Chapter 25 #2
“I want to repair what I can. Apologize for what I broke. Not just to her face, but in front of someone who can help me hear her this time because I didn’t listen when she needed me.
I didn’t believe her when she said she was lonely.
I didn’t believe her when she said she was drowning and when she gave birth alone to our daughter…
” his throat nearly closed. “I wasn’t just absent.
I was gone and she deserved more than that.
So much,” he cleared his throat. “So fucking much more than that.”
Silence filled the room.
Sabine sat perfectly still, every part of her face composed but inside, her heart was raging. Raging and cracking and thudding all at once. Because she had said those things. Had begged him to listen and now here he was, sitting across from her, finally saying them back.
Dr. Pie turned her attention to Sabine. Still gentle and unhurried.
“I want to acknowledge how hard it can be to sit here and hear those words, Sabine,” she said.
“You’ve carried a lot of pain and right now, I’m going to ask you to continue listening, for just a little longer because sometimes, the most powerful thing we can do in the beginning…
is allow the other person to speak the truth aloud. ”
Sabine said nothing but her throat tightened even more.
“What do you feel when you look at her now?” Dr. Pie looked back to Adair and he finally let his gaze land on the love of his life again.
“I see the same woman I met at that party in college,” he said softly.
“The one who couldn’t dance for shit but lit the whole room up anyway.
I see the woman who gave me a son and risked everything for our family.
I see the woman I didn’t protect enough.
I see someone I’m still deeply in love with…
even if she never says it back to me again. ”
Sabine exhaled sharply and turned her face away, but her hands trembled slightly where they rested in her lap. Dr. Pie gave that moment its space. Then she finally picked up her notepad, flipped to a blank page, and scribbled something small before looking at Sabine again.
“Would you be willing to share what came up for you hearing all of that?” she asked, no pressure in her voice, just care.
Sabine swallowed, eyes still averted. “I don’t know yet,” she said. “But I’m here. So that has to count for something.”
“Sabine, I want to remind you that you’re in full control here. If at any point this feels unproductive or unsafe, we can pause. Do you feel comfortable enough to proceed?”
“I’m here,” Sabine repeated. Pie nodded again, then sat back, folding her hands.
“I appreciate that honesty and since this is our first time meeting, I want to step back a bit. I understand that the two of you were married, and that there was a separation. But to guide this process well, I need to understand the scope of what we’re healing from.
Could you help me understand, what was the rupture?
The moment, or moments, that changed everything.
Adair, Sabine…I’d like us to begin by naming what happened. ”
The air in the room tightened. Sabine blinked. Once. Twice and Adair’s jaw clenched. For minutes neither spoke until…
“We stopped talking.”
Pie nodded, encouraging. “When did that begin?”
Sabine’s lip twitched like she might laugh, but it didn’t come. “Before the baby. Before we ever admitted anything was wrong. I think we both knew it…we just didn’t say it out loud.”
Adair glanced toward her, but Sabine didn’t look at him.
“I would try,” she continued, her voice steadier now, “to explain what I was feeling but it felt like I was speaking through water, like my words got muffled before they ever reached him. He always had somewhere to be. Something to win and I was home, nursing a baby and losing pieces of myself every day.”
“Did you share that with him?” Pie asked gently.
“I tried.” She shook her head. “I cried. I begged. I asked for help. But when you love someone that much, you start editing your grief. You start to silence it because you don’t want to look like the problem. So I just…quieted myself.”
“You never expressed it to me the way you did that night on the phone when I was standing in the hallway. You said you hated New York and regretted everything basically.”
“I never said I regretted everything,” she snapped, turning toward him now, eyes flashing. “I said I regretted what it had done to me. The isolation. The cold. The damn city swallowing me whole while you were off chasing whatever dream made you feel like a man.”
“Why didn’t you tell me that? I would’ve—”
“You would’ve what?” she cut in, voice rising. “Listened? You hadn’t listened in months. You barely looked at me. I was invisible, Adair. Pregnant, invisible, and drowning.”
“You weren’t invisible baby.”
“Stop lying!”
Pie held up a hand—not to silence them, but to guide. “You’re doing well. This is about honesty…” she turned to Adair. “Sabine wants you to acknowledge something. Right now, you’re offering a different version of events. That doesn’t make her truth any less valid.”
