Mag-log inEVE Saturday afternoon came too fast. I’d spent the morning trying to tidy the penthouse even though the doctor had ordered strict bed rest. Damon helped, moving slow, straightening pillows and clearing the pill bottles off the coffee table. We kept circling each other like polite strangers. “You should be resting,” he said when he caught me organizing the kitchen. “So should you.” “I’m fine.” “You had brain surgery a week ago. You’re not fine.” “Neither are you. The doctor said bed rest, Eve. That means in bed.” “I can’t just lie there while your parents are coming over. The place needs to look decent...” “My parents don’t care what the place looks like. They’re here to check on us, not do a home inspection.” He took the dish towel from my hands and steered me toward the couch. “Sit. I’ll finish.” “Damon...” “Please. Let me help. It’s one of the few things I can actually do right now.” I sat down. He was right. I was supposed to be resting, keeping stress low, taking ca
EVE'S POV I lay in the guest bedroom staring at the ceiling, listening to Damon moving around in the master bedroom. The penthouse was quiet except for the fridge humming and the faint city noise outside. Inside my head, though? Total chaos. I’d just told him we were separated. I watched his face as he tried to wrap his head around it...his pregnant wife sleeping in the guest room, us under the same roof but not really together. I’d lied. Not completely. We had been separated. That part was true. But I left out the divorce, Sophia, the stairs, everything that actually mattered. The doctor said big stress could mess up his recovery, and I was too scared to drop the whole truth on him right now anyway. My phone buzzed. Jessica. Jessica: How are you? Settled in? Me: Yeah. We’re both home. Both resting. Jessica: And? How’s it going? Me: Weird as hell. He knows we were separated but not about the divorce. Jessica: Did you tell him anything else? Me: No. Just that we had problems
DAMONThey discharged me on Friday afternoon.14 days after waking up from the coma.Days after finding out I was going to be a father.Dr. Patel went through the discharge instructions one more time while a nurse helped me get dressed in clothes Marcus had brought from the penthouse.“No strenuous activity for at least six weeks. No driving until I clear you. Someone needs to be with you at all times for the first two weeks in case of complications.”“Eve will be there,” I said.“Mrs. Sterling is also on strict bed rest. She’s not in a position to be your primary caregiver. You’ll need additional help.”“We’ll figure it out.”Dr. Patel looked like he wanted to argue but just sighed. “Fine. But I want you both back here next week for follow-up appointments. And if you experience any dizziness, confusion, severe headaches, or memory issues, you call immediately.”“Got it.”Marcus appeared in the doorway. “The car’s downstairs. Driver’s waiting.”“Is Eve...”“She’s already down there.
EVEI woke up alone in the hospital room with sunlight coming through the windows.For a second I forgot where I was. Then everything came back at once.Fainting in Damon’s room, the doctors talking about the baby, Damon finding out. The look on his face when they told him.Pure joy.Like the baby fixed every problem we had, like we were still the couple we used to be.I put my hand on my stomach. The bump was obvious now. Halfway. And Damon knew. He knew and he was thrilled. He thought we would raise this baby together. Thought we would be a family again.Because he didn’t remember any of the bad stuff.He didn’t remember the fights, the mistrust, the way everything between us had fallen apart before the accident. He only remembered the good times. The version of us when things were simple.The door opened. A nurse came in with a breakfast tray.“Good morning, Mrs. Sterling. How are you feeling?”“Tired. Confused. Scared.”She gave me a kind smile. “That’s normal after everything yo
“She's stable,” Dr. Patel said quickly. “She’s resting in the next room. We ran some quick tests...blood work, ultrasound. She’s going to be fine, Mr. Sterling. But there’s something you need to know.” Dr. Ramirez stepped forward. She had kind eyes and a calm voice that somehow made the room feel less like it was spinning. “Your wife is in her second trimester. About twenty weeks along. The dizziness and fainting episode were caused by a combination of low blood pressure, dehydration, and elevated stress levels. The pregnancy is viable and progressing normally, but stress is not good for either of them right now. We’ve given her fluids and something mild to help with the nausea she’s been hiding. She needs rest. Minimal emotional strain. Bed rest for the next forty-eight hours at least, and then very limited activity.” The words hit me like a second car accident...only this one didn’t hurt. It lit me up from the inside out. Pregnant. Eve was pregnant. Twenty weeks. Second trimes
DAMON The hospital room was starting to feel less like a cage and more like a strange kind of home. Six days in now, and the machines had become background noise instead of a constant alarm in my skull. The headache was still there, a low throb behind my eyes, but the fragments of memory weren’t quite as jagged. I could hold onto the good ones longer: Eve’s laugh in the kitchen at the penthouse, her fingers tracing lazy circles on my chest during lazy Sunday mornings, the way she’d looked at me when I slipped the ring on her finger in the park. The darker pieces...arguments I couldn’t quite place, my mother’s tight mouth whenever Eve’s name came up, Marcus warning me about something I couldn’t remember still floated just out of reach. I didn’t push them. Not today. Today I was winning at small victories, and that felt like enough.I was sitting up in bed, the adjustable frame cranked high enough that I could almost pretend I wasn’t wearing a hospital gown. Eve had brought me another
I didn't sleep.Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Catherine's face. Heard her voice. Common. Middling. Not our kind of people.Around three AM, I gave up and went to the kitchen.Damon found me twenty minutes later, sitting in the dark eating cereal."Can't sleep?"I shook my head.He sat down acr
The kiss ended and we just stood there breathing hard, foreheads pressed together. "Fuck," Damon muttered. That one word snapped me back to reality. What the hell were we doing? I pulled back. Put space between us. My lips were still tingling and my heart was doing this crazy racing thing but
I was in the middle of a design project Monday afternoon when Jessica appeared at my desk with that look on her face.The "we need to talk right now" look."Lunch," she said. Not a question. A command."I'm kind of busy—""Now, Eve."I saved my file and grabbed my bag.We ended up at the Thai place
Three days.It had been three days of this new arrangement and I was losing my mind.Not in a bad way. In a "I can't stop thinking about him" way. In a "every time he looks at me I remember exactly what he looks like naked" way.We'd fallen into this routine. Work during the day. Pretend to be norm







