Chapter 10
The first time Kate asked me not to come into the bathroom, I had a pot of soup cooling on her stove.
“Want some water?” I asked from the hallway.
“No.”
“Are the pills within reach?”
“Yes.”
“Do you want me to call the clinic?”
She didn't answer from the other side of the door. The radiator clattered twice beneath the window. On the sill, a basil plant leaned toward the glass as if it also needed someone to look after it.
I waited with the water glass in one hand and my phone in the other.
We’d gotten back from First Hill a few hours earlier.
Kate had taken off her coat, sat on the edge of the mattress, and said she wanted a shower.
Afterward, she’d emerged with wet hair, pulled on an oversized T-shirt, and asked me to stay.
She hadn't specified for how long. I hadn't asked.
The soup had carrots, ginger, and shredded chicken. I’d made it without asking what she had an appetite for. I began to see the flaw in that logic as I ladled it into two glass containers.
The door opened. Kate stepped out, steadying herself with one hand against the doorframe. Her lips were dry and her eyes were swollen, but her voice retained that low, clipped edge she used when trying to keep something from turning into an issue.
“I don't want soup.”
“That’s fine.”
“I don't want you looking at me like I’m going to break.”
I set the glass on the counter. The water rippled slightly inside.
“I’m not looking at you like that.”
Kate brushed past me without making contact.
She walked over to the bed and sat down with her feet on the floor, shoulders curved beneath the loose shirt.
Her watch lay open on the nightstand. Beside it, the white ultrasound envelope peeked out from beneath the clinic paperwork. She hadn't touched any of it.
“Cole,” she said.
I stayed where I was.
“Yeah?”
“I don't know what I need.”
The ache hit my gut first, compact and heavy. It wasn't my body cramping or my blood on the sheets. Even so, my brain kept searching for a task I could finish with my hands.
“That’s okay,” I said. “I can sit with not knowing too.”
Kate covered her face. She didn't cry. Her fingers rested still across her forehead, one dark burgundy nail chipped along the edge.
“Can you set an alarm?” she asked. “Just for the pain meds. The nurse said not to take them on an empty stomach.”
“Yeah.”
That, I knew how to do. I set an alarm for three hours out and another for the morning. I logged the time of the clinic visit, the time of the nurse’s check-in call, and the time the bleeding had started in a note on my phone. 11:27. 12:10. 2:45. Clean numbers. One row stacked beneath the next.
When I looked up, Kate was watching me.
“Don't keep a log of this.”
The phone felt heavy in my hand.
“I just wanted to make sure I didn't mess up the timing on the pills.”
“Just set the alarm.”
“All right.”
I deleted the note. I didn't show her that before deleting it, I’d copied down the phone number for a therapist listed on the clinic’s portal. I didn't have a full plan. Just a list of places where I could start looking for one.
That night I slept on her sofa with the living room lamp on.
Through the wall, I heard the bathroom faucet run twice, followed by the creak of floorboards as Kate walked back to bed.
Each time, I sat up, debating whether to knock.
Each time, I stayed seated, hands flat on my knees, waiting for her to say my name.
She didn't.
In the morning, the smell of the neighbors’ brewing coffee drifted up through the lightwell.
Kate was still asleep. I left a slice of toast and a small plate of crackers on the coffee table.
I scribbled *Eat something if you can* on a sticky note, then peeled it off before sticking it down.
I stared at it in my palm, then tore it into strips.
My phone buzzed. It was the team physio.
Physio: *Coach is asking if you're coming in for recovery. No need to explain. Confirm when you can.*
I typed that I couldn't make it. Deleted *can't*. Sent: *Personal matter today. I’ll keep you posted.*
Then I opened a delivery app. I ordered milk, fruit, rice, yogurt, more crackers. Added flowers, then deleted them from the cart. I didn't want a bunch of peonies showing up at her door as if some florist could resolve a loss with tissue paper.
Priya texted back mid-morning. I’d messaged her first, knowing Kate wouldn't answer if I asked out loud.
Me: *She’s sleeping. Clinic said expectant management. Any idea what food she can tolerate when she’s like this?*
Priya: *Toast, soup if you don't push it, and zero sentences starting with “you should.”*
I looked at the container of soup on the counter.
Me: *Noted.*
Priya: *Is she with you?*
Me: *Yeah.*
Priya: *Then stay. But don't build a command center in her kitchen, Cole.*
It wasn't a joke. I didn't answer right away.
The delivery arrived at eleven. I stocked the groceries in the cupboards I’d learned: rice behind the tea tins, yogurt in the spot where Kate stashed the premade salads she bought and forgot to eat.
