The Breaking Point (24 page)

A few moments later, the doctor straightened and turned to them. He put his hands in the pockets of his coat and shrugged. “I’m sorry, Mr. and Mrs. Roman, but it appears your baby has no blood flow.”

Renee heard the words but didn’t understand them. No blood flow? What did that mean?

When they just stared at him in silence, he cleared his throat. “What I mean is there’s no heartbeat. Your baby is dead.”

Renee heard the screaming and wanted to tell whoever was doing it to just shut up, to get out and let her think. It wasn’t until Gabe gripped her by the shoulders and shook her that it dawned on her: The screams were coming from her.

She looked at Gabe and their gazes locked—and Renee knew what it was to look into the face of utter despair. She reached for him then, and they held each other, their sobs and tears mixing in that tiny terrible room. The doctor muttered something about giving them time alone and stepped out, the ultrasound technician on his heels.

She wanted to go with them. It wasn’t fair! Why did they just get to walk out of the room, to leave the grief and pain behind? The answer was as swift as it was painful: Because the pain wasn’t theirs. It belonged to someone else. To her. And she would never be able to escape it.

She hugged herself, aware of Gabe holding her, speaking words of comfort between his sobs. But it was as though she were seeing him, hearing him, through some kind of gauzy veil. As though he weren’t really there. Or maybe it was that
she
wasn’t there. Maybe she’d gone someplace else, someplace where she was alone. Safe from reality.

But she’d never be safe again. She knew it—and hated knowing it. Hated knowing that life would never be right again. Not now. How could it be when her baby—her precious gift from God that had filled her life even more than it
filled her belly—was gone. She would never hold him in her arms, never sing him lullabies, never press her face to his soft head and breathe in the fragrance of creation. Her baby was dead.

She cried out against the truth. What had she done wrong? Why had God taken him away? And why hadn’t He taken her as well?

Gabe stood in the doorway of the baby’s room, staring through the darkness with unseeing eyes. Dead. His son was dead.

They had been right. It was a boy. The doctor had told them that—then gone on about induced labor, a D & C. None of it made any sense. Not even when they wheeled Renee away. Not even when they brought her back after the procedure, and she looked at him, her eyes as hollow and empty as her womb.

Gabe’s fist slammed into the wall.
Nothing
made sense! How could a baby be there one minute, and then gone the next?

“These things sometimes happen, and we never know why,” the doctor had said as though they were discussing why a tire went flat on a car or why a faucet continued to drip after it had been fixed a dozen times.

Like it was nothing.

Like the baby—his baby … his
son!
—was nothing.

“Lord Jesus,
why?”
His scream, as much protest as prayer, sliced the stillness permeating their apartment. It didn’t matter. Renee was out cold. The doctor had given her a sedative of some sort. As responsive as she was to medications, he could turn their apartment on end and she would sleep through it. He’d even been the one who had to call her parents, to tell them about the baby.

They wept with him, prayed with him. Told him they loved him. That phone call had been the one spot of light in a very dark day.

Gabe glanced back at their bedroom door. Renee would never even know he’d left her side, come into the baby’s room.

The baby’s room …

He reached for the switch and flicked on the lights. He and Renee had spent so much time here, painting, decorating, making everything just right. Perfect. For their child.

They’d talked and laughed and dreamed.

He never should have let himself trust. Never should have let his heart break free from the numbing shelter it had slid into that night Renee told him she was pregnant. But when he’d felt that movement inside her, known it was their child growing …

He could no more stop his reaction than he could stop the sun from rising. His heart burst into life with an excitement and purpose he’d never known before. He was going to be a father! And as that fact planted itself deep in his heart, he made himself and his child a promise. He would be the best father a kid ever had. The kind of father he’d always wanted. A guy like Renee’s dad. And one day his child would talk about him the way Renee talked about her folks—with shining eyes that spoke of love and respect.

What a fool he’d been!

He should have known better. Shouldn’t have let himself feel … trust … believe. His fisted hands ached to strike out. To crush something the way he was being crushed. His gaze scanned the room, halting when it fell on the beautiful illustrated children’s Bible he and Renee had chosen together.

Gabe forced his leaden feet to move. The Bible lay open on the small table next to the rocker. Renee must have been sitting there, reading, thinking about rocking their baby.

At the thought, Gabe’s knees gave way and he lowered
himself into the rocker. He reached for the Bible, cradled it in his trembling hands.
Please. Speak to me. Give me peace …

He looked down, let his eyes roam the page.

Don’t be afraid. God loves you and will take care of you. If even a tiny sparrow falls to the ground, God knows. He cares.

Emotion grappled at Gabe’s throat, choking him. His fingers gripped the edges of the Bible, even as his mind and heart struggled to grip the words he read.

And He cares for you even more. He has numbered every hair on your head. He loves you more than anything.

The words pierced Gabe’s heart, and he closed his eyes with a groan. He wanted to believe. To trust. He wanted to lay his head in God’s lap and know He would make everything right. But that was impossible. Only one thing would make it right, and it was too late.

His baby was dead. Not even God could change that.

Gabe jumped up and flung the Bible across the room.

“Why did You do this? If You love me, if You care for me, how could You take him from me? I thought he was the reason for all of this … that he was why You brought Renee into my life, why we ended up together. But now … what’s the point? What’s the stinking point of any of this?”

A harsh laugh escaped him. There wasn’t a point. Not to his marriage. Not to his life.

Not even to God.
If there even is a God.

