Chapter 19 Ivy
IVY
Hours have passed since Cam disappeared out the bathroom door.
His wet footprints dried from the floor before I even managed to pull myself off the bench in the shower, where I collapsed and sat for God only knows how long after he left.
The only evidence he was here is the way my legs still tremble, the food in the fridge, and the bag of bright red fruit sitting on the counter.
The baby is as big as a pomegranate at 21 weeks. They’re one of my favorite fruits. Try them with the vanilla Greek yogurt.
Dammit…
Tears blur his words, making them impossible to read anymore, but nothing can wash away this feeling that settles squarely in my chest each week when I find his notes.
Because it’s precisely the type of thing Drew would be doing if he were here…
Tracking the weeks and the size of the baby.
Ensuring I’m eating even when I don’t feel well.
Taking care of me the way he did in the shower…
And I’m lying to myself when I say he didn’t leave something else when he walked out—a reopened gaping wound in my chest.
It was created when Drew died.
When the love of my life was ripped away from me without warning and with no explanation.
It almost killed me.
Every second, every minute, every hour felt like I was bleeding out without Drew.
But then I opened that door to the storm churning outside, and I saw him.
The man who shared his face but has proven to be so different in so many ways.
Cam somehow helped hold those shredded pieces of my heart together.
His constant strength and unyielding presence gave me what I didn’t even know I needed in those moments—someone to share my grief with and who understood what I was suffering.
He gave me something to cling to when I felt like I couldn’t keep going.
But after everything that’s happened, that wound he helped heal has reopened.
It festers inside me the same way my grief and anger do.
And what just happened in that shower, what I’m staring at through my tears on this counter, only make the pain worse.