Chapter 11 - THE ENVELOPE
The white envelope remained in Carlos’s desk drawer.
For months.
He could not throw it away.
It contained:
the first ultrasound,
the anemia result,
bleeding precautions,
and the sentence:
Viable intrauterine pregnancy at time of examination.
Viable.
At time of examination.
Carlos hated the phrase.
Mariana eventually found him holding it.
“Why keep that?”
“I don’t know.”
“You think it proves something.”
He looked at her.
“Doesn’t it?”
“What?”
“That there was a baby.”
Mariana sat beside him.
“We know.”
Carlos looked down.
“Mom didn’t.”
“She knows now.”
“No. I mean she didn’t know that morning.”
Mariana understood.
Carlos had turned the envelope into another argument against himself.
If only he had left it on the table.
If only he had explained.
If only he had stayed home.
Retrospective bargaining.
Their grief counselor named it.
The mind offering imaginary trades with the past.
May you like
Carlos could learn from what he failed to do.
He could not reopen that morning.