Gabe went cold. No God? Did he really believe that?

He stepped back from the thought, spinning when he bumped into something hard. The crib. Gabe lifted a hand and ran it across the smooth wood. Images flashed through his mind—pictures of him and Renee choosing the wood, planing it, finishing it … the careful way they’d followed the plans, making sure every piece fit just so … the excitement he felt as the crib took shape, transformed from a pile of wood into something beautiful. Something they’d made together.

Like their baby.

His fingers convulsed on the crib, and with a roar of agony he whirled, running to the closet in the hallway. He flung the door open and jerked out the baseball bat he’d had since he was a kid.

His determined steps echoed in the dark hallway as he moved back to the baby’s room. He didn’t hesitate as he walked through the doorway. He lifted the bat high and brought it down, felt the impact of wood on wood jolt through his body. Again he raised it and swung, and again, and again …

He didn’t stop until the crib lay in a pile at his feet. Broken, shattered, fit only for the trash heap.

Just like his dreams.

Renee lay in bed, listening. She didn’t have the energy to open her eyes. Wouldn’t have done so even if she did. She liked the darkness.

She jumped when Gabe cried out, heard his anguish—and wondered at what she felt. Nothing.

Her heart was as empty as her womb.

Then, when the sound of furious pounding—of wood splintering, giving way—filled the apartment, she turned her face to her pillow, longing for the oblivion the doctor had promised her when he handed her the bottle of pills.

“One should do,” he told her.

She’d taken two. But even that wasn’t enough to keep her in the darkness, not totally. Her lids squeezed tight in a vain effort to halt the scalding tears, but she felt them push free, flow down her face. She dug her fists into the covers.
Please, God, this has to be a bad dream. It can’t be real.
Her groggy mind embraced that thought, clutched it close. That was it! This was all a dream. A nightmare. There
was no way she could lose her baby. No way God would let that happen!

All she had to do was wake up, and everything would be fine.

And if it’s not a dream?

Then she hoped she never woke up again.

S
PRING
1985

PLEASE, RENEE … DON’T BE AWAKE.

Gabe stared at the stoplight, fingers tapping the steering wheel. He couldn’t believe he’d been called out again. That made five times since he got home from work tonight. If it happened again, he was taking a cot and just staying there for the night.

Twelve-thirty in the morning and he was finally heading home. He shook his head. What a day. Work was bad enough, but if he had to see that sad, puppy-dog expression on Renee’s face once more today he’d scream.

Be in bed, Renee. Asleep.

Yeah, right.

He pulled a cigarette from the pack in his pocket, then pushed in the cigarette lighter. Ten to one, she’d be sitting there when he walked in. Ready to talk. To do something. To be together.

The woman was driving him nuts.

The lighter popped out, and he grabbed it, holding it to the cigarette, taking long draws until he felt his muscles start to ease. The light turned, and he drove through the intersection.

Relax. You’re just tired. It’s been a long day.

Yes, he was tired. But not from work. He was tired of trying to be patient and understanding.

You knew what Renee was like when you married her. Knew how important being together was to her.

Yeah, but he hadn’t realized he couldn’t have even five minutes to himself without feeling guilty! And what on God’s green earth made her think he wanted to do any of the things she suggested? This last one was the worst. A jigsaw puzzle? Nobody did those anymore. Where did she come up with this stuff? Okay, so her parents did puzzles together. So Renee liked doing them. Hey, to each his own. But did he have to do what she wanted just because they were married? If she wanted to go do stuff, go, have fun, great. Just don’t expect him to tag along.

He was her husband, not her playmate. Or her babysitter. And if she didn’t give him some space soon, he’d tell her so.

Not a good idea.

Gabe grimaced. He didn’t want to hurt Renee, and he was pretty sure he would if he let his frustration get the better of him. He sighed, squeezing his fingers on the steering wheel so tight that his knuckles went white.

Let her be in bed, Lord. Let her be asleep. She needs the rest.
He drew in a heavy sigh.
And I need a break.

Renee pulled her knees to her chest and looked at the clock. Again.

Three minutes later than the last time she looked.

She sighed and uncurled from the couch, standing to
stretch. She hated nights like this, when Gabe no sooner got home than he was called out again. The money from his new job at the hospital was nice—she had no idea hospitals paid their building maintenance workers so well. But she really didn’t like him being on call every third week. It wouldn’t be so bad, of course, if they seldom called him. But they called
all
the time.

Tonight he’d been called back in to deal with one crisis after another. This last call came barely fifteen minutes after he got home from the last one. So off he went, leaving her alone.

Again.

As he’d pulled open the door of their apartment, ready to head down the stairs to the outside door, he turned back to her. “Don’t wait up for me this time, Renee. It’s late. Just get some sleep, okay?”

She nodded, but they both knew she’d wait up. She always did.

Why should that bother him? What was wrong with a wife waiting up for her husband? Sometimes Gabe acted as if he could barely stand being around her. As though everything she said and did irritated him.

Other times …

She pressed a hand to her burning eyes. She was tired. Seemed as though she never got enough sleep, but then, it was hard to do so with the nightmares. She’d lost count of the number of nights Gabe had shaken her awake because she was crying or screaming. Every time she collapsed against him, and he’d hold her. Talk to her. Sometimes he read the Bible or sang to her. Then there were the stories. She loved it when he lulled her to sleep with one of his tales of adventure, where the good guy always won and the romance was pure and uncomplicated.