Timeless

The wine stopped falling halfway to the floor. Natalie noticed because she had thrown it. Not the wine. The glass. The wine had merely been unfortunate enough to be inside it.

The glass remained above the kitchen tiles at an angle that looked temporary. Red wine curved from its rim in a perfect sheet, each drop separate and motionless.

Scott looked down at it. Neither spoke.

Outside the window, rain hung above the garden in thin silver lines. A blackbird hovered three feet above the lawn, wings spread, head turned slightly as though it had reconsidered the whole business of flight.

Scott reached toward the glass.

“Don’t.”

He touched it.

The glass dropped and shattered.

The wine hit the floor.

Only the wine that had already left the glass remained suspended in the air.

Natalie stared at it. Scott crouched beside the broken pieces.

“Well,” he said. “That seems inconvenient.”

She hated him a little for still being funny. She hated herself more for nearly laughing.

On the table between them lay the letter from the clinic.

His name.

Procedure completed.

Six weeks ago.

Natalie picked it up again although she had already read it enough times for the words to become shapes.

“Say it.”

Scott stayed crouched.

“Natalie.”

“Say it.”

He stood carefully. A shard of glass had gone through the knee of his trousers. There was a shallow cut beneath it. One bead of blood formed and stopped.

“I had a vasectomy.”

She folded the letter once. Twice.

“You had a vasectomy.”

“Yes.”

“Without telling me.”

“Yes.”

“While we were discussing trying again.”

He closed his eyes.

That made her angrier than if he had argued.

“Look at me.”

He did.

“You sat across from me in Dr. Verbeek’s office while she explained the risks of another pregnancy.”

“I know.”

“You held my hand.”

He shifted his weight.

“You asked questions.”

“I know.”

“You let me think we were deciding.”

Scott put both hands on the back of a chair.

“We were deciding.”

“No. I was performing a decision you’d already made.”

The clock above the stove said 18:43. The colon between the numbers had stopped blinking. Natalie watched it.

“Is that clock broken?”

“Probably.”

“The microwave too?”

00:00.

His phone showed no numbers at all. Just the photograph he used as wallpaper: a strip of beach, Natalie squinting into the sun, Scott beside her, and between them the small pink hat they had placed on the sand because neither of them had known what else to do with it.

Natalie turned the phone face down. Scott saw. Neither mentioned it.

She went to the window.

Across the road, Mr. Peeters stood beside his car with one hand raised against the rain. His Labrador was suspended halfway through shaking itself, ears horizontal, a spray of water fixed around its body like cheap crystal.

Further down, a cyclist leaned into the bend.

Nothing moved.

Natalie opened the back door.

“Natalie.”

She stepped outside.

The rain did not touch her until she walked into it. Drops broke against her face. The ones she didn’t touch remained where they were.

She put out her hand and swept it through the air. Water gathered across her palm.

Behind her Scott said, “That’s not possible.”

She turned.

“Excellent. You’ve finally found something we agree on.”

He came outside.

For a while they stood among the rain.

Natalie walked to the gate and looked up.

The clouds had stopped. Not drifting slowly. Not threatening to clear.

Stopped.

Scott checked his phone again.

“What are you doing?”

“Seeing if there’s a signal.”

“Who are you going to call?”

He looked at her.

Fair enough.

Natalie walked away.

“Where are you going?”

“I don’t know.”

“Should I come?”

“No.”

He stayed where he was.

That irritated her too.

She walked through the village alone.

She passed a bus with nineteen people inside. A man was asleep against the glass. Two schoolgirls were sharing something on a phone. An old woman held the yellow stop button with one finger.

The bus would never reach the next stop.

The thought arrived without drama.

That was apparently how the end of time worked. No thunder. No celestial announcement. No horsemen.

Just public transport failing permanently.

Natalie sat on the low wall outside the pharmacy.

She waited. Nothing happened. She tried again. Still nothing.

Waiting required something to approach.

There was nothing.

No kettle boiling. No phone ringing. No bruise fading. Grief becoming less sharp because people kept promising it would.

Give it time.

The phrase seemed obscene now.

Scott appeared at the end of the street.

Natalie watched him approach.

“I said don’t come.”

“You said you didn’t want me to.”

“Yes.”

“I didn’t. For a bit.”

“There is no bit.”

“I’m still adjusting to the terminology.”

He sat at the other end of the wall.

A drop of rain rested in his hair.

Natalie stared ahead.

Across the street, a pregnant woman stood at a pedestrian crossing, one hand beneath her belly. Her coat was open. The curve was unmistakable.

Scott had seen her too. His face changed.

Natalie looked away first.

“Do you think she knows?”

“What?”

“That she’s pregnant.”

“I assume so.”

“No. I mean now.”

Scott said nothing.

Natalie looked again.

The woman’s other hand held that of a small girl wearing pink wellington boots. The girl had one foot lifted above a puddle.

She would never put it down.

The woman’s child would never grow larger inside her.

Nothing grew without time.

Nothing healed either.

Natalie touched the pale scar beneath her shirt.

Scott saw the movement.

“Don’t.”

She laughed once.

“You don’t get to say that anymore.”

“I know.”

“You keep saying that.”

“Because I do.”

“No. You know facts. That’s not the same thing.”

Scott rubbed his hands together although it wasn’t cold.

Or perhaps cold still existed and simply had nowhere to go.

Natalie said, “Were you ever going to tell me?”

“Yes.”

“When?”

His mouth opened.

She looked at him.

