4: 4
4
When I woke again, a nurse was patting my shoulder, telling me the procedure was over and I could leave after half an hour of observation.
A dull, swollen ache kept rising in my lower belly, still throbbing faintly.
I lay there for a while, then slowly sat up and got dressed. I picked up the anti-inflammatory and the medication to stop the bleeding at the pharmacy, and took an Uber home alone.
Once I got home, I went straight to the bedroom to sleep.
By the time it was fully dark, the bedroom door was pushed open.
Desmond stood in the doorway, still in his dress shoes, coat draped over his arm. He glanced at me, impatience he'd clearly been holding the whole way home in his voice. "Winifred, what's the matter with you? You left without even eating?"
"I called you all those times and you didn't pick up once, then came home to sleep the day away by yourself?"
"Do you know how angry Mom is? Go apologize to her tomorrow. Don't be so childish."
I stayed curled up under the blanket, not moving.
My belly hurt, and I didn't have much strength left to argue with him.
He stood there a moment, and when I didn't answer, his footsteps came closer. The mattress dipped hard under his weight. "Winifred! Don't lie there pretending to be asleep!"
Then he suddenly grabbed my arm and hauled me up out of the blanket. "What is it you're throwing a fit about? I'm talking to you. Do you hear me?"
The pull wrenched my body, and in that instant it felt like something tore open low in my belly, a sharp pain shooting up from below.
My hand went to my stomach on instinct, cold sweat breaking out all over me.
My voice came out thin. "Desmond, why aren't you off keeping your childhood sweetheart company? What are you doing here losing your temper at me?"
The jab stung him, but his grip didn't loosen. He leaned in closer. "Winifred, I just want to ask you what you actually mean by all this! You've had that face on since the concert, and today you walked out of Mom's without a word of explanation. What do you take me for?"
"I've told you countless times, Fifi and I are not the kind of relationship you keep imagining!"
"If we really were, I've known her so long, do you think it would ever have been your turn?"
A wave of cold revulsion went through me, my heart sinking almost to despair.
It was like a knife turning in my belly, the pain draining the strength out of me.
I struggled to pull my arm free of his hand, and in that very moment a warm rush came from below, running down the inside of my thigh, unstoppable.
My pajama pants and the sheet were soaked through in seconds, and the pain low in my belly was so bad it nearly choked off my breath.
I think I was hemorrhaging.
"Desmond..." My voice was frantic. "Call an ambu—"
But right then his phone rang.
That special ringtone pulled his attention away in an instant.
His voice went gentle at once. "Fifi, what's wrong? Don't cry... take your time..."
Felicity's thin sobbing came through the phone.
"Okay, okay, don't hang up, I'll be right there."
Phone in hand, he turned and headed out of the bedroom, his steps quick and urgent.
I collapsed back onto the bed and heard the security door in the living room slam shut.
The blood kept coming, soaking warm through layer after layer of fabric. I reached for the phone on the nightstand, my fingers sticky, and with shaking hands dialed 911.
When I woke again I was in a hospital room, and the ache in my belly was gone.
When the nurse came in to change the dressing, she told me the bleeding had been heavy, that I'd come close to needing a transfusion. "Good thing you were brought in when you were."
I stayed in the hospital for a day.
It wasn't until the next day that Desmond finally called me.
"Did you work overtime last night?"
"I got off early today and came home and cooked. I steamed the fish you like, and I got someone to fix the door. What time will you be back?"
"Don't worry, I hung up the laundry too. I said I'd remember."
"When are you coming home? I'll wait to eat with you."
I answered softly. "I'm not coming back."
He laughed. "Still angry?"
"Don't be angry. Fifi's light bulb went out last night, and she was scared on her own, so I just went over to change a bulb, that's all."
"It's such a small thing. Do you really have to keep holding on to it?"
If it had truly been something life-or-death for her that night, maybe I could have understood a little.
But when it came down to it, it was nothing more than a burned-out light bulb.
So it turned out one light bulb mattered more than my life.
I didn't say anything more to him and hung up.
Then, after checking out of the hospital, I went straight to the airport.
From now on, I wouldn't be reminding him to hang up the laundry, fix the door, or take out the trash.
None of it had anything to do with me anymore.
