14. Daphne
14
I don’t remember much of the drive home. I think Pasha tries talking to me, but I’m a zombie. Unreachable.
I don’t want to cry. I’ve cried so fucking much since the day I gave birth. But I’m suffocating under this overwhelming pressure in my chest. Drowning in a sorrow I don’t know how to express.
So when we arrive home, I decide to channel all of it into determination.
I will get this figured out.
I will feed my baby.
I hear Asya ask Pasha how it went, but I don’t stick around to hear his answer. I leave them to discuss my failures while I carry the bag with the breast pump into the bedroom.
Whoever designed this thing at least made an effort to make it look less like something I’d find on a dairy farm and more like… I don’t know. Anything other than what it is, I guess. It’s this egg-shaped contraption that suctions securely onto my breast at my nipple.
But as soon as it does, pain surges through my breast. One good thing from this—I have to find something good—is the lack of baby gums gnawing at my sensitive nipple. It’s a duller, broader pain.
But it changes nothing.
I don’t know how long I sit there, trying to pump one breast and then the other, before I break. The containers are completely empty. My chest hurts from the effort.
How long has this been happening?
Have I been starving my baby?
The tears I’ve been holding back all day break through. I slump into the pillows, but not before angrily hurling the pump at the foot of the bed.
Of course, Pasha chooses that exact moment to walk into the room with Taty cradled to his shoulder. His eyebrow twitches when he sees the pump bounce off the mattress and onto the floor, but he wisely holds back from saying anything about it.
“I made a bottle for her,” he says instead. He sits down on the edge of the bed and hands her to me. When he pulls the bottle of prepared formula from his pocket, I want to chuck that across the room, too. “I figured you should be the one to feed her. It might help improve things.”
Fuck him for being kind and perfect. He’s being so patient and understanding while I lose my absolute shit over my inadequacies.
It would be so great if our daughter was just as patient and understanding.
She’s not. Not by a long shot. I hold her close and keep her to my breast as if she’s feeding from it, but offer her the bottle’s nipple instead of my own. At first, she takes it without fussing. I glance up at Pasha, who smiles and squeezes my shoulder.
But then she stops. Scrunches up her face. Spits the nipple out.
And screams at the top of her lungs.
“Malyshka, come on,” Pasha chides her. He reaches for her and I’m all too eager to give her back. “Your mother just wants to feed you.”
The one saving grace here is that she keeps right on screaming. I know it’s horrible to think that—one more horrible thought in a day full of them—but I can’t help it. I can’t stand seeing her giggle at him when she only screams and cries when I try to bond with her.
This time, she’s an equal opportunity banshee who hates the formula with every fiber of her being. Not only does she shove the bottle away, she promptly turns her head and spits it up all over her father. Then looks at him with an expression neither of us anticipated—like, No, you drink it.
It’s kind of funny. Just a little. Enough to dry my tears for a second and make me ugly-snort. Pasha looks at me when he hears it and joins with a soft chuckle. “I’ll give the doctor another call. Here.”
He returns her to me so he can change his shirt.
“Sweet girl,” I coo between sniffles as I prop us both upright. “My sweet baby girl. Yes, you are! You’re my sweet baby girl…”
Taty just squints at me suspiciously.
When Pasha emerges from the bathroom, he finds both of us crying on the bed.
“What happened?” He scoops her up and holds her to his bare chest, guiding her cheek to rest against his skin.
The fact that she instantly calms down makes me feel even worse.
At the same time, my ovaries are screaming, “Round Two!” as I watch a shirtless Pasha, all rippling muscle and inked skin, cradle our tiny newborn and whisper comfort to her like it’s the most natural thing in the world.
I hate this.
I hate all of this so fucking much.
I hate how my heart aches knowing my own daughter hates me. How my brain keeps whispering reminders that I’m not a person worth loving, not even by my own family.
How my vagina and ovaries are completely ignoring the Northern Hemisphere of Daphne and urging me to have another baby with this man.
Pasha calls for his mother, who comes in and takes Taty out for a nap in one of the other rooms. Asya gives me a hug before she leaves, whispering encouragement that I know what to do; I’ve got this.
Do I? I sure as hell don’t feel like I do.