Her phone lay face down on the table. It had gone seven hours without a single work notification because I’d silenced them while she was sleeping.
I turned the alerts back on. I had no right to make that call for her.
Before putting my phone away, I searched for therapists specializing in perinatal grief.
I opened six pages. Two weren't accepting new patients. One had video availability Wednesday. I jotted names, hours, and accepted insurance onto a sheet of paper. I stopped when the page was half full. The ballpoint had pressed through the paper, leaving a faint indentation on Kate’s table.
That afternoon, she came out of the bedroom in sweatpants with a throw blanket draped over her shoulders. She sat in one of the kitchen chairs. I was dicing an onion, deliberately moving slow.
“Why does it smell like a restaurant?” she asked.
“Because I burned the first batch and had to start over.”
Kate looked at the cutting board. Stray bits of onion lay on the linoleum near the baseboard.
“Now that sounds serious.”
There was no real humor in the words. But there was no malice either. I clung to it.
“I can order something.”
“I don't want you ordering anything.”
“All right.”
I rested the knife on the cutting board. Kate nudged her chair an inch closer, leaning her forearm against the table.
“Did you go to practice?”
“No.”
“You shouldn't miss it on my account.”
“I didn't miss it on your account. I missed it because I couldn't look at a playbook screen today.”
She gave a slight tilt of her head. In any other week, she would have asked about our upcoming match, how my ribs felt, what the coach had said. Now her gaze settled on the curve of the mug’s handle.
“The doctor called,” she said. “She wants me to come in Thursday for a follow-up to make sure everything resolved.”
“Do you want me to come with you?”
“I don't know.”
The answer should have made me step back. Instead, I treated it like a door I had to prop open.
“I can drive. Priya can come too if you’d rather have a woman there. I can clear it with my coach and—”
Kate held up a hand.
“Don't talk like you’re drawing up a play sheet or whatever it’s called.”
I stared down at the knife. The tip touched a wet ring of onion on the wood.
Kate drew the blanket tighter across her chest.
“And my mother?”
“Linda would come if you asked her.”
“I’m not asking her.”
Kate stood up. The blanket slipped to the floor, and she made no move to pick it up.
“I’m going to lie down.”
“Kate.”
She didn't turn around.
The bedroom door shut. I knelt to pick up the blanket and took far too long folding it.
* * *
The forty-hour mark hit at 3:27 Tuesday morning. I knew because I’d jotted it down again, this time on a folded scrap of paper in my hoodie pocket. The living room lamp was still on. I’d fallen asleep with an arm thrown over my eyes, running shoes still on my feet.
The sound of the bedroom door woke me.
Kate was dressed in black slacks, a cream-colored blouse, her hair pulled back in a neat low bun that did nothing to hide the dark shadows under her eyes. Her bag was over one shoulder, her watch clasped tight around her wrist. Her phone screen cast a blue glow across her knuckles.
I sat up too fast.
“Where are you going?”
“To work.”
I glanced at the digital stove clock. 3:31.
“Kate.”
“The board meeting starts at eight. I want to be in before anyone else arrives.”
“You don't have to go in.”
“Yes, I do.”
I stood up. The sofa fabric had left a crease across my T-shirt. On the table sat three glass meal containers, a pharmacy bag, and the sheet of therapist names peeking out from under the fruit bowl. Everything I’d done while she was asleep filled her kitchen like a low-budget invasion.
“Yesterday you said you couldn't go back Monday.”
“It’s not Monday.”
“It’s been forty hours.”
Kate’s eyes dropped to the slip of paper sticking out of my pocket. Her expression barely shifted. That was worse than if she’d screamed.
“Are you counting them?”
“Not like that.”
“You just quoted the exact number.”
“Because I’m worried.”
“You’re not my supervisor.”
The line made my fists clench at my sides. Not in anger at her. At myself.
“No. But you’re not okay.”
“And what does being okay mean to you? Eating soup on a schedule? Picking a therapist from your list? Waiting for my mother to show up at my apartment with a suitcase?”
“I didn't say she should come.”
“You floated it.”
Through the floor, the neighbor below coughed. Kate drew a breath through her nose, looking down. For a second, I thought she might sit down. Instead, she adjusted her bag strap over her shoulder.
“I need to get out of here.”
“Do you want me to drive you?”
“No.”
“Did you call a car?”
“Yes.”
Her phone buzzed. Kate checked the screen and turned the door latch before I could speak.
“I’m not answering emails for you,” I said, louder than I intended. “I’m not calling your boss. But I can’t pretend this is just another Tuesday morning.”