Chapter 11 Emma
Chapter eleven
Emma
“What happened to you?”
That’s the first thing I hear. No hello, no good morning, just Ellie’s bewildered stare and an oat milk latte.
“Seriously,” Ellie continues, “should I be worried?”
“It was a long night.” I wave her off.
“Did Josie sleep okay?” she asks, slurping her coffee—iced coffee in January, like a heathen.
“She slept great.”
“How was therapy?” She winces at her own words. A therapist wincing about therapy, what a moment. “Did it go alright?”
“What’s with the third degree?” I try to tease, but I miss the mark, making her eyes widen. “I’m sorry. Therapy was exactly what you would expect.”
Ellie nods in understanding because she, of all people, does.
But it’s more than that. Therapy was tense, sure, but the night ended better than I expected.
I woke up content, with my husband’s arms wrapped around me.
It was the best night’s sleep I’ve had in months.
Yet, I’m still exhausted. Even in the midst of good sleep, I know I was anxious.
Woke up with a racing heart, thinking my baby was lost in the comforter or somehow scaled the wall to ride the ceiling fan like a carousel.
Ellie must sense I need a hug, because she wraps her arms around me, pinning mine at my sides and squeezing so tight I see stars.
“Cut that out.” Malcolm’s deep, stern voice rumbles behind me, followed by Kate’s bright, gleeful one, saying, “Oh, hush,” as she wraps her arms around me too. Now I’m pinned between her and Ellie, tightly restrained, and quickly my anxiety begins to wind tighter.
“Are we starting the day with group hugs now?” Benny asks as he wedges himself in without hesitation.
Ellie’s and Kate’s hair fills my vision, and then another weight drops onto my shoulders.
Malcolm, I think. The pressure runs straight down my spine and pools in my heels, and suddenly, it feels like there’s no space left to breathe.
“What do we have here?” Daniels says with a laugh, then he joins.
“I need air.” The words barely make it out, tangled in Kate’s thick, curly hair over my mouth and nose. I try to inhale, but dread floods in instead. The press of their bodies makes my bones feel heavy, like I’m being swallowed whole, sending a zap of panic surging through my lungs.
I wiggle, desperate to break free.
They tighten the hug, mistaking my panicked movements for affection.
“I—can’t—” I try to breathe as stars start to dot my vision. Can I breathe?
“I think that’s enough for now,” Malcolm mumbles.
“Just a little longer.” Kate squeezes tighter, and my chest constricts.
“I can’t bre—”
“Isn’t this great?” Benny cuts me off, and the last bit of air in my lungs leaves me.
Hot waves ripple up my neck, settling on my cheeks and tightening my throat. I gasp wiggle harder. They don’t know. “Please,” I breathe. “I can’t—”
A hand clamps around my wrist inside the circle. My pulse jumps. Then I recognize the grip, the warmth, the roughness of his palms, and I let him pull me out.
“I’ve got you.” Steven’s voice cuts through the buzzing in my head as he pulls me into his chest. “Breathe.”
I don’t have the capacity to ask what he’s doing here. I just fold into him, knees giving as he catches every shaky inch of me.
“Em?” Kate reaches for me, but her voice warps like it’s coming from underwater.
Steven’s voice is the only thing that reaches me. “Give her some space, please.” His tone is tense, protective, as his warm breath caresses my temple.
I hear a murmured sorry and the quick shuffling of feet, then we’re alone.
“Are you alright?” he speaks into my hair, his thumbs rubbing soothing circles at the base of my neck.
My skin still buzzes painfully, but I nod. He cups my face, but I can’t look at him. I focus on the hospital logo on his baby-blue scrubs. Baby blue. Baby. Blue. Baby…
“If you’ll excuse me,” my voice is pinched as I rush out of the room. My heart pounds so hard in my chest it burns.
“Emma, wait.” Steven follows me into my office and shuts the door behind me.
I don’t acknowledge him as I yank my purse out of my desk and dump everything out. Half of the contents hit the floor; others scatter across the desk.
“Where’s my phone?” I ask in a panic, wildly sifting through my desk before dropping to my knees and doing it again. Pens, hand sanitizer, Chapstick…I see everything but my phone. “Where’s my phone?” I cry as the stomach-knotting feeling of urgency takes over.
Steven drops to his knees next to me. “Emma, what is wrong?”
I can feel him watch me as I go through the mess, picking up the same things multiple times, as if the package of Kleenex itself can tell me where my phone is. My movements are now frantic, tossing things out of the way, nearly hitting Steven with a pen.
“Emma.” He speaks soft and low, patient. “Baby, talk to me.”
“I need to check on Josie,” my voice cracks, and tears erupt. “I haven’t checked in. What if something is wrong?” I whimper, feeling like a crumpled piece of paper. Nothing can straighten and smooth me out right now.
Steven fights his natural reaction—the one to tell me not to worry. I can tell because he forces his wide eyes back to a normal size and scrapes his teeth over his bottom lip.
“Alright, let’s check on her.” He doesn’t hesitate to reach into his pocket and pull out his phone. With the screen face up in his palm, he sits cross-legged next to me, urging me to take it.
I do, dialing the nanny in seconds.
“Cindy?” I ask when the line clicks over. “How’s Josie? Is she okay?”
“Yes, Ms. Jones. She’s perfect. Here, let me show you.”
She clicks over to FaceTime, and a giggly, pink-cheeked Josie illuminates the screen. Lying on her tummy, chewing on a rubber carrot, drool flows out of her mouth like a faucet. Her hair is sticking up in every direction. Perfect.
“Hi, sweet girl,” Steven says as he peers into the screen over my shoulder. Josie beams, babbling loudly and squirming like a fish from her spot on the floor.
