All Your Perfects
Page 36
“Based on all the scientific evidence that proves how insignificant we are, it was always hard for me to believe in God. The more appropriate question would have been, ‘Could a God believe in me?’ Because a lot has happened on this earth in four and a half billion years to think that a God would give a shit about me or my problems. But, I recently concluded that there’s no other explanation for how you and I could end up on the same planet, in the same species, in the same century, in the same country, in the same state, in the same town, in the same hallway, in front of the same door for the same reason at the exact same time. If God didn’t believe in me, then I’d have to believe you were just a coincidence. And you being a coincidence in my life is a lot harder for me to fathom than the mere existence of a higher power.”
Oh.
Wow. I’m breathless.
Graham has said so many sweet things to me, but this wasn’t sweet. This was pure poetry. This was beyond an expression of his intelligence, because I know he’s incredibly smart. This was sacrificial. He gave me purpose. He made me incredibly relevant—crucial—to him, when I’ve never felt relevant, vital, or crucial to anyone else before. “I love you so much, Graham Wells.” It’s all I can say because I can’t compete with what he just said. I don’t even try.
“Do you love me enough to marry me?”
I lift off his arm and sit up straight, still facing him.
Did he seriously just ask me that?
It was so spontaneous. He probably hasn’t even thought it through. He’s still smiling but in a few seconds I think he’s probably going to laugh because he accidentally blurted it out without even thinking. He doesn’t even have a ring, which proves it was an accident.
“Graham . . .”
He slips his hand under the blanket. When he pulls his hand back out, he’s holding a ring. No box, no gift wrap, no pretenses. It’s just a ring. A ring he’s been carrying in his pocket for a moment he obviously did think through.
I bring my hands up to my mouth. They’re shaking because I wasn’t expecting this and I’m speechless and I’m scared I won’t be able to answer him out loud because everything is caught in my throat but I somehow still whisper the words, “Oh my God.”
Graham pulls my left hand from my mouth and he holds the ring near my ring finger, but he doesn’t attempt to slip it on. Instead, he dips his head to bring my focus back to him. When our eyes meet, he’s looking at me with all the clarity and hope in the world. “Be my wife, Quinn. Weather the Category 5 moments with me.”
I’m nodding before he’s even finished speaking. I’m nodding, because if I try to say yes, I’ll start crying. I can’t even believe he somehow made this perfect weekend even better.
As soon as I start nodding, he laughs with a heavy sigh of relief. And when he slips the ring on my finger, he bites his lip because he doesn’t want me to see that he’s getting choked up, too. “I didn’t know what ring to get you,” he says, looking back up at me. “But when the jeweler told me that the wedding ring symbolizes an endless loop without a beginning, middle, or end, I didn’t want to break up that endless loop with diamonds. I hope you like it.”
The ring is a delicate, thin gold band with no stones. It’s not a reflection of how much money Graham has or doesn’t have. It’s a reflection of how long he believes our love will last. An eternity.
“It’s perfect, Graham.”
Chapter Twenty-four
* * *
Now
“. . . cervical ectopic pregnancy,” she says. “Very rare. In fact, the chances of a woman experiencing this type of ectopic pregnancy are less than one percent.”
Graham squeezes my hand. I lay back in the hospital bed, wanting nothing more than for the doctor to leave the room so I can go back to sleep. The medicine has me so drowsy, it’s hard to pay attention to everything she’s saying. I know I don’t have to though, because Graham is focused on every word that comes out of her mouth. “Bed rest for two weeks,” is the last thing I hear her say before I close my eyes. I know Graham is the one who loves math, but I feel like I’m going to be obsessing over that less than one percent. The chances of me getting pregnant after so many years of trying were greater than the chances of a pregnancy resulting in a cervical ectopic abruption.
“What was the cause?” Graham asks.
“More than likely the endometriosis,” she replies. She goes into a little more detail, but I tune her out. I tilt my head toward Graham and open my eyes. He’s staring at the doctor, listening to her response. But I can see the worry in him. His right hand is covering his mouth, his left hand still has a grip on mine.
“Could . . .” He glances down at me and there is so much worry in his eyes. “Could stress have caused the miscarriage?”
“Miscarriage was inevitable with this type of pregnancy,” she says. “Nothing could have been done to prolong it. It ruptured because ectopic pregnancies aren’t viable.”
My miscarriage happened nineteen hours ago. It isn’t until this moment that I realize Graham has spent the last nineteen hours thinking he was somehow responsible. He’s been afraid that the stress from our fight led to this.
After the doctor leaves the room, I brush my thumb across his hand. It’s a small gesture, and one that is very hard to make due to the amount of anger I still hold, but one he notices immediately. “You have a lot to feel guilty for, but my miscarriage is not one of them.”