Adair sighed, his jaw tightening before he spoke. “I’m not saying she doesn’t have the right to feel how she does. I just…I hate that that’s how she felt. Like I really made her feel that way.”
“That’s understandable, Adair,” Pie said gently. “But your emotional reaction to her pain, however strong, doesn’t erase the pain itself. She felt invisible. That hurts you to hear but that hurt? It’s part of the work. Acknowledge it, and then we can start to explore why it happened.”
Sabine looked away again. Her hands trembled in her lap. “You want honesty?” she nodded. “I gave birth to our daughter alone. In a hospital bed, surrounded by strangers.”
Adair’s head dropped.
“She wasn’t breathing when they placed her on my chest,” Sabine said, her voice shaking now.
“I didn’t even cry at first. I think my body went into shock.
I just…stared. Waiting for her to move,” she was looking down into her open palms as if their deceased baby girl still lie there.
“Waiting for someone to say it was a mistake. That there was still time,” she wiped the tears that fell rapidly.
“We lost our daughter. Ariyah…” Sabine whispered.
“What happened…the name you said we needed to put to our issues…it’s Ariyah. My baby girl.”
The words landed like a brick dropped in still water. Pie’s face didn’t change, but her spine straightened just slightly. “I’m so sorry,” she said softly. “How far along were you?”
“I was full-term,” Sabine answered. Her voice had dropped to a murmur. “Thirty-nine weeks. Her name was Ariyah,” she kept saying her daughter’s name.
“Thank you for sharing her name.”
“I gave birth to her in the hospital,” Sabine continued, her tone clearer now. “Alone.”
Adair’s eyes closed briefly.
“I called him,” she went on, nodding toward Adair but not looking. “Over and over. I texted. I begged but he didn’t answer. My sisters were on FaceTime, but they weren’t there. Nobody was. Just me…and my dead daughter.”
Adair’s mouth parted. “Sabine—”
“No.” Her hand shot up without looking at him. “Don’t.”
“Adair, were you aware Sabine was in labor?”
“No,” he said, shame dragging the word down. “But I knew she was close. I told myself I’d call her later.”
“Why?” Pie asked.
He didn’t answer right away. Then, hoarsely: “Because I…I just needed…I needed a night to breathe and feel…” his lip quivered. “Feel something that I was failing to give my wife too,” he admitted shamefully. “I hate myself for it.”
The confession sat heavy between them, thicker than air, more suffocating than guilt alone. Pie gave the moment exactly what it needed—a moment.
Sabine’s jaw clenched as she blinked back a new wave of tears.
Her voice came low, but clear. “You didn’t even want to answer your phone that night.
That’s what keeps me up the most. You chose not to.
They took my son away from me kicking and screaming.
Then…my daughter…silent,” she her bottom lip quivered.
“And still…but you…you…you just needed a night.”
“What you’re describing,” Pie said gently, “sounds like trauma in the deepest form. The physical trauma. The emotional rupture. And the loneliness...I hear it in every word.”
“I called him. Over and over. I left voicemails. Texted. Facetimed. Nothing.” Her throat flexed hard.
“I called my sisters. Parthenia answered. Narri answered. They heard everything. I remember laying there thinking—I can’t go too.
I can’t die right now, my son needs me, even though part of me wanted to. ”
Adair covered his mouth, tears rising fast now. He shook his head like he could undo it all. “I didn’t know,” he whispered. “I swear to God, Sabine, I didn’t know it was happening that night.”
“You knew I was close,” she snapped. “You knew I was at the end. We’d talked about it the day before. You just…weren’t reachable. You just needed…a night.”
“Where were you?” Pie asked softly.
“Out having drinks…with…a co-wor—”
“No,” Sabine cut him off. “Don’t minimize her down to a measly co-worker when she played such a big role in our cinema before! Say who you were with Adair!” she shouted.
“I was out with…Corrine,” he painfully admitted.
“You didn’t even answer when the hospital called! That bitch had your head so far up her ass!”
Seeing that it was once again taking an argumentative turn, Pie shifted and spoke up, “I want to acknowledge how devastating this is and not just the loss of Ariyah but the loss of being able to go through it as a team. That grief doesn’t end at the hospital.
It changes everything that comes after.”
Sabine gave her a simple nod and Adair couldn’t even look her way.
“You mentioned Corrine,” Pie said, turning toward him. “I’d like us to return to that, if you’re willing.”