She shakes her head, and the realization that there will never be a right time and place for this conversation comes crashing down on her. “Nothing. Thanks for the ride home. We’ll see you guys later.”
“Oh. Okay,” her dad says, nonplussed. “See you later.”
Nancy walks toward the front door. Michael says goodbye to her dad and follows.
Later that night, Michael comes to find her in the nursery. The noise of the hockey game was getting on her nerves, so she left him alone on the couch to come sort baby clothes. She’s passed an hour arranging and rearranging items in the chest of drawers. Her mind is racing and she can’t seem to settle.
“Are you sure you’re okay, Nance?” Michael asks again. He’s standing in the doorway, watching her fuss with a sleeper. “You’ve seemed really off since you got home. Did your mom say something to get to you?”
Nancy takes in her husband’s sandy hair and blue eyes, reflected in the soft light from the bedside table lamp she picked out at Eaton’s a few weeks ago. He’s so handsome, and thoughtful, and she knows she’s lucky to have him. If they have a boy, she hopes he turns out just like his dad.
She looks down at the striped green sleeper in her hands, marvels at how tiny the little feet are. She can hardly believe that in a few weeks she’ll be holding something so small and vulnerable in her arms. Something that she and Michael created together in love.
“Nancy?”
Michael is in the room now, walking toward her with his brow knitted. She steps over to the rocking chair, avoiding him, and settles herself down into it with the usual grunting sigh that now accompanies any kind of exertion.
“What’s wrong? What is it? Is the baby okay?” he asks, kneeling on the rug at her feet.
Nancy is hit with a pang of guilt. “Oh God, yes, the baby is fine. Kicking and moving a lot. It’s not that, Mike. I don’t know. I’m fine. I just got overwhelmed at the shower today, that’s all.”
“Is it? You’ve been quiet and avoiding me all night. I think I know you better than that, Nance.”
Oh, Michael. Do you? Nancy rubs her belly in circles to give her hands something to do.
He rocks back on his feet. “I guess…” he begins, picking at a spot on the carpet before looking up into her eyes. “I guess I’ve just felt for a while like there’s something you’re not telling me. I know you well enough to know there’s something I don’t know, if that makes sense. But I can’t tell if things are just weird because of the pregnancy—I know you don’t feel great—or if there’s something else. Are you having second thoughts about this, or me?”
“No, Mike, of course not.” Nancy reaches for his hand, but his grip is loose in hers.
A shadow crosses his face. “Then why do I feel like I’m on the outside of our relationship looking in?”
Nancy swallows on a tight throat.
“Whatever it is, you can trust me,” he says. “Just tell me what’s going on with you. Let me in.”
Nancy stares down at her husband, considering. She can feel her toes teetering on the edge of truth, but she’s afraid to jump. If she tells him about the adoption, that opens a whole world of questions that she herself can’t yet answer. Michael is practical, straightforward. And he’s close with her parents. She knows he’ll insist she confront them, that the two of them can’t keep this under wraps from her parents for the rest of their lives. And yet, that’s exactly what Nancy’s plan has been. There’s too much on the line. It’s easier for her to keep it to herself. Easier to deny it when she needs to, with no one there to remind her of the truth when she’d rather ignore it.
But she has to give him something.
She can’t tell him about the Janes, and that leaves her with one option. The least threatening one. It’s not the truth that he’s digging for, but it’s still a way to let him in, and hopefully stop any further questioning.
Her mouth has gone dry, but she meets his eyes and says the words anyway. “I had an abortion, Mike. Before I met you.”
He stares back at her. The room is silent.
“You… what?”
“I got pregnant, and I had an abortion. A couple of years before I met you.”
She watches him process the information, emotions sliding across his features one after another. He rises to his feet and starts to pace.
“How did you—Why would you tell me this now? Why didn’t you tell me before?”
“Does it change anything?”
“Well… I don’t know, Nancy! We’ve been together how long? We’re married, we’re having a baby, and the whole time you’ve been keeping something this huge from me?”
“It’s not—” she begins, faltering. “It is huge, but it’s also not, Mike. It doesn’t change anything for you and me.”
“But you didn’t trust me enough before to tell me about this part of your life?”
Nancy hesitates a moment too long.
“Jesus Christ, Nancy! I’m your husband. Do you not trust me?”
“I do, I do! That’s not it—”
“Explain to me how this isn’t a trust issue. Seriously. Explain.”
His features are dark now. Nancy wants to get up and turn on the overhead light. Everything seems more dramatic in the dimness. But she’s frozen in the rocking chair under Michael’s accusatory stare.
“I never told anyone, Mike. Not my parents, my friends, no one.”
“So, it’s not just me you don’t trust. You don’t trust anyone at all, is that right? That’s fucked-up, Nancy.”
“Excuse me?”
An uncharacteristic grimace pinches his mouth. “That’s fucked-up. And let me get this straight: You’ve been pregnant before. You felt sick before, got a positive test before, went through all that before, and you, what, pretended that this was the first time for you?”
“I wasn’t pretending, Mike. It was so different this time. I wanted to be pregnant this time! I can’t even tell you how different it is.”
“Well, I thought this was the first time for both of us, but it turns out you were lying about that. That feels great, Nancy. Really great.” Michael halts in his tracks again, hands on his hips. “What the fuck else have you been lying about?”
The words smack her across the face. She feels a hot flush creep up her neck. There’s no reply she can give him that won’t be another lie.
“I need to…” Michael trails off, runs a hand through his hair. “I need to get out of here. I’ll see you later.”
He turns on his heel and leaves. Nancy listens to his footsteps disappear down the hall. A moment later the front door slams and locks.
Nancy isn’t sure how much time passes while she rocks back and forth in the chair, massaging her belly as the tears run down her cheeks. Their trust was an illusion to begin with, but now even that’s broken. Michael doesn’t trust her, and she sees now that she can’t trust him, either. How would he have reacted if she’d told him about one of her other secrets?
What a stupid move, she thinks. Keep yourself to yourself. Nancy understands now why her parents haven’t told her about the adoption. You can control the internal damage caused by keeping secrets far easier than the external damage. The consequences, as Michael has just shown Nancy, are unpredictable. Lethal.