Graham stares at me a moment with vacant eyes and a broken soul. Then he releases my hand and walks out of the room. He doesn’t come back for half an hour, but it looks like he’s been crying.
He’s cried a few times during our marriage. I’ve never actually seen him cry until yesterday, but I’ve seen him in the aftermath.
Graham spends the next few hours making sure I’m comfortable. My mother comes to visit, but I pretend to be asleep. Ava calls, but I tell Graham to tell her I’m asleep. I spend most of the day and night trying not to think about everything that’s happening, but every time I close my eyes I find myself wishing I would have just known. Even if the pregnancy would have ended the same way, I’m angry with myself for not paying more attention to my body so I could have enjoyed it while it lasted. If I had paid more attention, I would have suspected I was pregnant. I would have taken a test. It would have been positive. And then, just once, Graham and I would have known what it felt like to be parents. Even if it would have been a fleeting feeling.
It’s a little morbid that I would go through this entire thing again if I could have just known I was pregnant for one single day. After so many years of trying, it seems cruel that our payoff was a miscarriage followed by a hysterectomy without the cushion of feeling like parents, if even for a moment.
The entire ordeal has been unfair and painful. More so than my recovery will be. Because of the rupture and the hemorrhaging, the doctors had to perform an emergency abdominal hysterectomy, rather than a vaginal one. Which means a longer recovery time. I’ll likely be in the hospital another day or two before I’ll be discharged. Then I’ll be confined to our bed for two weeks.
Everything feels so unfinished between us. We hadn’t resolved anything before the miscarriage and now it just feels like the decision we were about to make has been put on hold. Because I’m in no place to discuss the future of our marriage right now. It’ll probably be weeks before things are back to normal.
As normal as things can get without a uterus.
“You can’t sleep?” Graham asks. He hasn’t left the hospital all day. He only left the room earlier for half an hour, but then he returned and has been alternating between the couch and the chair next to my bed. Right now he’s in the chair, seated on the edge of it, waiting for me to speak. He looks exhausted, but I know Graham and he isn’t going anywhere until I do. “Do you want something to drink?”
I shake my head. “I’m not thirsty.” The only light on in the room is the one behind my bed and it makes it look like Graham is in a spotlight on a lonely stage.
His need to console me is warring with his awareness of the tension that’s been between us for so long. But he fights the tension and reaches for the rail. “Do you mind if I lay with you?” He already has the rail down and is crawling into the bed with me when I shake my head. He’s careful to turn me so that my IV doesn’t pull. He fits himself into less than half the bed next to me and slips a hand under my head, sacrificing his comfort for mine. He kisses me on the back of my head. Part of me wasn’t sure I wanted him in the bed with me, but I soon realize that falling asleep in our shared sadness is somehow more comforting than falling asleep alone.
Oh.
Wow. I’m breathless.
Graham has said so many sweet things to me, but this wasn’t sweet. This was pure poetry. This was beyond an expression of his intelligence, because I know he’s incredibly smart. This was sacrificial. He gave me purpose. He made me incredibly relevant—crucial—to him, when I’ve never felt relevant, vital, or crucial to anyone else before. “I love you so much, Graham Wells.” It’s all I can say because I can’t compete with what he just said. I don’t even try.
“Do you love me enough to marry me?”
I lift off his arm and sit up straight, still facing him.
Did he seriously just ask me that?
It was so spontaneous. He probably hasn’t even thought it through. He’s still smiling but in a few seconds I think he’s probably going to laugh because he accidentally blurted it out without even thinking. He doesn’t even have a ring, which proves it was an accident.
“Graham . . .”
He slips his hand under the blanket. When he pulls his hand back out, he’s holding a ring. No box, no gift wrap, no pretenses. It’s just a ring. A ring he’s been carrying in his pocket for a moment he obviously did think through.
I bring my hands up to my mouth. They’re shaking because I wasn’t expecting this and I’m speechless and I’m scared I won’t be able to answer him out loud because everything is caught in my throat but I somehow still whisper the words, “Oh my God.”
Graham pulls my left hand from my mouth and he holds the ring near my ring finger, but he doesn’t attempt to slip it on. Instead, he dips his head to bring my focus back to him. When our eyes meet, he’s looking at me with all the clarity and hope in the world. “Be my wife, Quinn. Weather the Category 5 moments with me.”
I’m nodding before he’s even finished speaking. I’m nodding, because if I try to say yes, I’ll start crying. I can’t even believe he somehow made this perfect weekend even better.
As soon as I start nodding, he laughs with a heavy sigh of relief. And when he slips the ring on my finger, he bites his lip because he doesn’t want me to see that he’s getting choked up, too. “I didn’t know what ring to get you,” he says, looking back up at me. “But when the jeweler told me that the wedding ring symbolizes an endless loop without a beginning, middle, or end, I didn’t want to break up that endless loop with diamonds. I hope you like it.”
