Save Me From Me (26 page)

“Hey, have you seen Dani?” I had ask. His smug grin tells me the answer.

“As a matter of fact, I did a bit ago. She told me everything about how she was supposed to leave with you. Sorry dude, but she changed her mind.” Yeah, his face looks anything but apologetic.

“Well, where is she? I need to talk to her myself,” I say with irritation.

He steps in closer to me as he says, “Even if I did know where she was, I wouldn’t tell you. I don’t know what all happened, but I damn sure know you better get the hell out of my town.”

I don’t even know what the hell happened. For now, it looks like I don’t have a fucking choice. I have to hit the road soon. As much as I don’t want to, I can’t ruin the one decent thing I have going on when it looks like the only good thing I had has bailed on me. I’m not accepting defeat. I’m somehow going to get to the bottom of this. I just have a feeling it won’t be as soon as I want.

The day I let Holden go is one of the hardest days of my life, second only to the day that I lost my father. I return home a bawling mess and fall asleep in my mother’s arms, crying. Like Holden’s father instructed me to do, I ignore all calls and texts from Holden. I just let him believe I’ve changed my mind… that I don’t love him. That alone hurts worse than the situation itself. Knowing that he now thinks I never loved him. That cuts me deep.

For the first two weeks, I am a total robot. I do everything without thought or reason. Yes/no. Black/white. No in between. No emotion. Adyn is being the best friend she possibly can be. We’ve had a few nights filled with ice cream and tears. She doesn’t get why I let Holden go without a true fight. It’s hard to explain, but unless you’ve been in the situation where you have to choose between the life that you want, or someone you feel is going to hold you back, then it’s hard to know what you would really do in the situation. Plus, Holden’s father is very belittling. My intentions with Holden have never been to hold him back in life. I don’t want him to ever be stuck. I refuse to be the one that super glues his ass to misery.

Work has sucked. I am more than glad that I didn’t put in my notice. It’s crazy how stuff like this pans out. Joy, bless her shriveled heart, has taken her bitchiness down a few notches. Smart woman, right there. I’m honestly not sure if I’d be able to keep my cool if she was her normal self towards me.

Life slowly gets back to normal. Tyler came into town last weekend and we went to the movies. Now him, he’s the only one capable of bringing me out of my funk. He told me to keep my chin up. That it will get better.

Yeah, right. Holden was my better.

Gage starts slowly easing his way back into my life as he pops in the store more frequently. We had quit talking for a while. I guess, now that he sees his opening, he’s trying to slowly put a foot back in the door. That’s wrong of me to even say. I’m sure it’s actually innocent for the most part. I’m sure he just misses our friendship. I do as well.

“Hey Danielle.” He offers me a weak smile. “I’m not sure what happened,” he whispers from the other side of the counter. “But, I just want you to know I’m here for you. In a totally best friend type of way. If you ever need to talk or just bullshit, you know where to find me.”

“Thanks, Gage. No promises on my end, but I might take you up on that offer.” I attempt to smile back. I wince and double over as pain from my cramps karate chops me in the ovaries. My periods have been hell all of my life. I’ve basically been on the pill since I started trying to regulate the pain, but nothing ever really works, so I’ve just grown accustomed to it. But this pain is different, and it’s kicking my ass.

“Danielle. Are you okay?” I look up at Gage’s face full of concern, but realize Adyn is the one asking. She’s right by my side with her arm supporting me.

“Yes… No. I’m having really bad cramps.” She rubs her hand up and down my back, trying to relax me.

“I think you need to go home. We’ll figure it out here. Take some ibuprofen, and get yourself a heating pad and lay down for the rest of the day.” I nod as I walk around the counter to meet Gage who is waiting with his arm extended to help me.

He walks me into my house and past the nasty stares from Brandy and Billy who would obviously have to be here to see me like this. My mother is instantly at my side, asking what’s wrong and what I need.

“Do you have any Ibuprofen 800?” Gage asks her. “Or a Lortab, Percocet, anything to hurry and get the pain down?”

“I don’t think I have either,” my mom says.

“I might be able to get her something,” Gage says.

I hear Brandy snickering from the living room. “I bet he can.” I have no idea what she means, but I hate her.

Thirty minutes later, I’m laying down, dozing off to a movie. Gage has pulled through on finding me something for the pain, and my mom has made me a rice sock since her heating pad has disappeared. I’ve always been more of a fan of the rice sock. I could live without the smell when you microwave it, but the fact that you can heat it or make it a cold compress is a win/win.

Winning.

Sharp pains surround my lower waist and entrap me in a fierce pain. These are so much worse than the ones I had earlier. I slowly prop myself up in my bed as I try to control the urge to vomit. This is the type of pain that is so excruciating that your mouth instantly waters, your stomach flip-flops, and you just know that you’re going to hurl.

Which I do — in my bed.

“Mom,” I yell as I sob in my bed, unable to move any further.

She throws my door open and flips on my light. “Oh my God. Danielle, what’s wrong?” Her voice is panicked, and she is instantly at my side.

“I can’t move. It’s my ovaries.” I wince as I attempt to pull off the blanket that I threw up on.

“I thought you finally had all that under control?”

