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Chapter 184

Claire still hadn’t told Jamie she wanted a divorce, but she tried to push that burden out of her mind as she shuffled slowly through the maternity ward alongside her mother. She felt sore already without adding in the pain of her marital problems, and besides, she wasn’t here to dwell on Jamie. She was here for her daughters, them and them only.

“Should I come in, or do you want go alone?” asked her mom, outside the NICU doors.

“Alone,” admitted Claire. “For now, anyway.”

“Sure, honey.” Offering an understanding smile, her mother patted her shoulder. “I’ll just be down the hall in the waiting area then.”

“Thanks, Mom.” Claire offered a brief smile over her shoulder as she passed into the NICU. Cut off from her mother, she instantly felt a flicker of relief. She was grateful to have a supportive mom around, but at the same time, it was aggravating to be living under the same roof as her parents again. She hated relying on her mother, but right now, she had no other choice. The only way she could get out of the condominium was if someone drove and went with her, and even then, the exertion was almost too much this soon after surgery.

It was all worth it, though, to see her babies.

Looking into the two incubators, she drew in a slow breath. They looked slightly bigger than she remembered, even Delaine. It was a happy thought, but in a way, it almost saddened her. In just two days, she felt like she’d missed out on precious moments of their young lives. She wished she could bring them both home to the condo, where the cribs still lay empty, but it would still be weeks before they were ready.

And yet, minor milestones were being reached every day.

Something about Caitlin was different, and she realized it upon second glance. The ventilator, with its large, snakelike hose that had once connected to the breathing tube in her throat, was gone. It had been replaced by thin tubes that ran into both of the baby’s nostrils, and for the first time, Claire could get a good look at her tiny, rosebud mouth, the soft pink lips pushed into a slight pout.

It was hard to look away, but concern made Claire’s eyes drift to Caitlin’s monitors, anxious to make sure her daughter was still breathing well without the help of the ventilator. The numbers for her oxygen level were right in the normal range, though, and a happy sigh passed through Claire’s lungs. “That’s my girl,” she whispered, smiling into the incubator. “I knew you were strong.”

“She sure is,” said a sweet voice behind her, and Claire turned to find the girls’ nurse, Fernanda, coming over, a smile on her face. “We took her off the vent last night, and she’s doing great without it. She’ll be on oxygen for a little longer, just for some extra help, but her lungs are maturing, and her sats are excellent.”

Claire grinned. “That’s incredible.”

“It is,” Fernanda nodded. “And how are you doing?”

“Oh, I’m… I’m pretty good.” Claire was hesitant, unsure of how to answer that question. This good news about Caitlin made her feel ecstatic, like she and her daughters could get through anything, but beneath the thrill of happiness, she still felt sore and weak, and then there was that minor detail about her ending her marriage…

“That’s good to hear. It’s not an easy recovery, but you’ll feel a little better every day. In a way, it’s probably nice for you to not have to worry about caring for twins on top of everything else.”

Claire forced a smile; she had tried to tell herself the same thing the day she’d come home from the hospital, but she still knew she would rather have Caitlin and Delaine at home with her than here in the NICU. “I miss them, though,” she murmured, resting her hand on top of Caitlin’s incubator. “I feel like I’m missing out on their first days of life, not being here…”

Fernanda returned the smile sadly. “I understand. This is a hard thing for new moms to cope with. You’re doing a great job, though.” She patted Claire’s hand. “Now that the vent’s out of the way… would you like to hold her?”

Her heart leaping as she processed the question, Claire turned to look at the nurse with wide, hopeful eyes. “Really?? I can hold her?”

“I think she’s ready. Let me get you a rocker…” She dragged over one of the many rocking chairs, positioning it in between the two incubators. Claire sat down carefully, hand pressed over her incision, and Fernanda opened up Caitlin’s incubator.

Gently untangling the wires and IV lines still hooked to the tiny preemie, she picked up Caitlin with care. The baby was small enough to be held in one hand, Claire observed, but Fernanda used two. Drawing in a breath, Claire opened her arms to receive the infant, scarcely able to wrap her mind around the fact that the moment had finally come, the moment when she would hold her firstborn child for the very first time.

It wasn’t as simple as she’d expected; Fernanda took her time in positioning Caitlin’s little body against Claire’s chest, showing her the right way to cradle the baby in order to make her feel safe and calm. “Don’t talk to her much while you hold and rock her,” advised Fernanda in a low whisper. “Too much can actually overstimulate her.”

