Chapter 2 - The Empty Doorway and the Phone
The sound of the engine faded before the pain did.
I stayed bent over the kitchen counter with my forehead almost touching the Formica, breathing through my nose while the contraction peaked. The daylight coming through the open front door was too bright. It laid a hard blue-edged rectangle across the entryway tile and made everything else in the kitchen look dim by comparison.
When it eased, I pushed myself upright. My hands were shaking. On the counter, right next to my elbow, were Blake's car keys and my phone.
He'd left the keys. I stared at them for a second without understanding it. Small dark keys on the pale counter. He'd been holding them when I told him the contractions were six minutes apart. He'd said he'd be back fast. And then he'd walked out with his mother and left the keys behind.
I picked up the phone first. The case was dark and warm from the sun through the window. Then I picked up the keys. They were heavier than they looked. I closed my fist around them and felt the teeth press into my palm.
"Okay," I whispered to nobody. "Okay."
My sweater had ridden up in front. I pulled the light blue knit back down over my belly. My hair had come loose at the sides where I'd tied it back that morning. I tucked it behind my ears with the hand holding the phone and left a damp streak on my cheek.
The next contraction started as a tightening low in my back. I looked at the microwave clock: 10:42. I'd been timing since breakfast on the notepad by the sink. Six minutes apart, then five and a half. The doctor had said don't delay once they held steady. I put one hand flat on the counter and counted through it, breathing in for four, out for six, the way the class instructor had taught us at the community center.
It lasted longer this time. I knew it before I checked. Forty-five seconds, maybe fifty. When I could stand straight again, the clock said 10:47. Five minutes. Not six.
My stomach dropped. I walked to the entryway, one hand braced under my belly, the keys jingling with every step.
Our gray and navy duffel was still on the floor by the front door where Blake had set it last night. Packed. Zipper closed. Hospital paperwork in the side pocket, going-home outfit folded on top. It looked ready and stupid sitting there while the blue door stood wide open to the driveway.
I stepped into the doorway and looked out.
The driveway was empty. The concrete where his sedan had been that morning was just pale concrete with a dark oil spot in the middle. Across the street, Mrs. Henderson's sprinklers ticked. Down the block, a school bus hissed at a stop sign. No car pulling back in. No Blake jogging back up the sidewalk saying he forgot his keys.
He didn't just leave me. He left without a way to get back fast.
I came back inside and shut nothing, locked nothing. I couldn't bring myself to close the blue door in case he did come back and I missed the sound. I stood beside the duffel with the phone in one hand and the useless keys in the other, and listened to the house. Refrigerator humming. Clock ticking. My own breath, too fast.
I set the keys back down on the entryway table so I wouldn't lose them. Then I looked down at the dark screen of my phone.
My thumb hovered over it. Mom was forty minutes away on the highway. My sister was at work at the diner with her phone in the back. The doctor's office number was taped to the fridge. 911 was right there.
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Calling felt like admitting he really wasn't coming. Not calling felt worse.
Another tightening started deep and low, and I gripped the doorframe and stared at my own reflection ghosted in the phone screen — reddish hair pulled back, face pale, mouth pressed tight — and tried to decide who to trust with the next ten minutes.
