Page 109 of Yearn
Bitch ass piece of shit.
Scott always used the wordcounselorlike a thumb on a bruise. He knew I wasn’t a lawyer—I was a legal assistant who could run circles around half the associates in his firm—but he also knew I had wanted to be a lawyer long ago.
We had met first year. Contracts, front row, competing for the same answers. I left second year when I discovered I was pregnant. Nine months later, in the hospital, our daughter, Mia never took a breath.
I'd been so shattered.
So confused.
For the rest of the year, I could barely function, let alone study.
So many tears I'd swallowed for months because crying made him uncomfortable. Silence lived in my throat after Mia died because there were no words big enough for that kind of empty.
So I worked.
And worked.
And never went back to law school.
“You will see that I have every right to be here.” Scott waved the papers at me again and his scent hit me—that same bergamot and cedar cologne, expensive and sharp.
My stomach dropped.
Suddenly I wasn't in front of him anymore.
I was in a hospital room with blue walls and too-bright lights, and he was wearing that same smell when he said, "Maybe her passing is for the best," three hours after our newborn daughter died.
He didn’t say our daughter or her name.
Justherpassing.
Like she was a kidney stone he'd been worried about having to deal with.
He'd checked his phone twice during that conversation while I'd still had my hospital bracelet on.
“Teyonah.” Scott brought my attention back to him. “Read the papers, counselor.”
“I said stop calling me that.”
“Why?”
“You do it to be cruel.”
“Or nostalgic. You remember law school. Back when you had. . .potential.”
“No. I remember that it was back when I was helping to payyourrent. Back when I was color-codingyouroutlines while my ankles swelled under the table. Back when I worked two jobs so you could ‘focus’ and ‘network’ and practice your opening statements on cute bartenders.”
Maybe, Mia would have been alive if I had just remained on my own. . .
I should have left him then.
But I wanted to make sure our child had a father in the house.
I’d been so young.
So stupid.
So insecure.