But Claire found that she didn’t need to talk. Words could not express how she was feeling at the moment, anyway. Sitting back in the rocking chair, with her tiny infant snuggled against her chest, she felt an overwhelming sense of peace. Everything up to this point had been worth it, she decided, as she rocked slowly back and forth. From having her eggs extracted and fertilized with Jamie’s sperm, to her rocky pregnancy, weeks of bed rest, and a painful C-section; it had all been worth it for this moment. This was the baby she’d dreamed of, prayed for, and fought to have, and for the first time, she truly felt like a mother. This was her child, curled up against her breasts, her baby… her own flesh and blood…

The feeling was incredible.

She found it hard to take her eyes off the little bundle in her arms, but at one point, she did manage to glance up, absently so, her gaze drifting across the NICU.

It was a mistake.

Instantly, her eyes were drawn to him, standing out in the hallway, on the other side of the large, glass window. A groan escaped her. “Now he decides to show up,” she murmured to her daughter, cupping her a little more firmly, knowing she wouldn’t be able to hold her for much longer. Jamie was here, and it was time she talked to him. She was already annoyed at him for interrupting this special moment and knew that it would never be any easier for her to drop the divorce bombshell on him than it was going to be right now.

Waving Fernanda back over, she let the nurse take Caitlin from her and place the baby back in her incubator. Then she rose from the rocker with difficulty, holding her incision, and forced herself to shuffle away from her babies and out of the NICU.

“How are they?” Jamie asked, when she made it into the hall.

Claire forced herself to answer him calmly. “Better. Cait’s off the ventilator. They let me hold her.”

“I saw.”

That was all he said, and she felt a flicker of anger which made staying calm even harder. That was it? He was their father, and all he could say in response to this wonderful news about his daughter was “I saw”?

It was one of many reasons she was done with the marriage.

“Your dad said you’d be here,” Jamie went on.

Claire arched an eyebrow, distracted by the change in subject. “You’ve been to the condo?” She wondered what else her father had told him, but apparently not everything, because Jamie looked quite passive and subdued. She had a feeling his reaction would be much different when she told him she wanted a divorce.

“Yeah. I wanted to see you… say goodbye before I left…”

“You’re leaving?” she blurted, before she’d even had time to think about it. Don’t tell me you’re leaving; I’m the one who’s supposed to be leaving you!

His adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed. “I have to. Work, you know. I can only take off so many days; they need me back.”

“Oh… right.” In all the drama of the last few days, she had almost forgotten that he’d skirted out of his business trip early to come back and still had a job to go to in Des Moines. Something as ordinary as work seemed far removed from her life as of late.

“I’m sorry. I’ll be back as soon as I can… next weekend, maybe?”

She shook her head, jumping on the perfect moment to deliver the blow. “Don’t bother. Not for me, anyway. If you want to come back for your daughters, that’s your prerogative, but… I don’t want to see you.”

She expected him to question her, but Jamie just frowned, his dark eyebrows furrowed. “I know you’re mad,” he offered after a moment’s pause. “About the whole transfer thing. I don’t blame you. It was a shitty thing to do…”

“Gee, that’s the understatement of the century,” Claire snapped, unable to resist the biting remark. She could feel her blood pressure start to rise as the annoyance turned to anger and realized that the middle of a hospital hallway was not the place to have this conversation with him. “Look, can we find a more private place to go? I need to sit, and we need to talk.”

Looking nervous, Jamie agreed, and they walked down the hall to an abandoned rest area with vending machines and a pay phone. There were a couple of chairs there, and, slightly woozy from the walk, Claire instantly sank down into one of them. Jamie perched next to her, turning his body to face her. For a few seconds, they just sat in silence that was broken only by the low hum of the vending machines.

Claire braced herself, working up the will to say what she needed to say. But now that she was here, sitting so close to him, it was harder than she had imagined. She was still angry at him, but he was her husband… her first love… her friend of fourteen years. He was Jamie, and even if she didn’t know him as well as she thought she had, she knew all too well the wounded expression his clear blue eyes would take on when she told him she was leaving him. She hated to see that look on his face. It angered her when it was all for show, the pathetic puppy dog face he made when he was trying to persuade her of something, but when it was genuine, it broke her heart. She hated that she was about to put it there.

