Two Weeks (The Baxter Family #5)(10)

Bloomington was a fresh start for Aaron and her. No well-meaning friends at church asking whether they’d thought of in vitro fertilization or some special diet meant to aid fertility. No social workers calling to see if they’d foster a teenage runaway for a week in lieu of a baby. No one feeling sorry for them.

Poor Aaron and Lucy. Trying ten years to have a baby and still nothing.

Lucy crossed the upstairs hallway and stopped at the room. The nursery. Seven years ago back in Georgia they’d filled a bedroom like this one. Same crib with the pastel baby animal sheets. Same dresser with the untouched teddy bears that lined the top. Same changing table and pale gray rocking recliner. Same Winnie-the-Pooh curtains framing the windows.

Setting up the nursery again here in their new home had been Aaron’s idea. A declaration of faith, he called it.

Aaron used the room for his Bible time each morning. If infertility was a boat tossed about on a stormy sea, Aaron was the one willing to step out. Willing to walk on the waves. He believed to the core of his soul that God would bring them a baby. When the two of them prayed about it, Aaron believed so completely he actually thanked God. Time and time again.

Without any signs of a child.

Lucy leaned against the doorframe and stared into the lifeless room. The Atlanta house had been a ranch. Everything on one floor. Because of the layout, she could avoid the hallway that led to the nursery. But not here.

And so every day since they’d unpacked three months ago, Lucy had to walk by this spot. Most of the time she didn’t stop, didn’t look in. Tried not to think about it. Especially given the job she was doing.

Pediatric nurse at Bloomington Hospital.

She stared at the crib and tried to picture it, a baby lying in the pretty bed. A nine-month-old pulling herself up and calling out for them. Mommy . . . Daddy.

Ghost voices that would never come to be.

A sigh made its way through her and filled the silence. God had either banned them from the child-rearing list or forgotten about them. Lucy couldn’t understand why Aaron still prayed. Still believed.

The difference between the two of them was becoming a great divide. Lucy should have been angry at him for clinging to his faith after so much disappointment and heartache. But she couldn’t bring herself to be upset.

Instead, she felt sorry for him.

With their views on faith and fertility growing further apart, Lucy felt more alone with every passing day. The only glimmer of hope she’d found since moving to Bloomington was a friend she’d met at the hospital. A pediatrician who made the rounds and had somehow noticed her. The sadness inside her.

A doctor named Brooke Baxter West.

Lucy turned away from the nursery and walked downstairs. Thirty minutes till her shift began, and she liked to be early. Liked to walk around the unit and smile into the faces of the babies. Where she could imagine what it would be like if one day the baby was hers.

Twenty minutes later, after a coffee stop, Lucy got off the elevator at the hospital’s second-floor administrative offices. Aaron worked here, an assistant administrator. The president of the hospital was quoted as saying Aaron was one of the brightest new faces on the team, and that they expected great things from him in the future.

Lucy felt the same way about her husband’s professional future.

It was their personal future that worried her.

How could she feel hopeful about their marriage when she disappointed him every twenty-eight days? All the fertility tests on the market could never determine whose fault it was. Why they couldn’t get pregnant. But Lucy knew. It was her . . . it had to be. Hers was the body not making a baby. No matter how she prayed or ate or believed. No matter how often they tried.

Her period came.

She took slow steps down the hall toward Aaron’s office. She wore her white nurse’s scrubs, her name tag firmly in place. Her pale blond hair pulled back in a ponytail. She held both cups of coffee in her hands. A peace offering for the way her discouragement layered dark clouds over their relationship.

She used her elbow to give a quiet knock at her husband’s office door, and a few seconds later she heard him approach. God, if You’re there, help me love him. Please. This isn’t his fault.

Aaron opened it and smiled at her. “Hey, beautiful.” He took both coffees from her, set them down on his desk, and then gently eased her into his arms. “What a surprise.”

She waited a minute in his embrace, then she shut the door behind her and nodded to the coffee. “For you.”

“Mmm.” His eyes found hers. “Caramel Machi-Frappiato with extra Breve Espresso?”

“Exactly.” The slightest laugh came from her. “Black coffee never sounded so good.”

“I try to sound like I belong.” He picked up the cup with his name and breathed in the smell before setting it down again. “You know, part of the Java on Main Club.”

“Right.” She angled her head and looked at him. He was still blond, like her. The two of them stayed in shape so that when—if—a baby came they’d be ready. Not too old. Not yet.

He leaned against the corner of his desk and searched her face. “What’s wrong?”

“My period.” She took a slow breath and sank against the wall. “I got it this morning.”

The familiar disappointment flashed across his face, the way it had so many times in the past. And like before he did what he could to cover it up. “Baby, that’s okay.” He held out his arms, a smile lifting the corners of his mouth. “We have time.”