He closed it again.

“Right.”

“I was trying to find the right moment.”

“Apparently you missed the deadline.”

That one made him laugh. A small, unwilling sound.

Natalie hated the relief it gave her.

She got up. Scott remained seated.

“Natalie.”

“What?”

“I thought you were going to die.”

She stopped.

Across the street, the little pink boot remained above the puddle.

Scott spoke to the pavement.

“They took you away and nobody would tell me anything. There was blood on the bed. On the floor. One of the nurses changed her shoes.”

Natalie said nothing.

“I remember that.”

“So do I.”

“I don’t think you do.”

Her head turned.

He met her eyes.

“I don’t mean you’ve forgotten. I mean you were inside it. I was standing outside the room while people kept coming through those doors without looking at me.”

“That gave you the right to sterilize yourself?”

“No.”

“Good.”

“It gave me the fear.”

“That’s not the same thing.”

“No.”

She started walking again. He followed.

This time she let him.

They passed the church, the school, the small park where someone had left a football in mid-bounce.

At the corner, Natalie turned left without deciding to.

Scott noticed where they were going. He didn’t say anything.

The hospital stood four streets away.

The automatic doors had stopped halfway open.

Natalie squeezed through. Scott followed.

Inside, a cleaner stood with his mop lifted from the floor. A nurse leaned over the reception desk. In the waiting area a toddler had dropped a plastic giraffe. It remained six inches above the tiles.

Natalie walked past all of them.

Maternity was upstairs. She took the stairs.

At the double doors, Natalie stopped. Scott nearly walked into her.

“I don’t want to go in.”

“Okay.”

“I don’t know why I came here.”

“Okay.”

“Stop saying okay.”

He nodded.

She turned on him.

“You decided there wouldn’t be another one.”

His face tightened.

“You decided there wouldn’t.”

“Yes.”

“I was there too.”

“I know.”

“Scott.”

“I know.”

She shoved him. Not hard. Enough to move him back against the wall.

“I held her.”

His eyes dropped.

“You think because I nearly died, you get the larger grief?”

“No.”

“You think because you stood outside the room, you were somehow the one it happened to?”

“No.”

“I held her. She had your ears.”

His face folded.

That stopped her.

Not because she felt sorry for him.

Because she hadn’t seen him cry about Sophie since the hospital.

He covered his mouth with one hand.

The corridor remained perfectly still around them.

Natalie leaned against the opposite wall. Scott wiped his face.

“I couldn’t do it again.”

“You didn’t have to.”

“I know.”

“You could have said no.”

“I tried.”

“You said maybe.”

“You said we should see the specialist.”

“I know.”

“You let me buy vitamins.”

His eyes closed.

The vitamins.

A stupid white bottle beside the coffee machine. She had taken one every morning. He had known.

Natalie looked at him and felt something inside her change shape.

Not soften.

That would have been easier.

“You watched me take them.”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“I was a coward.”

She waited for an explanation.

None came.

Good.

Scott lowered himself to the floor and rested his back against the wall.

Natalie remained standing.

“I didn’t do it because I didn’t want another child,” he said.

“Don’t.”

“I’m not trying to make it better.”

“Good, because you’re doing badly.”

“I wanted one.”

She looked away.

“That was the problem.”

A tiny plastic giraffe was still there, six inches above the floor.

Scott continued.

“I wanted another baby so badly I started hating one that didn’t exist.”

Natalie looked at him.

“I hated that it wouldn’t be her. Before it even existed.”

She sat down opposite him. Not beside him.

Scott stared at his shoes.

“I thought if you got pregnant, I’d spend every day waiting for something to go wrong. And if nothing went wrong, I’d spend every day feeling guilty that nothing did.”

Natalie pressed her thumb into her palm.

“And you thought I wasn’t afraid?”

“No.”

“You thought I wanted to replace her?”

“No.”

“What, then?”

He looked at her.

“I thought you still believed there could be an after.”

Natalie looked toward the maternity doors.

She had said it herself so many times.

After the funeral.

After the bleeding stopped.

After she could sleep again.

After people stopped lowering their voices around her.

After the first anniversary.

Now there was no after.

Scott rubbed at the dried bead of blood on his knee. It did not smear. It had stopped being blood and became an object.

“So what happens to us?”

“I don’t know.”

“You had a plan for everything else.”

“That was one plan.”

“One permanent plan.”

“Apparently permanent has lost some of its drama.”

She looked at him. He looked back.

Against her will, she smiled. Barely.

Scott did not take advantage of it. One of his better qualities. Occasionally.

Natalie stood and walked to the maternity doors. She put her hand against one. It opened because she pushed it.

Beyond it, the corridor was exactly as it had been.

A doctor stood reading a chart. A man held flowers. A woman in a wheelchair had her head tilted back, laughing at something the person beside her had said.

Natalie recognized the room at the far end.

The door was closed. She did not open it.

Scott came to stand beside her. Not touching.

“I still don’t forgive you.”

“I understand.”

“I may never.”

He almost smiled.

“Strong choice of word.”

She looked at him.

“Right.”

They stood there.

Natalie reached for his hand.

Not because she had decided to stay. Staying required leaving to remain possible.

She held his hand because it was there.

Scott’s fingers closed around hers.

Behind them, the giraffe remained suspended above the floor.

Outside, the rain remained rain without falling.

Natalie looked at the closed door at the end of the corridor.

“What now?” Scott asked.

She considered the question.

“Nothing, apparently.”