PART 4
Two weeks later, our daughter was born.
Three weeks early.
Healthy.
Loud.
Absolutely furious about being removed from the womb.
When the nurse placed her on my chest, I stared at her tiny face and immediately began crying.
She had Marcus’s mouth.
Not metaphorically.
Not in the way grieving people search desperately for resemblance.
She actually had his mouth.
That slightly crooked lower lip.
The same crease underneath it.
I touched her cheek.
“Hi, June.”
Yes.
June.
Marcus had surrendered the argument four days before he died.
Mostly.
He had written on our kitchen whiteboard:
JUNE NAOMI COLE.
Underneath it:
FINAL OFFER. NO FURTHER NEGOTIATION.
I had taken a photo.
So our daughter became June Naomi Cole.
Denise met her the following afternoon.
She stood outside my hospital room looking suddenly smaller than I remembered.
“Can I come in?”
That mattered.
For the first time in weeks, she was asking instead of demanding.
I nodded.
She approached the bed.
When she saw June, her face collapsed.
“Oh.”
Just that.
Oh.
I handed the baby to her.
Denise cradled her carefully.
“Hello, little girl.”
June opened one eye.
Denise laughed through tears.
“Your daddy used to look at me exactly like that when I woke him for school.”
I almost corrected her.
Almost said she was four days old and probably just squinting at the light.
But I didn’t.
Because for one moment, Denise wasn’t fighting me.
She was simply missing her son.
And I understood that.
For almost a month afterward, things improved.
Denise brought groceries.
She asked before visiting.
She washed bottles.
Once, she sat with June while I took my first uninterrupted shower since giving birth.
I began to wonder whether the worst had passed.
Then one Sunday afternoon, I walked from the hallway into my living room and heard Denise speaking to Marcus’s older sister, Carla.
June was in Denise’s arms.
Carla whispered, “Do you really think Tessa pressured him?”
Denise looked down at my daughter.
“I think Marcus was exhausted. I think he wanted peace. And Tessa had strong opinions.”
I stopped walking.
Carla noticed me first.
Her face changed.
Denise turned.
“Tessa.”
“Give me June.”
She froze.
“Tessa, we were only talking.”
“Give me my daughter.”
Denise stood and handed June to me.
I held her against my chest.
“She cannot understand us,” Denise said.
“Not yet.”
“Tessa—”
“But one day she will.”
I looked directly at her.
“And I will not let my daughter grow up hearing that her father was too weak to know his own mind.”
Denise’s eyes filled with tears.
“You have no idea what this is like.”
I nearly laughed.
“You keep saying that.”
“You still have him.”
I stared at her.
She pointed at June.
“You wake up and look at her face. You see him.”
My anger stopped.
Underneath Denise’s cruelty was something I finally understood.
Not accepted.
Understood.
She was jealous of a baby.
Not because she hated June.
Because June represented a connection to Marcus that Denise believed she had lost.
I lowered my voice.
“You think I still have Marcus because I have his daughter?”
Denise said nothing.
“I don’t.”
My throat tightened.
“I have June.”
She looked confused.
“June is not Marcus.”
“But she’s part of him.”
“She’s part of me too.”
I adjusted the blanket around my daughter.
“And more importantly, she is herself.”
Denise looked away.
Her next words came out like a confession.
“When Marcus was born, he was all I had.”
I waited.
“When his father left, I built everything around him. School. Work. Holidays. Everything.”
Her voice broke.
“I don’t know what my life is supposed to be now.”
I swallowed.
For the first time, I felt sorry for her without excusing her.
“You could have had me.”
She looked up.
I continued.
“For nine years, I was your family too.”
Denise’s mouth opened.
“You came to my ultrasound appointments. You held my hand after my miscarriage. You were sitting beside me when the fertility clinic called and told us the third round had failed.”
She began crying.
“You were not only Marcus’s mother to me.”
I looked at June.
“But after he died, you decided hurting me was easier than admitting you were angry at him.”
Denise shook her head.
“I wasn’t angry at Marcus.”
“Yes, you were.”
“No.”
“You were angry because he chose something you hated.”
Silence.
“And you couldn’t argue with him anymore because he was gone.”
Her face crumpled.
“So you argued with me instead.”
Denise covered her mouth.
Carla quietly stood.
“I think I should go.”
Neither of us answered.
After she left, Denise sat down.
For a long time, neither of us spoke.
Then I said, “Marcus knew this might happen.”
Denise looked up sharply.
I walked toward his desk.
Opened the drawer.
And took out the black case.