“I’ll call Dr. Bradshaw in a bit.” Pasha slides in next to me until I’m on his lap. “Right now,” he continues, “we need to talk?—”
“About how I’m a terrible mother?”
“No. Why would you say that?”
I pluck at some lint on his sweatpants. “Because I am. I can’t feed her, I can’t hold her, I can’t even keep my shit together when I try.”
Pasha takes my hands in his and holds them to me. Like a warm, strong, solid straitjacket. “You are an incredible mother. I’ve never doubted that for a second. Neither should you.”
“But I?—”
“You panic. And stress. And no one blames you. My God, Daphne, the stress you’ve been under all through the pregnancy could fill a medical textbook on endurance.”
At least he acknowledges it.
“But Taty is literally brand-new to this world. She’s sensitive to emotions, and most especially your emotions.” He scoffs. “She couldn’t care less if I’m chewing on something from work that’s pissing me off. But you? You’re her mother. If you’re upset, she’s upset.”
“I’m trying,” I groan into his chest. “I really am.”
“I know. But are you worried when you do? Thinking about what it means if nothing works?”
“… Maybe.”
He gives me a knowing smile. “Have you tried just feeding her? No expectations, none of this stupid self-deprecation you keep putting yourself through. Just… feed her.”
I can’t stop myself from rolling my eyes. “If it’s that easy, then why don’t you do it? Even better, why not go marry someone else who can do it? Apparently, I’m the only idiot in this world who struggles to give milk to a goddamn baby!”
I know I’m lashing out. I know I’m letting my fears get the better of me.
But I can’t help it. I can’t take it.
I try to move off his lap. Pasha wraps his arms around my waist and in an instant, the world spins around me and he pins me down onto the bed.
I try to wriggle away, but he presses his whole body on top of me. Head to toe, I’m covered by Pasha’s bulk with no way out.
My brain wants to scream at him.
My legs want to wrap around him.
“Hush, moya plamya.” His breath fans over my face. “You’re beautiful. Wonderful. Everything I’ve ever wanted and needed and I’m not letting you go.”
“Tell that to our daughter.”
“I do. Every day.” He strokes my hair back and feathers more of his kisses across my brow. “And she knows it. She loves you, Daphne. Wholly and completely. You are her safe space. She needs you.”
Tears spill from my lashes. He kisses them away. “I almost starved her to death,” I whimper.
“Daphne.” His tone firms, and he makes me look him in his eyes. “Neither of us knew what was going on. For you to say that, to even believe that, means you think I’d actually let something like that happen. Is that what you think of me?”
“No.”
“Good. So stop thinking that about yourself. We went to the doctor for answers. We got them. Now, we adjust.”
I have to admit, feeling him on top of me like some weighted blanket is actually calming me down. Hearing him say these things is, too. I’m still shaky in the confidence department, but… he may have a point. I need to stop freaking out all the time.
“I have to keep trying.” It’s barely a whisper. But it’s something. “I can’t… I can’t just give up without trying for her.”
“Only as long as it’s actually doing you good. If it starts hurting you, physically or emotionally, we stop. I won’t let you hurt yourself. Okay?”
I sigh and nod. “Okay.”
For a long, quiet moment, we lie together on the bed. Pasha doesn’t move off of me, and I don’t want him to. He studies my face, strokes my hair, rests his brow to mine as we both breathe each other in.
“There’s no one in this world I want more than you, Daphne,” he murmurs. “So no more talk about you leaving or me finding ‘someone better,’ because that’s not happening. Ever. Understood?”
I can only nod. I don’t trust my voice right now.
“Good. Now, let’s go show our daughter who’s the boss.”
When we emerge from the bedroom, Asya has Taty curled up in one arm and holding a fresh bottle with the other. “I was just about to feed her,” she explains. She holds the bottle out to me.
Here we go. Showtime.
“Come here, malyshka,” I croon to my baby girl. “It’s time to eat, and no more fussing. There’s nothing wrong with takeout. You’ll learn to love it.”
She’s still tentative at first. But when Taty latches onto the bottle, and starts drinking? No fuss, no screams, no tears?
I about collapse with relief.
“I got you,” I whisper. “Mommy’s got you. I’m gonna figure this motherhood thing out, I promise.”