1. KADENCE

KADENCE

July | Miami, Florida

I feel numb. Staring out of the large pane windows of the hospital room, my hands have finally stopped shaking. I feel empty. Why me? The voices behind me are muffled by the slow thud of my heartbeat. I can’t focus on the medical terms and prognosis of my stay here, so instead, I watch the clouds swirl and form together into soft pillows in a blue sky. My green eyes flicker down and onto a woman being pushed in a wheelchair, her arms wrapping tightly around a blanket, her fingers tracing along chubby cheeks. The man pushing her halts their journey, planting a kiss on top of her head followed by the infant’s. I wince at the family, a haunting picture of what my future should have been.

The voices grow louder and, as if turning a knob on an old radio, they become clearer. “Kadie? Sweetie, are you listening?” My mother’s voice. I wrap the deep gray knit cardigan further around my body like a shield as the new parents disappear from my view.

“ Kadie. ” I can hear the sternness in Janice’s voice as I turn around, purposefully using the nickname she knows I hate.

Doctor Watkins clears his throat, crossing his arms over his chest. “It’s very important that she rests for the next few days. Her body has been through a lot and needs to heal.” His words drip with monotonous sympathy and his brows furrow with a pain he has no right to feel.

“When can I go home?” I ask, glancing between Watkins and my mother.

The doctor sighs, looking down at my chart. “We can discharge her now if you’d like—” He glances towards me once more before turning to Janice. “However, I would recommend that she stays overnight for observation.”

I narrow my eyes as he addresses my mother as if I’m not in the room. Anger brews in my chest and my fingers curl tighter around the woven threads of my cardigan.

“ Doctor , I would really appreciate you addressing me . I lost my child. I didn’t lose my hearing,” I bite.

“Kadence Marie Andrews,” my mother snaps. My eyes never leave the Doctor. I wish I could take a picture of the look on his face, surprised by the sudden conviction in my voice.

“I would like to be discharged now.”

“I don’t think—” Janice begins, staring at me with silent heat in her eyes.

“Take me home or I’ll find another way home.” I cut her off before the gaslighting starts. Before it gives her the chance to convince me this was my fault more than I already feel like it is.

I can’t stay in this hospital room for another night. Constantly being poked and prodded at, arms bruised from the constant IV drips, and exhaustion turning to irritation with every bright-eyed, bushy-tailed nurse that walks into my room.

“Fine. Gather your things.” Janice sighs, pinching the bridge of her nose at my protest, her words laced with bitterness.

The doctor nods, his face twisting in obvious disapproval of my choice, though he doesn’t push the matter. “Right this way, Mrs. Andrews. I’ll have the nurses get the discharge paperwork filled out.”

“Thank you, Doctor.” Janice smiles, the bitterness quickly turning to sugar as she peers up at the man in his mid to late fifties, with salt-and-pepper hair and the perfect salary for my mother’s liking.

My stomach had filled with dread the moment he walked through the door to my room. I knew my mother had spied the lack of a wedding ring on his left hand just by the elated smile that had crept across her face. His hand roams to the small of her back as he pushes her out the door with my mother grinning as another hook has been set.

I roll my eyes and move to sit on the edge of the bed, flinching at the jolt of pain that courses from my core and up through my spine. I hadn’t known it was possible to give birth at 16 weeks, but nobody really expects to have a miscarriage. Nobody expects to be abused by the person they thought loved them, but this is my life now, alone, abused, and enraged, with any plan I had developed over the last few years suddenly up in flames.

The door clicks back open, Janice sauntering in behind it. “Are you ready to leave? I have an appointment—”

A date is what you really mean , I think.

My mother’s dull brown eyes glance down at the knock-off Chanel watch on her wrist. I stand, grab my bag, and throw what few items I have into it. “—I’d really like to be on time and since Jeremy obviously can’t pick you up and you refuse to stay, I’d like to go.”