I just shake my head and brace myself as the next wave of pain sets in. I try to keep my noise level down and hold in the screams that are begging to escape. Keeping my body as still as possible, I close my eyes and breathe through my nose. I clinch my teeth and let the tears stream down my face.

Mom tries not to touch me as she rolls my comforter the rest of the way down to get it off of me. The gasp that follows has me quickly opening my eyes. “You’re bleeding,” she says, looking down at me.

I look down and the bottom of my t-shirt and my pajama pants are soaked in blood. There’s only one place that this blood could have come from. Unless someone snuck in and stabbed me, because the searing pain that I’m feeling is how I assume being knifed would feel. The idea has me lifting my shirt to double check and make sure I don’t have any open wounds. It’s not like I’d put it passed my sister.

“I’m calling an ambulance.” My mom heads for the door.

“No.” I throw my feet over the edge of my bed and double over in pain. “Just give me a minute. I can make it to your car. Go put a blanket or something down so I don’t ruin the seats.”

“I don’t care about my seats right now. I care about you, Dani Jo. Now let me help you if your stubborn ass won’t let me call 911.”

“It’s not like I’m dying,” I say, but very much feel like I could be. I ease my way onto both feet, and make sure that I have my balance before attempting to walk. Finally feeling that I can make it to my mom’s car, I open my eyes. As soon as I do, my room starts spinning, and black, fuzzy dots float all around me. I shake my head to clear my vision, but it only makes it worse. I hear my mom yelling my name, but it sounds warped as if I’m in a tunnel, and it’s echoing all around me. What coherent thoughts that are still forming tell me to back and just fall against my bed, but before I can put those thoughts into action, it’s too late. My legs give out from underneath me, and my mind goes blank.

I slowly shake my head back and forth, trying to get rid of the faint beeping noise I keep hearing. This action only makes the noise louder and clearer. I pull my arm up to place it over my eyes, but it will only move so far because something is confining it. I start to panic as realize that I don’t exactly know where I am. A familiar, calm voice and a gentle stroke of a hand is all that it takes to calm my erratic heart.

“Hey, hey, hey.” He takes my hand into his and brushes my bangs to the side of my forehead with the other. “You’re okay, Danielle.”

I smile at Gage’s reassuring words, but then, suddenly, take them in as I force my eyes open. “Where am I?” I ask as I scan what is obviously a hospital room.

“You’re in the hospital. Do you remember what happened?” he asks with concern in his eyes.

I shake my head and start crying, willing myself to remember what happened. It all seems fuzzy, and I just want a sense of clarity.

“Where’s my mom?” I ask, knowing that she should be here, and that she will know exactly what happened.

“She had to pick up your nephews.” He gives me a weak smile. “I told her I’d stay here with you. Neither of us wanted you waking up alone. Let me go get your doctor.” The mattress starts to lift as he stands, and I grab his arm pulling him back down.

“Wait. I want you to tell me what happened first. I need to remember before some doctor comes in spilling off some big words that I don’t understand.”

He sighs, but knows me to well to just let it go. “Since I wasn’t there, I can only tell you what your mom has told me, and what I heard the doctor telling your mom. You woke up last night screaming, and your mom came in. Turns out the pains you were having at your work yesterday were far worse than just cramps. You were bleeding heavily, and ended up passing out.” He shakes his head. I can see the pain in his eyes as he retells it. “Your mom didn’t call me ‘til this morning to tell me what happened, but when I got here, they had already operated on you. I don’t know what all they did, but I do know that you had been pregnant.” I see his eyes gloss over. He said had been, meaning past tense.

“I was pregnant,” I say out loud, completely shocked.

“Yeah, you were. Didn’t you know?”

“I had no clue. I must not have been that far at all.”

He starts to get a bit angry at the fact that I didn’t know. “How could you not even have an idea that you were knocked up, Dani?”

I’m not really in the mood to defend myself to him, especially when he’s out whoring around with Loralee and whomever the hell he wants, when he wants.

“Really, Gage? First of all, I’ve had problems with my periods all my life. Meaning, I don’t have regular ones. They throw my shit all out of whack. And most women don’t know they are pregnant until a good 6 to 8 weeks anyways. So back off, Dr. Phil.”

He looks away, realizing he needs to hold his temper in. “I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, whatever. I’ll see my doctor now,” I say as I look down at my hands, all of a sudden feeling an overwhelming sadness.

Hearing that you can’t have kids does something to a woman. To most, it’s so heartbreaking that they become depressed, but to me, it’s causes my heart to harden a bit. To know that I will never be able to have the one thing that I’ve always known I’d want, is life shattering. I feel like I’m a failure. I’m used goods, or actually, more like broken merchandise.

Good thing Holden isn’t around any longer. I’m damaged goods. If I still had his number instead of deleting it when I changed mine, I would have maybe called him to tell him about the miscarriage. Maybe, I wouldn’t have. He deserves so much, and there are things I know he will want that I just can’t give him. Not because
I don’t want to one day, but because the doctors say it’s something that I’ll never be able to do. Being a mother isn’t in my cards, and it breaks my heart. The hardest part of it all is when people who shouldn’t be mothers keep popping out kids like a Pez dispenser. My sister, for one, desperately needs her kids and baby making goods taken from her.

Who’s going to want me now that I can’t have kids? The answer echoes in my head as soon as the question forms.

Gage. He will still want me. But do I want him?