Chapter 35 Bastiaan
Bastiaan
The night is cold and still, but my mind refuses to rest.
The cabin should be quiet enough to settle me—Amber’s soft breathing, the faint hiss of wind through the trees, the occasional creak of the wood.
It should make me feel safe.
Instead, the silence just makes the dark inside my head louder.
Sleep takes me eventually, but not gently. It comes quick, like being pulled under without warning.
I’m back in that hospital room.
It’s bright, too bright, but warm in a way that almost feels safe.
Marieke is propped up in bed, her hair pulled back, cheeks flushed from the contractions.
She’s tired, but she smiles at me between the waves of pain.
We talk between the checks, between the nurses coming in and out.
We’ve been here for hours, and everything’s fine.
Until it isn’t.
The first alarm is a sharp, high-pitched tone from the monitor by the bed. I see the numbers drop before anyone says anything. Then the nurse is there, frowning at the screen. Another alarm joins the first.
“Fetal heart rate’s too low.”
“Get the doctor in here now.”
The room changes instantly—nurses moving faster, one adjusting the monitor belt around her stomach, another calling down the corridor for NICU.
“Bas, step back, please,” someone says, already lowering the bed, checking lines, scanning the readouts.
I hear the words oxygen dropping. And then I know.
It’s Abel.
The machines scream faster. A doctor comes in, barking orders. Hands are everywhere—adjusting wires, pressing on her stomach, readying equipment I’ve never seen before.
Then someone shoves a set of scrubs into my hands. “Put these on. We’re moving now.”
Marieke’s eyes find mine for a split second. There’s fear there, but also something steady—like she’s telling me it’ll be okay.
The doors swing open, and they rush her out, the bed rattling over the floor. I follow, scrubs bunched in my fist, but the corridor blurs—people in blue and green, the squeal of wheels, clipped voices, the shrill beeping that doesn’t stop.
And then—
Nothing.
The next thing I know, I’m on the floor in another hospital room. My back is against the wall. My parents are there—my mama’s face streaked with tears, my pa’s hand heavy on my shoulder. I’m staring at the space in front of me like maybe, if I don’t move, the world will rewind.
It doesn’t.
She’s gone.
Marieke is gone.
And Abel… Abel is alive. But not because I was there when it mattered. Not because I did anything, but because someone else pulled him out in time.
The guilt presses in until it’s hard to breathe.
I wake with a sharp inhale, my chest tight, my skin damp with sweat. The shadows in the cabin feel heavy, the air too still. My fists are tangled in the blanket, knuckles aching.
Beside me, Amber sleeps curled toward me, her hair spilling across the pillow. One shoulder is bare where the blanket’s slipped, her breathing soft and steady.
I want to reach for her. I want to pull her in and hold her until the ghosts lose their grip. But my hand hovers and falls.
Because I’ve learned what happens when you hold something too close. You lose it.
The guilt sits like a stone on my chest. The fear cuts sharper—not just of losing her, but of what I’d become if it happened.
I lie there until dawn starts to bleed through the blinds. The images won’t fade. The missing pieces in my memory feel heavier than the ones I can recall.
Amber stirs, stretching under the covers. When she blinks at me and smiles, it’s small, sleepy, unguarded.
“Bas,” she murmurs, “did you sleep well?” She reaches for my hand like it’s the most natural thing in the world.
I pull back before she can take it. Gentle, but deliberate. “I need some air.”
Her smile falters for half a second, but she just nods. “Okay.”
Outside, the cold cuts through me, sharp and clean. The lake is black and still, the pines at its edge standing like sentries.
I hear her boots crunch over frost before I see her. She steps up beside me, close enough that I feel her warmth.
“Talk to me,” she says quietly.
I keep my eyes on the water. “I dreamed of Marieke again. The night Abel was born. Everything was fine, and then the alarms started—they said his oxygen was dangerously low. They rushed her out, shoved scrubs at me… and then the next thing I remember, I was sitting on the floor with my parents. Knowing she was gone.”
Her hand brushes my arm. “You’re not alone.”
My throat closes. “I’m terrified, Amber. Terrified that loving me will only break you. Terrified I’ll lose you the way I’ve already lost too much. I don’t know how to set that fear down.”
She looks at me with that same fierce determination Marieke once had. “Then don’t. Not yet. Let me carry it with you.”
For a moment, I almost believe her. I want to.
But the shadow inside me doesn’t move.
And I know this fight isn’t over.