I lean my back against the wall next to the crib and stare off into space. Olivia blamed herself for losing the baby. I know now that’s why she kept apologizing to me the day she told me she’d been pregnant. That’s why she told me she felt guilty. She blamed herself and I fed her fears by accusing her of killing our baby. I fucking looked right at her and called her a murderer. I told her not to speak because I couldn’t stand the sound of her voice spewing more lies. She was never lying, not once. Instead of forcing her to tell me everything, I let her keep the pain and guilt bottled up inside her. I knew she wasn’t telling me everything, but I never thought it would be something like this.

“The drug your mother gave her caused her labor to progress so rapidly that she wasn’t able to get an epidural. Olivia was in labor for a total of ten hours, Cole. For ten hours, she screamed and she cried and she called your name.”

I clench my hands into my hair and squeeze as hard as I can. “STOP! Please, I can’t…”

“Fuck you, Cole! She was alone! She was fucking alone and scared and in so much pain. Garrett and I were out of town and we couldn’t get to her. I had the doctor videoconference me in just so she wouldn’t feel like she didn’t have anyone there for her. I saw it all and Goddammit, you’re going to hear it all!” Parker shouts. “She was so fucking exhausted, but she kept going. Her hair was plastered to her face with sweat and her body was shaking, but she kept going because she knew it would all be worth it in the end. I helped her count through the contractions and I told her everything would be okay, but it wasn’t okay! That beautiful, dark-haired little boy came out of her and the room was completely silent. Do you have any idea what it’s like to sit there, waiting for your baby to make a sound, to scream and live and breathe, but nothing happens? Your body is so fucking tired and in so much pain all you want to do is cry, but you can’t because everything you have, everything you are is wrapped up in the tiny little bundle they’ve placed in your arms but is struggling to breathe because his bronchial tubes aren’t mature enough yet.”

I slide down the wall until I hit the floor, not even trying to hide my sobs. They wrack my body and roar out of me with each word that Parker shouts.

“I watched her run her fingers through the hair on his little head before they snatched him out of her arms and started CPR. It wasn’t until that very moment she realized something was wrong. I can’t get her fucking screams of agony out of my head, Cole. I can’t. She cried and she begged them to save him and, I swear to God, it was the worst fucking sound in the world. While they hooked him up to oxygen and pumped his little chest, she just sobbed and told him she loved him and begged him not to leave her. I was helpless. I couldn’t do anything but sit there in that fucking hotel room and watch her heart break in front of me on a fucking computer screen.”

I hear Parker sniffle and I wish I had it in me to comfort her, but I don’t. I have nothing left. There’s a giant, gaping hole where my heart used to be. I don’t understand why my fucking chest hurts so bad when there’s nothing left inside it. My tears are falling fast and my throat aches so bad I can hardly swallow.

“I didn’t even realize something else was wrong,” Parker continues. “I was so focused on the crowd of people hovering around the bassinet, willing him to take a breath that I didn’t notice all the blood. Jesus, there was so much blood. When the doctors started racing around the room, shouting orders and yelling for help, that’s when I saw it. It was practically pouring out of her. The bed and the whole bottom half of her was covered in blood and they couldn’t get it to stop. I watched her head flop back onto the bed and the heart monitor flat lined. I screamed and one of the nurses finally realized I was still on video. She ran over to the computer, hit a button and my scream went dark. I had to take a four hour flight, not knowing if she was dead or alive.”

I watched King and Dragon die, knowing in my heart that would be the worst fucking moment of my life, but I was wrong. I feel dead inside, completely numb outside of the ache in my head from the tears I can’t seem to stop. I keep replaying the scenes Parker described over and over in my head. I can see Olivia holding our son in her arms, screaming for him to breathe as they snatch him away. I have no idea how Olivia managed to get up and go on day after day. I didn’t live through it and I want to die. Her strength humbles me. Olivia offering me her heart and her body after I walked away and left her to go through hell alone is a miracle that I’ll never understand and don’t deserve. Recalling the look on her face after I accused her of killing our baby, I realize that I’m the Vargas who finally destroyed Olivia. Nothing my family did to her could’ve hurt as much as what I’ve done. I ruined her.

This beautiful, amazing, strong woman who went through so much… I took all of that good and I wrecked it. She’ll never forget that I believed my mother’s lies, accepting her twisted version of the truth as fact without giving Olivia an opportunity to defend herself. She’ll never forgive me for the things I said to her or the way I used her body in spite and anger. I don’t deserve her forgiveness, anyway. I hurt her once and I’ll never forgive myself for that, but this time, I broke her. I’ve spent my entire life trying to outrun my family’s legacy, but as it turns out, I’m exactly fucking like them. I deserve to suffer, imagining in my mind the pain she went through, knowing all the while it’s only a fraction of what she felt and will never be enough.