10. Hannah
HANNAH
I sat on Julia's sofa with my hands on my knees, numb.
My wedding ring was gone. The place where it should have been felt wrong, naked, like I'd left part of myself behind.
My stomach pressed against the waist of my blue dress, tight and uncomfortable.
The baby kicked once, a little flutter against my ribs.
I barely felt it. I stared at my bare finger and tried to feel something besides empty.
Julia's home smelled like cinnamon tea and old books.
I'd always loved that about her place. It smelled like home.
Not the Langford house with its high ceilings and marble floors and rooms I kept pristine for dinners I didn't want to host. This was small and cluttered and warm, and I could breathe here.
Julia moved around her kitchen. I heard the kettle click on, heard the cabinet open and close, heard the clink of mugs on the counter.
She came back with two mugs of tea and set one in front of me on the coffee table.
Steam curled up from it, smelling faintly of chamomile.
Tea I wouldn't drink. My stomach couldn't handle anything right now.
She sat down beside me and waited.
I kept staring at my hands. My left hand looked wrong.
Bare. Incomplete. I'd worn that ring for six years.
Every single day since Pierce slid it onto my finger and promised to love me for the rest of our lives.
I'd taken it off once to get it cleaned, and my finger had felt naked for the two days it was gone. This was worse.
This was me taking it off.
"What happened?" Julia asked. Her voice was gentle. Careful, like I might break if she pushed too hard.
I opened my mouth and nothing came out at first. My throat was tight, my chest aching. I swallowed hard and tried again. "I came from the house."
"The Langford house."
"Yeah."
She waited. Her hands were folded in her lap, patient.
Julia had always been patient. It was one of the things I'd loved about teaching with her.
She'd wait as long as it took for a student to answer, never rushing, never pushing.
She gave them space to find the words. She was doing the same thing for me now.
I picked up the mug of tea and wrapped my hands around it. The warmth seeped into my palms, but it didn't reach the cold knot in my chest.
"I went to his office today," I said.
The words felt flat. I heard them come out of my mouth and they didn't sound like anything. Like I was telling her about the weather. Like it didn't matter.
Julia didn't move. "Okay."
"I saw something there."
She was quiet for a moment. Then, carefully, "What did you see?"
I looked down at my hands wrapped around the mug. My left hand looked so wrong without the ring. I'd worn it for six years. I turned my hand over and looked at my palm like the answer was written there. Like I could find some other explanation that made sense.
"Pierce and Sienna," I said. "They were alone together."
Julia went very still beside me. I felt her go still, the way the air changes before a storm. The shift in her breathing. I didn't look at her. I kept staring at my hands.
"Sienna," Julia said. Her voice was level. Controlled, like she was keeping a lid on something.
"Sienna Tatum. Pierce's event planner," I said.
Julia's hands closed into fists in her lap. I saw it from the corner of my eye. Saw her knuckles go white. She didn't say anything for a long moment, and when she spoke, her voice was tight. "What were they doing?"
I shook my head. God, I didn't want to say it. I didn't want to make it real by putting words to it. If I didn't say it out loud, maybe it hadn't happened. Maybe I could go back to this afternoon and stay home and never get the stupid idea to walk into his office.
But I had gone. I'd seen them.
"They were in his office," I said. My voice sounded hollow. Empty. "His door was standing wide open. I had a travel mug of tea in my hand, and I stepped just inside. Something stupid."
Julia didn't say it was stupid. She just waited.
"The lights were dim," I said. "There was wine, already uncorked, and two glasses. Her heels were kicked off on the floor. And he was looking at his tablet, talking about donor numbers. He wasn't pulling away from her. He wasn't leaning in."
My throat tightened. I set the mug down before I dropped it.
"It was like any other day to them," I said. "Like I was the one who wasn't supposed to be there."
"Did they see you?"
"No." I shook my head. "I just stood there like an idiot for I don't know how long. Maybe ten seconds. Maybe a minute. I don't know. And then I turned around and left. I didn't say anything. I just walked out."
"Hannah—"
"I don't know what it was," I said quickly. Too quickly. The words tumbled out in a rush. "I don't know what I saw. Maybe it was nothing. Maybe it was just work. Maybe I'm making a mountain out of an anthill, like he always says."
I laughed, and it came out wrong. Bitter. Broken.
"Maybe I'm just being emotional because I'm pregnant and my hormones are all over the place," I said. "Maybe I'm the one with the problem."
Julia's jaw tightened. I saw the muscle jump. "Don't do that."
"Do what?"
"Use his words to explain away what you saw."
I flushed. Heat crawled up my neck and into my face, and I hated it. She was right. God, she was right, and I hated it. I was doing exactly what Pierce always did. Waving off my own feelings like they didn't matter. Like I was overreacting. Like I was the problem and he was the rational one.
I pressed my hands to my face and took a breath. Then another. The baby gave a hard kick, and I dropped my hands to my stomach. A little foot pushed against my palm from the inside.