I stare at my mother as the unbelievable words fly from her mouth. Making it sound as if Jeremy, currently being held at the Miami-Dade County jail, is my fault. Not that I expect him to stay there long; being the Lieutenant of one of the biggest counties in Florida means you make a few friends. Most of them won’t believe that an upstanding officer of the law would ever hurt the woman he claims to love so much. But I know differently. Jeremy Miles is a different person behind closed doors, one with an explosive temper and one that only I was unfortunate enough to meet.

“I’m so sorry my trauma has inconvenienced you, Mother,” I mutter, doing a quick once-over of the room as a nurse walks in with a wheelchair.

“Don’t be ridiculous, Kadie.” My mother sneers.

Jeremy had quickly become my mother’s favorite out of the two of us. Not that it was surprising. Janice is a mother only when she absolutely needs to be, and even then, her motives are questionable. Jeremy’s silver tongue charmed his way into Janice’s heart the first night I introduced them four years ago. Ever since then it’s always been two against one.

The drive from the hospital should only take twenty minutes, but with my mother’s incessant complaining, it feels like hours... I haven’t moved fast enough from the wheelchair to the car seat, then it’s the traffic and, as we pull into my driveway, it’s the sloped concrete that she has to park her precious ’08 Mercedes Benz onto. “You know I hate this driveway, Kadie. You need to move. ” I’m positive she’s speaking about the speed I’m moving to get out of the vehicle and not the actual home itself.

Janice hands me the packet of care instructions and a bag of prescription meds and grins in the rear-view mirror, one hand waving out of the window as she drives off.

“As always, good to see you, Mom,” I mutter, watching the car disappear down the road.

I turn around towards the two-story, white townhome. I dread walking through that blue door, not ready to face the reality of my life from here on out. People talk about skeletons being hidden behind closet doors. Those people are lucky. Closets are small, confined, and the skeletons contained. I have a whole townhome full of skeletons and secrets; so much so that it feels like they ooze from the walls at times.

I push open the door to be greeted by a mess only a tornado could make. Picture frames lie in pieces on the floor. Tiny shards of glass stick up from the thick carpet. The dinner I had made is splattered onto the wall and stains the carpet below. I set the items in my hands down on the table in the entryway. Tears sting my eyes.

It was never supposed to be like this.

Love is never supposed to be like this.

I make my way up the stairs, gripping tightly onto the wooden railing that clings to the narrow hallway. The grief slowly creeps in with every step. The hallway is dark, lit only by the small, blue-and-teal stained-glass window at the other end, its halo falling onto the only closed door to the room I’m terrified to walk into. One that I’m not allowed to be in without him.

Jeremy has controlled every aspect of my life except for the one thing I would not budge on. My home. The very first big purchase of my own and I refused to let him take it from me. I remember the fight we’d had about it. I also remember having to buy four different kinds of concealer to try and hide the bruise under my eye. When he’d apologized, if I can even call it that, he’d promised to let me keep the house. He reminded me every day after I found out I was pregnant that he did so, and to appease his incessant reminders, I told him he could choose the nursery theme. He’d ordered and bought everything you could think of that an infant could need, only letting me in the room when he was home, and for a while, the fighting and the temper had stopped.

I thought things had changed.

My fingers wrap around the metal doorknob, freezing for a moment, almost expecting an open palm to the back of my head for even thinking about touching it. It doesn’t come so I twist the handle, pushing open the door and letting the stream of sunshine light up the pale blue and yellow features. It illuminates the small safari animals painted on the walls; their eyes watchful and full of disappointment.

I feel tears begin to stream down my cheeks as I pick up a small stuffed giraffe with button eyes. It’s the only thing I had been allowed to pick out for the room. I hug it to my chest, setting myself down into the rocking chair housed in the corner. Every raging emotion I willed myself to hold in while in the hospital finally begins to spill over. It feels like someone turned on the faucet and set my cup under the tap to let it flow.

This isn’t a home anymore and the longer I sit, the more I realize that it hasn’t been a home for a while. It will never be my home again.