“Mama and Daddy love you, baby girl,” he adds, and an ache swells in my chest, rising like a tide and spilling into my lungs. It can only be described as love, this feeling. The unmistakable moment when your heart and mind meet in quiet agreement, whispering to each other, “This is bliss.”
“Bye, sweetie,” I say weakly, tears pricking my eyes. “Thank you, Cindy.”
The screen clicks off, and my arm feels impossibly heavy as the phone slips from my hand to the floor. A shaky breath shudders out of me.
Steven’s fingers tighten around mine. I don’t remember reaching for him, but here we are, hands threaded together. It’s instinct now. Muscle memory. My body finds him before my mind does.
Most of the time, I let myself lean into him and his steadiness. I’m grateful for it. Grateful for him.
But somewhere under all of that, a voice curls up, whispering that I can’t do it on my own. That needing him is a flaw. It shows how exposed and weak I really am.
Needing him makes me weak.
“There we go. Josie’s fine. Nothing to worry about.” Steven smiles, but his words skewer me like a heated metal rod.
“Worrying about her isn’t nothing,” I murmur pathetically. “I can’t help it sometimes.”
“You’re right.” He tries to pull me close, but I stiffen. “I should’ve phrased it differently. I’m sorry.”
He’s frustrated; I can hear it in his voice. See it in how his lips twist.
“I’m sorry too.” Weight presses behind my eyes, and the image of racing down the hall and out the front door flashes through my mind. “I’m sorry I worry so much. I’m sorry my feelings are a burden.”
“I don’t think that, Emma.” Abruptly he stands, pacing now.
“Cleary it’s a problem, though.” I gesture to his angry shuffling.
“I was just trying to reassure you that Josie was fine. She’s always fine, Emma.
” He’s nearly yelling now, which “yelling” for Steven is a cross between a mime pounding his fists against the invisible box and Judge Judy asking for receipts.
It’s never loud; it’s just deep and puffy and intimidating in its own way.
“You worry too much, Emma.” Now this is not what I need.
“I do not.” I scoff.
He eyes me, half frustrated and half knowing.
We both know worrying might as well be stamped on my forehead.
Even before having children. I was diagnosed at eleven years old, and no matter how much therapy, medication, or reassurance by the people around me, it’s never gone away.
It’s a permanent, unfortunate part of me.
But I’m too prideful to admit he’s right, especially in moments like this. There are better ways he could reach me. He could reassure me that needing help doesn’t mean I’m broken or failing, but strong, resilient, surviving. He used to do that.
Not now. Instead, he focuses on what I should stop doing instead of what I’m getting right.
As if he can read my mind, he continues, pacing and gesturing with his arms to add emphasis to his words.
“I know it’s hard on you being away from her.
There is no one else who can care for her the way you do.
But Emma, baby, it doesn’t help your anxiety to obsess over what you can’t control, and it doesn’t help us.
You get mad at me when I try to be level-headed. All I’m doing is stating a fact.”
“You’re trying to fix me.” I deflate as humiliation sinks into my stomach, and I can’t help but wonder if this is how his patients feel. They come to him with a problem, and he knows the answer, regardless of what they’ve lived through.
He halts, facing the wall of bookshelves in my office. His broad shoulders rise as he inhales slowly. The blue scrub top clings to him, stretching over the curve of muscle beneath.
It’s almost distracting, thinking about what lies beneath the uniform. The rawness of him. The ticklish spot on his ribs, the butterfly tattoo on his arm, the body that could undo me with a single motion—all hidden under a layer of polyester meant to care for the world. Care for me.
But the line between me and the world tends to blur, lumping me in with how he treats everyone else.
He turns to face me, and a tiny wrinkle running down the center of his top catches my eye. It sends an instant blaze of irritation simmering in my gut.
“I should have done laundry.” I grind the words out.
“What?” He blinks at me.
“Your shirt is wrinkled.” I point to the creased fabric in the center of his chest.
He doesn’t look. Wrinkle be damned. “Emma, can we focus—”
“I’m sorry I didn’t set your scrubs out last night.” The words tumble out.
“Emma.” Steven grabs my hands and presses them against his chest. “I don’t give a damn about the wrinkles. So what if you didn’t set my scrubs out last night? Maybe I should man up and set my own clothes out for once.”
I snort reactively. He arches a brow. It’s not that he can’t set out his clothes; it’s that he never does. He’d treat patients in sweatpants if left to his own devices.
“I can do it.” He points at himself, emphasizing that he is a man who can do his own laundry regularly.
“Whatever you say.” I force a smile.
He smiles back, and the tension between us loosens for a moment before the clock on the wall grabs his attention. He groans. “Look, I need to get to work. Can we make an effort to get through a conversation tonight and not get derailed by random wrinkle-related stuff? Please?”
“We don’t get derailed,” I scoff.
“Emmaaaaaa, please,” he groans despondently, pressing his thumb into the bridge of his nose.
“Fine.” I hold my hands up in surrender.
I don’t have the desire to argue. I know myself.
I know we can get off topic. I have a million things going on in my head at once, but even if we trail off, I always bring us back to the point at hand.
Always. Even if it’s agonizing. Even if it ends the same way it always does.
“We’ll talk tonight.”
Without another word, he kisses my forehead, then he’s gone.
My office door clicks shut behind him, and suddenly, all I hear is the ticking of my clock and the frantic thump of my still-recovering heartbeat.
I press my palms flat against the desk, focusing on the cold wood against my skin and breathe.
We’ll talk tonight. We always do. But I hope this time I can actually find the words to say what I need. And I hope he really listens.