Best Friends Forever. Margot Hunt
hesitated. It wasn’t that I wanted to conceal the truth from Kat, especially when she had just been so forthcoming with me. But sharing my past would cast a pall on what had been until now such a lovely day.
Kat seemed to sense my discomfort. “Am I being intrusive?” she asked, borrowing my earlier line.
“No, not at all.” I took a deep breath. It was never a good idea to start any relationship with lies. “It’s just... It’s a sad story. My daughter Bridget had a twin sister. They were both born prematurely. Bridget was fine—is fine—but my other daughter...she didn’t make it.”
I had told this story dozens of times over the past eight years. It had gotten easier in some ways. The dark, suffocating grief that had crippled me in the days and weeks following my daughter’s death had eventually receded. I could now talk about my lost baby without instantly dissolving into tears. But the heavy weight of her absence in the world was still there. In a way, I treasured this. If I ever stopped missing her, it would mean that my daughter, the one who left the world before she could ever make her mark on it, would be forgotten forever.
Usually when I did tell people about her death, this was the point when they would lean forward, face creased with horrified sympathy. They would pat my arm and tell me how sorry they were, how much it must comfort me that Bridget survived. This was true, of course. I was lucky in many ways—I had two healthy children, and that was something no parent should ever take for granted. But it was also true that no bereaved parent ever wanted to hear that her living children made up for a dead one. It didn’t work that way.
But here again, Kat surprised me. “What was her name?”
“Meghan.” My voice cracked a bit. I cleared my throat. “Her name was Meghan.”
“Meghan,” Kat repeated. “That’s a beautiful name. Were she and Bridget identical twins?”
I nodded. “We were so surprised when they did the ultrasound.”
“Do you know what caused you to deliver early?”
“Placental abruption, although my doctors didn’t know what caused it. Everything was fine, all my checkups were great...and then suddenly everything wasn’t fine, and I was in labor two months ahead of schedule. But even then, even after the delivery, both babies were doing well at first. They were small, of course, and we knew they’d have to spend some time in the NICU. But the doctors kept reassuring us that they were doing well, that they’d be able to come home soon, so I wasn’t worried.”
I stopped and took a sip of wine to steady myself. That lack of worry, that blind trust in the doctors’ feckless pronouncements, still haunted me on the nights when I lay awake. Kat was silent, still looking at me, her focus absolute.
I continued. “Then Meghan had a brain hemorrhage. And she just...died.”
My mouth was suddenly unbearably dry. I reached for my water glass and took a large gulp from it. I could feel the pricks of unshed tears gathering in my eyes. I willed them away. If there was one thing Meghan’s death had taught me, it was that crying didn’t fix anything. It certainly didn’t bring back the person who was gone forever.
“That,” Kat said, “is a fucking nightmare.”
The unexpected profanity made me laugh and then choke slightly on the water. I dabbed at my mouth with my napkin.
“Are you okay?” Kat exclaimed, reaching a hand out.
I waved her off. “No, you’re right. It was a fucking nightmare.”
Kat relaxed back in her seat. “I’ll say. You were not only experiencing one of the worst things that can happen to any mother but also taking care of a newborn.” Kat shook her head and drained the rest of her wine. She reached for the bottle and poured each of us another large glass. “I’m so sorry you had to go through that. No wonder you left your job. It would have been too much for anyone to cope with. I can’t even imagine. I think I’d have a hard time just getting out of bed in the morning.”
“Oh, I struggled. That’s the thing about grief. It’s just...suffocating. Like you’re being buried alive. And even the easiest tasks, like showering or eating or even brushing your teeth, suddenly seem insurmountable.” Then I shook my head and smiled regretfully at Kat. “I’m sorry. This isn’t a very cheerful topic of conversation. I’m putting a damper on our lunch.”
“No, you’re not, not one bit. I asked you a question and you answered it honestly. Frankly, it’s refreshing to talk to someone who doesn’t feel the need to bullshit her way through life.” Kat patted my hand. “I’m glad I called you. I’m usually terrible about following through on things. But I have a feeling that you and I are going to be good friends.”
She raised her glass, and I clinked mine against hers.
“To new friendships,” I toasted.
* * *
“I am home and I have pizza,” I called out, using my foot to push open the back door that led into our house from the garage. My hands were filled with a grease-stained pizza box. Half cheese, half sausage and onion, with a side order of garlic knots.
“Mom’s home!” Liam hollered, not looking up from the Xbox game he was absorbed in.
“No, don’t get up,” I told him. “You don’t have to eat any pizza. There’ll be more for the rest of us.”
Liam rolled his eyes but grinned. He hopped up, gave me a quick hug and headed toward the kitchen. Bridget was there, sitting at the kitchen table, frowning down at her homework.
“Hi, honey,” I said, trying to remember if I’d even had homework in elementary school. I didn’t think so. Some in middle school. Both of my children came home from school every day with their backpacks full to bursting. “What are you working on?”
“Science,” she said moodily. “And it’s really hard.”
“Where’s Dad?”
“Right here,” Todd said, coming into the kitchen. He kissed me on the cheek and plucked the pizza box out of my hands. “We’re all starving.”
“Sorry I’m late,” I said. “Thanks for picking the kids up from school.”
Once I’d realized that lunch was extending into the late afternoon, I’d texted Todd from the restaurant and asked him to handle the school run. It meant that both kids had to wait in aftercare until Todd arrived.
“I hate staying late at school,” Bridget complained. “Where were you, anyway?”
“I was having lunch with a friend.”
“You’ve been at lunch all this time?” Liam asked. “It’s dark out!”
“After lunch, we went shopping, and then we had coffee.” I shrugged. “We started chatting and lost track of time.”
“Stop giving your mom a hard time,” Todd said. “She gets to have a day off every now and then.”
I smiled at my husband, feeling a surge of affection for him. “It was nice to do something out of the ordinary.”
“Lunch in Palm Beach compares favorably to laundry and the school run?” Todd teased.
I laughed. “Surprisingly, yes, it does.”
Todd grabbed plates and napkins while I poured glasses of water for everyone. Once we were seated at the table, I got reports from the children on their days. Liam shrugged and said his was okay, which was pretty much what he said every day, and then returned his attention to stuffing pizza in his mouth. Bridget launched into a very long story involving hurt feelings and drama over a game of four square played by her classmates that, in the end, had nothing to do with her at all, because she was on the opposite side of the playground when it happened.
“But if you weren’t participating in the game, why do you care