The last year of my life had been measured in milliliters and calendar days. My stomach was a map of blue and purple bruises. My hormones were a rollercoaster that I rode with white-knuckled determination.
I did it because Mark begged me.
“We just need one more,” he had whispered one night, holding me while I cried about how distant we had become. “He begged for a third child to ‘bring us closer.’“.
He swore that a new baby would be the glue we needed. He promised that if we expanded our family, he would expand his heart back into our marriage. So, I agreed, hoping to save us.
I threw my body into the fire of fertility treatments. I went through IVF, the injections, the sickness. I endured the invasive procedures and the mood swings, fueled by the vision of Mark holding our newborn and finally looking at me with love again.
Then came this morning. The stick on the bathroom counter turned pink. Two solid lines.
I felt a surge of triumph. We had done it. I ran downstairs, the test clutched in my hand, ready to tell him that we had fixed us.
“Mark!” I called out. “It worked!”
I rounded the corner into the bedroom. Mark was there. But he wasn’t waiting with open arms.
He was zipping up a suitcase. The closet was half-empty.
The day I came home with the positive test, he was packing his bags.
I stopped in the doorway, the joy draining out of me instantly. “What… what are you doing?”
He looked up. He saw the test in my hand. A strange, satisfied smile touched his lips—not a smile of a father, but of a man who has successfully completed a checklist.
“I’m leaving, Jen,” he said calmly.
“Leaving? But… I’m pregnant. We just did this. You said this would bring us closer!”
“I lied,” he said, smoothing his shirt. “I’ve wanted to leave for a year. But I felt guilty.”
He walked over to me, looking at the positive test like it was a receipt.
“‘I just wanted to make sure you wouldn’t be alone when I left,’” he said, his voice dripping with a sick kind of benevolence.
My knees gave out. I sank onto the edge of the bed.
He hadn’t wanted a child. He hadn’t wanted a family. He viewed my future loneliness as a liability he needed to offset before he could guiltlessly exit to his new life. He thought that leaving me with a newborn infant to raise alone was an act of charity, not cruelty.
He didn’t want to save the marriage; he wanted to give me a consolation prize.
He walked out the door, suitcase in hand, believing he was a good guy who had provided his ex-wife with a parting gift. I sat there, clutching the test, realizing that the child growing inside me wasn’t made from love; it was manufactured to be his replacement.