The ring is a delicate, thin gold band with no stones. It’s not a reflection of how much money Graham has or doesn’t have. It’s a reflection of how long he believes our love will last. An eternity.
“It’s perfect, Graham.”
Chapter Twenty-four
* * *
Now
“. . . cervical ectopic pregnancy,” she says. “Very rare. In fact, the chances of a woman experiencing this type of ectopic pregnancy are less than one percent.”
Graham squeezes my hand. I lay back in the hospital bed, wanting nothing more than for the doctor to leave the room so I can go back to sleep. The medicine has me so drowsy, it’s hard to pay attention to everything she’s saying. I know I don’t have to though, because Graham is focused on every word that comes out of her mouth. “Bed rest for two weeks,” is the last thing I hear her say before I close my eyes. I know Graham is the one who loves math, but I feel like I’m going to be obsessing over that less than one percent. The chances of me getting pregnant after so many years of trying were greater than the chances of a pregnancy resulting in a cervical ectopic abruption.
“What was the cause?” Graham asks.
“More than likely the endometriosis,” she replies. She goes into a little more detail, but I tune her out. I tilt my head toward Graham and open my eyes. He’s staring at the doctor, listening to her response. But I can see the worry in him. His right hand is covering his mouth, his left hand still has a grip on mine.
“Could . . .” He glances down at me and there is so much worry in his eyes. “Could stress have caused the miscarriage?”
“Miscarriage was inevitable with this type of pregnancy,” she says. “Nothing could have been done to prolong it. It ruptured because ectopic pregnancies aren’t viable.”
My miscarriage happened nineteen hours ago. It isn’t until this moment that I realize Graham has spent the last nineteen hours thinking he was somehow responsible. He’s been afraid that the stress from our fight led to this.
After the doctor leaves the room, I brush my thumb across his hand. It’s a small gesture, and one that is very hard to make due to the amount of anger I still hold, but one he notices immediately. “You have a lot to feel guilty for, but my miscarriage is not one of them.”
Graham stares at me a moment with vacant eyes and a broken soul. Then he releases my hand and walks out of the room. He doesn’t come back for half an hour, but it looks like he’s been crying.
He’s cried a few times during our marriage. I’ve never actually seen him cry until yesterday, but I’ve seen him in the aftermath.
Graham spends the next few hours making sure I’m comfortable. My mother comes to visit, but I pretend to be asleep. Ava calls, but I tell Graham to tell her I’m asleep. I spend most of the day and night trying not to think about everything that’s happening, but every time I close my eyes I find myself wishing I would have just known. Even if the pregnancy would have ended the same way, I’m angry with myself for not paying more attention to my body so I could have enjoyed it while it lasted. If I had paid more attention, I would have suspected I was pregnant. I would have taken a test. It would have been positive. And then, just once, Graham and I would have known what it felt like to be parents. Even if it would have been a fleeting feeling.
It’s a little morbid that I would go through this entire thing again if I could have just known I was pregnant for one single day. After so many years of trying, it seems cruel that our payoff was a miscarriage followed by a hysterectomy without the cushion of feeling like parents, if even for a moment.
The entire ordeal has been unfair and painful. More so than my recovery will be. Because of the rupture and the hemorrhaging, the doctors had to perform an emergency abdominal hysterectomy, rather than a vaginal one. Which means a longer recovery time. I’ll likely be in the hospital another day or two before I’ll be discharged. Then I’ll be confined to our bed for two weeks.
Everything feels so unfinished between us. We hadn’t resolved anything before the miscarriage and now it just feels like the decision we were about to make has been put on hold. Because I’m in no place to discuss the future of our marriage right now. It’ll probably be weeks before things are back to normal.
As normal as things can get without a uterus.
“You can’t sleep?” Graham asks. He hasn’t left the hospital all day. He only left the room earlier for half an hour, but then he returned and has been alternating between the couch and the chair next to my bed. Right now he’s in the chair, seated on the edge of it, waiting for me to speak. He looks exhausted, but I know Graham and he isn’t going anywhere until I do. “Do you want something to drink?”
I shake my head. “I’m not thirsty.” The only light on in the room is the one behind my bed and it makes it look like Graham is in a spotlight on a lonely stage.
His need to console me is warring with his awareness of the tension that’s been between us for so long. But he fights the tension and reaches for the rail. “Do you mind if I lay with you?” He already has the rail down and is crawling into the bed with me when I shake my head. He’s careful to turn me so that my IV doesn’t pull. He fits himself into less than half the bed next to me and slips a hand under my head, sacrificing his comfort for mine. He kisses me on the back of my head. Part of me wasn’t sure I wanted him in the bed with me, but I soon realize that falling asleep in our shared sadness is somehow more comforting than falling asleep alone.