But then she remembered all the reasons why – his lies about the job transfer, his selfishness, his jealousy and possessiveness when it came to Nick, his lack of compassion for her during the selective reduction ordeal, his abandonment and neglect – and she knew it was the right thing to do. She had to do it.

“I’m not gonna beat around the bush,” she told him bluntly, wanting to get it over with. “I want a divorce.”

His blue eyes grew wide, immediately taking on the sad basset hound look. She looked away, trying to avoid them, but his voice chipped away at her defenses. “Claire… no…” he murmured breathlessly. “You can’t mean that. I know we’ve got our problems, but we’ll… we’ll work through them.”

“How? You wanna do marriage counseling or something?” Claire snorted, steeling herself against him. “Like you’d actually go for that. Jamie Turner, talk about his feelings? Never. You’d just sit there and scowl and not say a word. It’d be all up to me to fix our problems myself. And I can’t do that; it doesn’t work that way.”

“I can do better. Look, I know I haven’t been the best husband to you, but-”

“No, you haven’t. I’m sorry, Jamie, but I deserve better. I thought I knew you; I thought I loved you, but you’ve only let me down. I can’t keep going in this kind of marriage. I want out, for my own sanity.”

Jamie seemed to refuse to accept this. “We took vows,” he practically whimpered, in a pitiful attempt to convince her. “Before God! How can you just renounce them?”

“You’re the one who didn’t keep his vows, Jamie,” accused Claire, and now her voice shook just a little. “Love, comfort, honor, and keep, in sickness and in health. You didn’t do it, Jamie. That makes them null and void, in my mind. I think God will understand that I made a mistake… that you and I were never meant to get married.”

“How can you say that, Claire?” Jamie’s voice rose with emotion. “We’ve loved each other since high school!”

“I did love you in high school,” replied Claire, finding that as his voice grew more impassioned, hers reached a dull calm. It was becoming easier to come clean with him now, and even though she knew she was hurting him with every word, he needed to hear it. “But you’ve changed. I thought I was marrying the Jamie I fell in love with, but that was stupid. We’re a lot older now… we’re both different people. We don’t work as a couple, and if you think we do, you’re only kidding yourself. Think of all the crap we’ve gone through this year. A couple that was truly meant to be would be able to get through it a lot better than we have. All we do anymore is fight, and I’m sick of it. I can’t take it anymore. Please understand that. We’ll both be better off apart.”

Jamie shook his head, but he didn’t argue this time. He seemed at a loss for words.

“I haven’t talked to a lawyer yet,” Claire said, and her voice quivered again, “but I’m going to. I’ll take care of drafting up the papers and everything. I’ll be fair. I’m not out to ruin your life; I want you to be able to move on and find happiness without me. All I’m asking of you is your cooperation. Please, don’t make this any more difficult than it already is for both of us.”

He didn’t respond, not even a nod, but she was okay with that. She knew he needed time to process this, and she was sure that once he had, he would come around. If he cared about her at all, he would let the divorce be amicable.

“We can talk more after we’ve both had some time to think about this. Not anytime soon though. I need some time… we both need some time,” she stressed, as she started to stand up. It was time to leave. She couldn’t stand to stick around any longer, not now that the cat was out of the bag. She was anxious to leave him to his thoughts.

“Just like that? You’re leaving?” Jamie mumbled, as she stood, not even looking at her.

Claire hesitated. Then she shrugged. “I don’t know how else to do it. This is new to me too.”

She wanted to walk away, but his voice stopped her once more. “What about the twins?”

She swallowed hard, picturing the two beautiful babies they had created together. “They’re the best gift you’ve ever given me,” she said, the raw emotion returning to her voice, “and I’ll always be grateful. You’re their father; you’ll always have a place in their lives if you want to be. But I think they’ll appreciate growing up in a household without parents who argue and lie.”

Jamie didn’t reply, and she knew she had said enough. If she stayed any longer, the conversation would just keep going in circles, as he tried to convince her not to leave him, and she was not about to put up with it. Her mind was made up. Her will was strong.

She used it to turn herself slowly around and walk away.

He did not call out to her, and she never looked back.


Of all the things I believe in
I just want to get it over with
Tears form behind my eyes
But I do not cry
Counting the days that pass me by

I’ve been searching deep down in my soul
Words that I’m hearing are starting to get old
Feels like I’m starting all over again
The last three years were just pretend

And I said goodbye to you
Goodbye to everything that I knew
You were the one I loved
The one thing that I tried to hold onto

- “Goodbye to You” by Michelle Branch


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