Sever by Lauren DeStefano Page B

curled up in the backseat with her head on my shoulder. I can tell that she’s awake by the way she tenses when we hit bumps, but she doesn’t make a sound, and I know what’s keeping her subdued.
    When she’d gone into premature labor, she’d been unconscious, hanging to life by a thread. But the doctors had chemicals to do the work for her. Dilate the cervix. Loosen the muscles. Force everything out. I remember from one of Cecily’s childbirth books a drawing of a fetus at four months. In the drawing it was sucking its thumb, eyes closed, knees curled, and ankles crossed. Even when Cecily began to get stronger a few days ago, she asked me to stay with her. I was at her bedside when she and Linden asked the doctor about their stillborn child—if they could see it, if it had been a boy or a girl. The doctor said it was long gone, donated to the hospital research lab, which would take anything it found worthy of analysis. The doctor said it should be a comfort to them, knowing their loss might help find a cure.
    I remember that both of their expressions went blank. They were so bereft already that there wasn’t room for new grief. Linden’s hands were shaking when he held his palms to his temples.
    They’ve both endured the worst of it with wayward defiance. The silence between them is like a dam about to burst.
    The car squeals to a stop.
    “Wait for me to get the umbrella,” Linden says. “Cecily, love, pull your hood up.”
    She sits up, groggy, half of her hair rumpled. I help her with the hood of her coat. “We’re here?” she murmurs.
    “Yes,” I say. “And you can go to bed now. I even came by this morning and washed the dust out of the sheets.” I don’t tell her about the blood.
    “She did,” Reed says. “Who knew the washing machine actually worked? I’ve been using it to store food.”
    “I made the bed.” I frown and push the hair from her face. “The sheets are tucked in extra snug, the way you like them.” It was a pathetic gesture to comfort her, too little in the grand scheme of all she’s been through.
    “Thanks,” she yawns. Her head tilts sleepily. Linden pulls up the hood of Bowen’s plasticky raincoat and hands him to Reed before helping Cecily out of the car, holding an umbrella over her. Once we’re inside, he tries to carry her, but she brushes him off.
    “Wait,” Linden says, but she moves down the hallway ahead of him. There’s been a distance behind her eyessince her heart stopped that night. She somnambulates beyond human reach, ignoring voices that call after her. She has stopped talking about her nightmares, but she never truly awakens from them.
    Now her fingertips drag along the wall. Her steps are slow, shaky, but purposeful.
    Reed, who has just pulled the cord that illuminates the stairwell with flickering light, steps aside to let her pass. She stops in front of him, more than a head shorter than he is, and meets his eyes. “I’m sorry for how I acted,” she says. “I was awful, and you’ve been nothing but generous. Thank you for letting me stay in your home.”
    And Reed, who muttered angry things whenever she left the room, softens. “Think nothing of it, kid,” he says. Cecily gives him something like a smile and then pushes herself up the creaky stairs.
    In the bedroom she collapses facedown on the mattress, and Linden removes her muddy shoes. She turns onto her back, limp as a rag doll, watching with dull eyes as he unbuttons her coat, slides it from her arms, and rubs warmth into her fingers.
    He’s murmuring nice things to her the whole time, saying that she’s important and that she’s strong, but she doesn’t react, not even when he tells her he loves her.
    And then I hear her slight gasp, see the way her bottom lip curls back with a sob. The dam is finally breaking.
    When Linden peels away the covers, I backpedal from the doorway and into the hall. They should bealone. Husband and wife. There’s no room for an awkward, unmarried