed to work out all their buried issues before she made that decision. If Sara was willing to cooperate, maybe there would be hope for them. If Sara wasn't, she knew they were going to raise these kids separately. "Sara, you have to know I've had my heart's surgery recently and that's one of the reasons my mental health was not getting better. I wanted to tell you, but…"
"What? What are you saying?" She heard Sara's voice break with a gasp. She knew Sara cared and loved her. She knew saying that to Sara was going to be more hurtful for Sara to hear, but let it be, she thought.