Chapter 14 - The Cherry-Wood Desk
The basement was cool and smelled of cedar shavings and damp earth. The old cherry-wood desk had belonged to James’s grandfather, a heavy piece of furniture with dovetailed drawers that stuck if you pulled them too fast.
I knelt on the cold concrete floor, my fingers trembling as I reached beneath the bottom shelf of the second drawer. My hand brushed against a small, hidden latch I had never noticed in eleven years of marriage. With a faint click, a false bottom dropped open, revealing a velvet-lined compartment no thicker than a book.
Inside lay a single leather-bound journal and a small, silver-keyed safety deposit box tag.
I opened the journal first. The pages were filled with James’s familiar, blocky handwriting, dating back to the week we got married.
June 12: Clara talked about wanting a daughter today. Her eyes lit up the way they do when she reads poetry. I didn't tell her what the genetic counselor said during our pre-marital screening. I can't. If she knows that her family carries the marker for early-onset neurovascular failure, she’ll never let herself be happy. I’ll carry the weight instead.
November 4: Sam is healthy. Clara is exhausted. The doctor pulled me into the hallway today and said if we try again, we’ll lose her. I agreed immediately. But I saw the empty box in the garage tonight. I saw her standing by the window looking at the neighborhood children. I have to find a way to fix this without breaking her heart.
March 19: The clinic in the city agreed to an off-the-books surrogate cycle using our preserved genetic material from before the diagnosis was finalized. It cost our entire savings, plus the equity line. If Clara ever finds out, she’ll never forgive me for the risk. But a family isn't complete when someone is missing. I’m doing this for her.
The journal entries blurred behind a sudden, heavy rush of hot tears.
He hadn't betrayed me out of deceit or malice. He had lied out of an impossible, desperate, suffocating love—the kind of love that takes all the sharp edges of the world upon itself so the person beside them doesn't have to feel the blade.
May you like
When the front door opened upstairs and James’s heavy boots echoed in the entryway, I was still sitting on the basement floor with the open journal in my lap.
"Clara?" his voice called down the stairwell, laced with immediate anxiety. "Clara, are you down there?"
