Page 3 of Beyond Oblivion

I closed my eyes tight. “I hate that. You have nothing to feel guilty about, honey. Nothing. I’ve been in love with you since we were kids. Don’t ever let yourself think you’re not enough for me. You’re everything.”

She sniffed once, then buried her face in the crook of my arm, her breathing evening out within minutes. But sleep? Not for me. My brain was running a marathon. I’d spent the whole day working, rushed home, shaved, ironed my shirt for our anniversary dinner, and picked up flowers, a card, and the diamond earrings I’d saved half the year to get. After dinner, we swung by CVS for another round of pregnancy tests. And after all that buildup… nothing. Again.

I thought about the night I proposed in that stupid Britney Spears costume, waiting for what would be the longest two and a half years of my life for Camille to set a wedding date, booking a quaint venue right outside of town, and the way she kissed me right before the officiant declared us husband and wife. Spending the last seven years married to Camille had been the best of my life. Bishop’s stint on that reality show brought a ton of business to the shop, Camille was promoted to manager, and we saved for a bigger house for what we thought would be our quickly growing family. But month after month, her period came, and all the dreams of baby names, nursery décor, and Christmas mornings seemed to drift further out of reach.

The hardest part was watching the hope fade from her eyes. She thought she was failing me, like she was robbing me of some mythical ‘complete’ life. But it wasn’t true, not even close.

Too many nights I’d lie awake, hoping she’d find something new to believe in, that the guilt would stop eating at her. Tonight hit me like a truck. All she needed was reassurance—something so simple, and I’d been too much of a dumbass to say it out loud until now.

Damn it, Trent, you idiot.

I settled back against my pillow, mentally kicking myself. But hey, better late than never, right? She knows now. She knows I love her. She knows I’m not going anywhere. And she loves me just as much, or she wouldn’t even have been worried about it.

Self-talk, man. It’s one of the things I picked up from one of those marriage books. Cheaper than therapy, and sometimes, it actually works. I even taught Travis the trick. You need that kind of stuff when your mom dies and you have a constant, irrational fear of sudden abandonment. Especially if you’re a Maddox boy and your coping mechanism is basically just making things worse.

Some fucksticks in our town might say I’d been a failure at everything else in my life—not to my face, of course—but the one thing no one could deny was that I worked my ass off at being a good husband.

I squeezed my sleeping wife tighter to my chest and sighed. I couldn’t fix it, but I could fight. If that’s what it came down to, I knew I’d get us through it.

I had to.

Chapter Two

Camille

My knuckles connected with the wood of Abby’s door three consecutive times, and then I waited, holding the pasta maker Abby had let me borrow in the other arm. Since my sister-in-law had become a mother, it was an unspoken rule to knock instead of ringing the doorbell, especially around lunch time. The twins were now in second grade, but for years, interrupting a nap was a mortal sin, and the habit remained. I looked down at my hands, the letters Trenton had inked on them a bit faded but still read BABY DOLL beautifully. I rubbed my thumb over the letters for comfort, knowing Liis would also be inside, visiting for the weekend.

After a full two minutes, I slowly turned the knob, poking my head in. Except for muted voices, the house was quiet, the kitchen light bleeding into the dim living room. The sudden worry that the twins could be home sick and resting popped into my head, so instead of risking waking up my niece and nephew with more knocking, I let myself in, calling softly to Abby the second she and Liis were in view. Abby was seated at the dining room table—albeit scooted back just enough to make room for her growing baby bump—staring at one of the many papers scattered in front of her. Liis was standing, pointing at something that seemed of interest. They were both at different stages of pregnancy, and for a moment, I just stood there, taking in the moment.

Abby’s glow was undeniable, a serene warmth that only enhanced her natural confidence as a mother. It looked like a scene in an oil painting, Abby surrounded by framed photos, plants, drawings hanging from the fridge. Liis, on the other hand, carried her pregnancy with the same sharp determination she did everything else. Even as she gestured to something on the table, her movements were precise, purposeful—like she’d mapped out every step of her new chapter in life.

It should have hurt more, the realization that Liis could effortlessly build a family with Thomas when Trenton and I couldn’t seem to catch a break. But it didn’t. Not in the way I’d feared. When Liis and Thomas announced their pregnancy, I’d braced myself for the sharp pang of jealousy that usually followed those moments, but it never came. Maybe it was because Liis had never been the type to have the same dreams of children that I had. Her pregnancy felt more like a surprise plot twist than a golden ticket.

Toto trotted over to me, collar jingling. He’d onlyboofedonce. Even he knew better than to make noise when the babies were sleeping. That, and he was getting older, blind in one eye and moving slower, preferring quiet pats over his once-legendary bark-a-thons.

“Abby? Sorry. I just let myself in. I didn’t want to knock again.”

Abby pushed herself to stand and looked at her watch, walking toward me as Liis gathered the papers and put them in a file folder. “Oh my gosh, is it one already? I’m sorry, I didn’t hear the door. Lena always insisted on answering it when she was our nanny, and I can’t seem to get back into the habit.”

“Oh, that’s right,” I said softly, remembering the whirlwind when Lena left with barely any notice. “How are the kids adjusting?”

“They miss her,” Abby replied. “I miss her, too,” she added. There was a rawness to her tone, a vulnerability she didn’t often let slip through.

“I’m sorry. If you need help, please call me. I’m not the kid whisperer that Lena was, but I have other useful talents. I’m especially good at answering doors.”

Abby breathed out a laugh.

“How’s the morning sickness?” I asked, walking with her to the kitchen.

“I haven’t had any for a while, thank God,” she said, mindlessly touching her middle. “It was brutal this time around.”

I set the pasta maker down on the counter. “Thank you.”

Abby smiled. “No sense in you spending the money when I have one. How was the Bucatini?”

“Well, I didn’t totally screw it up, so I call that a win. Are you doing taxes or something?”

“Oh,” Abby said, glancing back at the table.

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