บททั้งหมดของ The Replacement Wife : บทที่ 31 - บทที่ 40

CHAPTER 32: RECOVERYDominic complains about hospital food, which the doctors say is a good sign. He's getting his strength back along with his opinions.The first three days he was on a ventilator and I didn't leave the hospital. I slept in the chair beside his bed, which is not designed for sleeping, and I ate whatever Mrs. Chen sent with Victor, which I don't remember tasting. I watched the machines breathe for him and I made deals with whatever was listening: take anything else, take the job, take the house, the money, the company. Just let him keep breathing.On the fourth day they took the ventilator out.He said my name before he said anything else, which the nurse told me later was a good sign neurologically and which I already knew was a good sign in every other way.By the end of the first week he was sitting up and asking questions about the board meeting he'd missed. By the beginning of the second week he was taking slow laps of the ICU corridor with a nurse on one

CHAPTER 34: SIX MONTHS FORWARDAt six months pregnant, I've finally stopped fitting into my desk chair comfortably, which means it's time to embrace working from home.The baby moves at the worst possible times. During board calls, during focused reading, in the middle of the night when I've finally found a position that doesn't put pressure on my lower back. I've learned to work around it, or rather to work with it, pausing mid-sentence when a particularly enthusiastic kick lands, waiting for it to settle, carrying on.Dominic says I shouldn't be working so much.I say I'm pregnant, not dying.We have this argument approximately four times a week. It is, functionally, a love language at this point.The morning sickness lasted four months, which was two months longer than I'd been told to expect, and during that period I developed a very detailed personal ranking of which rooms in the estate were closest to bathrooms. I know things now that I didn't know before about my own ca

CHAPTER 36: BIRTHLabor is nothing like the movies. It's longer, messier, and Dominic looks greener than I feel.We arrive at the hospital at eleven in the morning and by two in the afternoon I understand that all those books I read during the pregnancy were helpful and also completely inadequate preparation for what a contraction at four centimeters actually feels like from the inside.The nurses are efficient and kind in equal measure. The room is set up quickly, monitors attached, IV placed with minimal fuss. Dr. Martinez comes in at half past two, glances at the readouts, and says with the easy confidence of someone who has done this several thousand times: "Let's have a baby."Dominic does not leave my side. He stands at my left shoulder through every check, every adjustment, every contraction that tightens across my abdomen and back simultaneously in a way that no description I'd read had fully conveyed. He holds my hand when I need it and steps back when the nurse

CHAPTER 38: ISABELLE'S CLAIMIsabelle Whitmore stands on our doorstep at 2 AM with a baby and a story I already don't believe.Dominic opens the door. I'm two steps behind him, Helena asleep upstairs, the house quiet in the way it only is between the one and four feeds when both of us can briefly be unconscious at the same time.Isabelle looks nothing like the last time I saw her. The polished armor she wore to this house before is gone. Her hair is loose and not deliberately loose, her mascara has traveled south, and there's a milk stain on the shoulder of her coat that she either hasn't noticed or has stopped caring about. The baby on her hip is maybe six months old, round-faced and drowsy, wearing a onesie with a small yellow duck on the front."I need help," she says.Dominic's voice is flat and winter-cold. "You need to leave.""Please." Her voice cracks at the edge of the word. "Just listen. Five minutes."I put my hand on Dominic's arm, not stopping him, just paus

CHAPTER 40: FULL CIRCLEFive years ago, I walked down an aisle pretending to be someone else. Today, I finally know exactly who I am.The morning starts the way mornings start now: loud, warm, and slightly chaotic before seven.Daniel and Henry are three years old and have formed a coalition against furniture. They operate as a unit with separate roles: Henry identifies the target and Daniel executes. This morning's target is a couch cushion that has been removed from the sofa and is being used as a sled across the hallway floor. Dominic is on his knees at the bottom of the hallway acting as a human bumper, in yesterday's suit trousers and his good shirt, which he was supposed to have left for already.Helena, almost six and fully aware of her superior developmental status, is eating cereal at the kitchen table and watching her brothers with the expression of someone who finds them both beneath her and completely entertaining."Dad's going to be late," she says."Dad is ma