CHAPTER 148: The Hard Part

POV: Selene Castellano

It started on a Tuesday.

She was at her desk in the foundation office, reading Grace Kim’s latest update on the land trust formation, when she felt something.

Wrong.

The wrongness of a body communicating something the mind hadn’t caught up with yet.

She sat very still for a moment then she called Dr. Okafor.

Dr. Okafor’s voice was calm on the phone. The professional calm of someone who had learned that panic transferred and was therefore never useful.

“Come in now,” she said. “Don’t drive yourself.”

Selene called Avalon.

He answered on the first ring.

“I need you to come to the foundation office,” she said. “Now. Don’t panic. Just come.”

“I’m leaving now,” he said. 

She sat at her desk waiting and didn’t tell Amara what was happening because she didn’t know what was happening.

Amara looked at her once across the office.

Said nothing.

But she didn’t leave either.

Avalon was there in eleven minutes.

He walked in, looked at her face, and said: “Let’s go.”

Dr. Okafor’s office was quiet when they arrived.

She examined Selene thoroughly with focused attention of someone looking for something and not finding it or finding it and not saying.

Avalon sat in the chair in the corner.

Dr. Okafor did an ultrasound.

Selene looked at the screen before she meant to.

The heartbeat was there.

Rapid and certain.

She exhaled.

“Subchorionic hematoma,” Dr. Okafor said. “A small bleed. It’s not uncommon and in most cases it resolves on its own. The baby is fine and the heartbeat is strong.”

“Most cases,” Avalon said from the corner.

“Most cases,” Dr. Okafor confirmed. “I want to monitor it closely. I want you to reduce activity significantly for the next two weeks. Not bed rest. Just slow down.”

“Define slow down,” Selene said.

“Half days at the foundation. No long meetings on your feet. Rest when your body says rest instead of pushing through it.” Dr. Okafor looked at her directly. “This is manageable but it requires you to actually manage it.”

Selene looked at the screen.

“Okay,” she said.

In the car afterward Avalon drove and didn’t speak.

She didn’t either.

Somewhere on Market Street she said: “I’m scared.”

“I know,” he said.

“Are you scared?”

“Yes, since you called.” He said

“You didn’t show it.”

“You didn’t need me to show it,” he said. “You needed me to be there.”

She looked at him.

“Thank you for  coming without asking questions.” She said

“Always,” he replied.

She told Amara when she got back.

Not the details. Just: there’s a complication, it’s being monitored, I need to slow down for two weeks.

Amara said: “Okay. What does that look like practically.”

Not are you okay. Not what happened. Just the practical question, which was exactly right, because the practical question gave Selene something to answer instead of something to feel.

“Half days,” Selene said. “I’ll do mornings. You and James handle afternoons.”

“Done,” Amara said.

“The land trust timeline—”

“I’ll manage it,” Amara said. “Go home at noon. Every day. Without guilt.”

Selene looked at her.

“The foundation doesn’t fall apart without you for two weeks,” Amara said. “I built it to not fall apart.”

“You built it with me.”

“I built the structure,” Amara said. “You’re not the structure. You’re the reason for the structure. Different thing.” She turned back to her screen. “Go home at noon tomorrow. Today you can stay until three.”

She told Maya that evening.

Maya was quiet for longer than usual.

Then: “What do you need?”

“Nothing right now,” Selene said. “Dr. Okafor says it’s manageable.”

“I know what she says,” Maya said. “What do you need?”

Selene thought about it.

“Come over tomorrow,” she said. “Just be there. You don’t have to do anything.”

“I can do that,” Maya said.

That night she lay awake.

Just awake with the specific alertness of someone who had been reminded that hope required courage and courage was exhausting.

Avalon was awake too.

She knew because his breathing wasn’t the sleep breathing.

“Say something,” she said into the dark.

“The heartbeat was strong,” he said.

“Yes.”

“Dr. Okafor wasn’t worried.”

“She was measured,” Selene said. “There’s a difference.”

“She wasn’t worried,” he said again. “I watched her face the whole time. She was focused but not worried.”

Selene absorbed that.

“You were watching her face,” she said.

“Someone had to,” he said. “You were watching the screen.”

She turned toward him in the dark.

“We’re going to be okay,” he said. “The three of us.”

“You don’t know that.”

“No,” he said. “But I’m choosing it. Every day I’m choosing to believe it until something tells me I can’t.”

She looked at him in the dark.

“That’s terrifying,” she said.

“Hope usually is,” he said.

She put her hand on his chest.

Felt his heartbeat, then closed her eyes.