She scowled at him but relaxed into his arms.
I braced myself for her smile. Because it was forced, full of sadness. It was ice water to my bones. Lucy didn’t know she was doing it. It would break her heart if she did. It was a smile she put on for me because she was scared I couldn’t handle anything else from her. I was still to be treated with kid gloves and Polly gloves.
It hit me when her eyes dimmed a little, losing the brightness they’d had moments ago.
It hit me. Right in the chest. But it wasn’t hard since there was a constant gaping and bleeding hole right above where my heart should be. Despite the beautiful words and promises Heath made last night. Despite the fact I fell asleep in his arms and woke up to his lips on my forehead and him murmuring goodbye, promising to see me soon.
It would’ve been nice if such things could heal that big bleeding hole.
It only dulled the edges of the pain.
So obviously I turned on a megawatt smile to hide it.
“Don’t you two have like, jobs or homes to go to?” I asked cheerfully, walking toward the kitchen and snatching my reusable coffee cup from the counter.
“I don’t have a job since they kept sending me home,” Lucy huffed.
“Babe, you couldn’t fit behind your fuckin’ desk,” Keltan said dryly.
“Make one more remark about my size,” Lucy shot. “I dare you, soldier boy.”
I smiled as I filled up my cup with hot water and tea.
There was a pause.
“Yeah, I thought so,” Lucy said. “Keltan owns his place and the whole point of owning a business is so you don’t actually have to go to work.”
“Not the point of owning a business, at all, babe,” Keltan cut in.
“How is it that you have the bravery to continue baiting a pregnant woman with access to a knife?” she asked curiously.
Keltan chuckled. “Lucy, I confiscated your knife about three months into your pregnancy when you threatened to slash the tires of the guy who cut in front of you at Taco Bell.”
I fastened the lid and grinned at Keltan. “Good call.”
He grinned back at me.
He was one of the only people whose grin was almost genuine. Maybe because of what he’d experienced from war. Because there were parts of him that had been broken and he knew that there was no healing them by treating me like glass. I was sure Lucy and Rosie knew this too, since they had experience with pain, but they didn’t want to admit it.
Lucy rolled her eyes at him. “Whatever, dude,” she muttered. “If this kid’s a girl then I’ll be sure to hide all of the firearms on her first date, see whose laughing then.”
Keltan’s eyes darkened. “No fuckin’ way is my daughter dating until she’s forty,” he hissed.
I laughed.
It was almost genuine.
“We’re here because we thought we’d take you out for breakfast,” Lucy said, deciding to go back to ignoring her husband. “This new healthy vegan place just opened in Santa Monica and it’s supposed to not actually be terrible.”
Right.
This was just one in a long line of excuses that had one or both of the two of these people at my door.
It was part of the ‘wait for Polly to fall apart’ schedule.
I didn’t blame them. Firstly, they loved and cared about me. And second, I was Polly.
So there were impromptu breakfasts, shopping trips to decorate nurseries, movie dates. Lunch dates.
And in Rosie’s case, a day at the gun range. Or she’d planned it to be a day, but it had to get cut very short when I refused to touch a gun.
“As much as I love a good vegan restaurant, and I love watching you trying to eat vegan food without insulting someone’s fashion choices, and I do,” I smirked at Lucy, “I’ve got a class to go to.”
Lucy’s pretend smile dimmed immediately.
“What?”
“A yoga class,” I clarified, moving across the room to strap my yoga mat across my shoulder. “It’s part of my teaching certification.”
“No, you can’t go to yoga,” she said.
“Why not?” I asked, meeting her eyes. “Because I’m meant to be passed from one person to another, to be coddled and protected from the very world that has already done the damage?” I smiled. “No, Luce. As much as I appreciate and love you for everything you’ve done, and I do, I need to get back to my life.”
I hadn’t told Heath about this.
Not because I didn’t think he’d let me go. I knew he’d support me moving back toward my old life, even if I was just going through the motions. I hadn’t told him because I was scared of where that conversation would lead. Terrified it would lead to somewhere I couldn’t control my emotions. Somewhere too close to the truth, the past.
“There’s no rush,” Lucy said, stepping forward. “I know you’re Polly and you’ve been in a rush to do everything including leave the womb six weeks early, but this is something that you do not need to rush.” Her voice was only slightly more than a whisper when she took my hands in hers.
“I do,” I whispered back. “Because rushing was my life. It kept me sane. Kept me, me. Staying still doesn’t work for me, Luce. It works for you and it warms my soul that it does, but if I stand still for much longer I’ll scream.”
Lucy gauged my words. With shimmering eyes and pain in her face.
She squeezed my hands again.
“Okay. I get it,” she said finally. “I don’t get the whole yoga thing, it sounds fucking insane, but I get the rest. And I do kind of get we’ve been hovering. I know it’s selfish of us to suffocate you like that.”
“It’s not suffocating,” I argued.
She leaned in to kiss my forehead. “But it’s not helping. Not really. I should’ve seen it earlier. You need people around when most people need space, so it stands to reason when most people need company, you need space.”
“No,” I whispered. “Just peace.”
As if it were as simple as leaving the apartment and teaching yoga.
But it was a start.
I should’ve expected Heath to be waiting in the parking lot for me.
I didn’t. Because even after a month of having him come home to me, fall asleep with me and always be there, I wasn’t used to it. I wasn’t letting myself become used to it.
Not when it was temporary.
My muscles ached slightly from the class, the instructor pushing us past our limits because “you’re not going to be able to take your students from your comfort zone if you’re still residing in yours.”
I liked it. Challenging myself in a safe environment. Even if I was prodding at doors that rattled when I opened my mind up in the practice. I knew the more I practiced, the more dangerous it would be. Yoga was more about the discovery of the mind than the stretching of the limbs, after all.
My skin prickled at that realization.
If I continued doing this, I’d have no choice but to face my demons. Luckily, those thoughts didn’t find traction, since Heath was pushing off his car—which he was leaning on very well—and striding toward me.
He didn’t give me a moment to speak before he pulled me into his arms with a gentleness that was characteristic of the way he touched me now. It was funny, people only tended to treat others with tenderness after they’d been broken.