"I saw what I saw," I said quietly.
"Yeah," Julia said. "You did."
My phone buzzed on the coffee table. I glanced at it. Pierce's name lit up the screen, and my chest went cold. I watched it buzz once, twice, three times, and then it went dark.
"You're not answering," Julia said.
"No."
I didn't want to talk to him. I didn't want to hear his voice telling me I was wrong, that I didn't understand, that I was making something out of nothing. I didn't want his logic. I didn't want him to explain it away with reasons that made sense to him and none to me.
Julia didn't push. She just sat there with her fists still clenched in her lap, watching me.
I looked at the mug of tea she'd made me. The steam had stopped rising. It was going cold. I hadn't touched it.
"I don't know what I'm doing," I said.
Julia reached over and put her hand on mine. Her fingers were warm. Steady. "You're here. That's enough for right now."
I nodded. My throat was too tight to answer.
"What do you want, Hannah?" she asked.
The question hit me like a punch to the chest. What did I want? I'd stopped asking myself that a long time ago. I'd stopped thinking about what I wanted and started thinking about what Pierce needed. What the house needed. What the dinners and the events and the calendar needed.
What did I want?
"I just want a marriage where he listens to me," I said.
The words came out quiet. Small. Like I was admitting something shameful. Like wanting my husband to listen to me was asking for too much.
Julia's expression softened. She squeezed my hand.
"I want a husband who's there with me," I said. "Not just in the house. Not just at the dinners I plan for him or the events I coordinate so his business looks good. I want him there. Present. Listening when I tell him something matters. Caring about the things I care about."
My throat tightened. The words were coming faster now, and I couldn't stop them.
"I want him at the prenatal appointments," I said. "Not because I begged him to come. Not because I reminded him six times and put it on his calendar and sent him a text the morning of. I want him there because he wants to be there. Because he wants to know how the baby's doing. Because he cares."
I was talking faster now. The ache in my chest was spreading, filling my whole body.
"I want him there when the baby comes. I want the baby to have a father who shows up. Who's present. Who doesn't wave off everything I say like it doesn't matter. I want a marriage where I'm not invisible. Where I don't feel like I'm begging for scraps of his attention."
I stopped. My hands were shaking. I pressed them together in my lap and stared at them, at the bare place where my ring should have been.
"That's the marriage I want," I said. "That's all I've ever wanted."
Julia squeezed my hand. She didn't say anything. What was there to say?
It was easier to believe I was the problem. That I was too sensitive, too emotional, too needy. That if I just tried harder, did better, kept the house running smoother and the dinners more perfect and my complaints to myself, everything would be fine.
But it wasn't fine. It hadn't been fine for a long time.
My phone buzzed again. Another call from Pierce. I watched his name light up the screen and let it ring. It went to voicemail.
A second later, it buzzed with a text. Then another. Then another. The screen lit up over and over, messages piling up one after another.
I picked it up and looked at the screen. Three messages. Four. Five. Six.
Where are you?
I came home and you're not here.
Hannah, call me back.
This isn't funny.
Where did you go?
We need to talk about this.
I stared at the messages. Every single one was about what he wanted. Where was I. Why wasn't I answering him. What he needed. We need to talk about this, like I was the one causing a problem. Like I was the one who needed to explain myself.
None of them asked if I was okay.
None of them asked what I needed.
None of them even acknowledged that something might be wrong, that I might have a reason for leaving, that maybe — just maybe — he should have thought about me first instead of himself.
I set the phone down. It buzzed again immediately, another text, but I didn't look at it. My hand drifted to my left ring finger, to the bare place where my ring should have been. I rubbed the empty skin with my thumb, feeling the indent it had left after six years. It ached.
God, it ached.
I'd left the ring in the nursery when I came home from his office. On the shelf, next to the gray stuffed elephant.
I'd stood there in that finished gray room Sienna had designed, with my hand on my stomach and realized I couldn't do it anymore. I couldn't keep pretending everything was fine. I couldn't keep making excuses for him. I couldn't keep hoping he'd change, that he'd see me, that he'd care.
So I'd taken off my ring and left it there. On the shelf. In the room that was supposed to be for our baby.
And then I'd walked out.
I'd driven to Julia's place and knocked on her door, and when she'd opened it and seen my face, she'd pulled me inside without asking questions.
And now I was here. On her sofa. With my hands on my knees and my stomach pressed tight and my ring finger bare. And I didn't know what came next.
The phone buzzed again. And again. I ignored it.
Julia started to say something, but she stopped. Her head turned toward the door. Her whole body went tense.
A second later, I heard it. Footsteps outside. Heavy. Fast.
My heart kicked against my ribs.
Then a knock. Hard enough to rattle the door in its frame.
Julia looked at me. I looked at the door.
I sat there with my hand on my bare ring finger and ached.