Katie watched as Jackson’s fingers carefully opened the small white buttons of her blouse. The master bedroom in their new house felt like an oversized t-shirt around her, ill-fitting, empty and bleached white.
She could remember being in love with him once. She could remember the way it felt to wake up beside him, to press her face against his wool winter coat, to let him hail a taxi for her.
“I love you, Katie. I always will. No matter what.”
Even the bed beneath her back was white. Blank. Her husband touched her too gently, as if her skin was made of a thin glass and inside he could see all the working parts of her, ready to break open and spill onto the sheets beneath him.
He kissed her as he filled her up, but nothing could distract her from the emptiness within. She was barren. White walls. Empty walls. Empty womb.
Maybe Estuardo Gonzales was to blame. All of Katie’s friends in high school had been afraid of him, but she liked the way he watched her as he cruised the locker-lined hallways. When she practiced her cheerleading, she could see him across the quad smoking his cigarettes behind D-Hall.
She lost her virginity to him in the library. During detention, he had stolen the key from the librarian’s desk, and then taken her there at night. He brought a blanket to spread on the hard woven carpet between the bookshelves. She knew how she was supposed to act, how she was supposed to feel, but her eyes kept sliding over the book titles on each side of his naked body. H. Catch 22, A Moveable Feast, The Old Man and the Sea.
When she realized she was pregnant, she went to Este for help.
They arranged to meet that weekend at the bus stop.
“Don’t worry baby, we’re just gonna have some fun.”
In the hard plastic double seat of the bus, he draped his arm over her shoulder, and when no one was looking, he kissed her hair just above her temple.
The amusement park was empty because of the rain, but the roller coasters were still running. She had never paid much attention to the safety warnings before. Down at the bottom she noticed for the first time: Expectant mothers should not ride.
Este just squeezed her hand in reassurance. They sat in the very first car, and rode the same coaster over and over. During the first ride Este roared with pleasure, releasing Katie’s hand and letting his arms flail in the air fearlessly, while Katie clutched the lap bar tightly. Even then she knew that this was not how it was supposed to be.
After the tenth ride, Katie went to the bathroom to check whether she had gotten her period, while Este waited outside. She vomited instead. In the dirty mirror over the sink she watched herself as she splashed water on her bloodless cheeks. She wanted to go home. This was wrong. It felt wrong. Why couldn’t she just say it to him?
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