BEAUTIFUL MESS [Book 2] | MIKHAIAH

10

I rubbed my back as I returned from my latest shift in the Obstetrics Ward late in May. My second-to-last rotation involved a lot of poking about in vaginas. Most of those vaginas were full of babies on their way out, the rest had babies still being grown in preparation for the great wide world. While the obstetrician, I was studying under had a convenient stool to use as he assessed various things involving lubrication, I had to lean over his shoulder. Eight hours of that, and I was ready for a lumbar transplant.

After splurging on fast food, I returned home, tossing my keys in the bowl near the door and made a beeline to the fridge. Snatching out a cheap beer and flinging the bottle-top to who knows where, I slouched into the sofa and turned on the television. It was game night, and while the Vikings weren't playing, I was happy to sit and stare at anything.

Amaia came in when I was on my second beer. She made a noise of disgust when she found the bottle caps on the kitchen counter.

"Mikaila, for God's sake, the trash can is right there." She shoved the caps into the bin with gusto. As the bin flapped back and forth, she spotted my dinner on the coffee table. "McDonald's? Really? Do you have any idea of the number of chemicals in that?"

I let my head drop forward. It made all the muscles from my coxus to my brain cramp. "Aiah, just don't. Not tonight."

"Don't what? Make sure you eat nutritiously?"

"Yeah. Exactly. You're not my mother, so quit dictating what I can put in my mouth."

She scoffed. "If you had your way, you'd eat grease-soaked cardboard for the rest of your life."

"So what?" I said, slamming my beer bottle on the coffee table and standing to face her. "So what? It's Friday. I'm tired. I felt like taking a break from the kale fetish thing you're on. Big deal." It wasn't often I spoke to her like this, but in the past few weeks, it was becoming more frequent. We had gone from the heady rush of my pediatric heart surgery to a pair of grouchy, bickering women the warmer the weather became.

The pressure of study and the rotations was getting to us both, and for me, that meant having little patience for being told what to eat, or how to scrub the toilet, or what side of the cupboard I was supposed to stack the plates and bowls. So I mixed it up one time. It didn't stop the world from turning. I pursed my lips and rubbed my hand over my eyes.

I didn't like this version of us, and I especially didn't like this version of me.

Her eyebrows drew down, tight and fierce. "Not a big deal? You're studying to become a doctor, you should know better about what fuels your body than most. Trust me, It's not preservative-laden burgers."

"Having crap food occasionally isn't going to kill me." I crossed my arms. "I'm pretty sure kale will." I shuddered. That green power food pretending to be the best invention ever was bitter as sin to my palette. Amaia loved it. Figures.

She threw her hands up. "Fine. It's your funeral."

Just like every argument we had in the past month, she stormed off to bed, and I spent the night on the couch scowling at the ceiling. I couldn't remember the last time we had kissed or shared any type of intimacy. I'm certain it was in March. I drew my eyebrows together. Perhaps it was February around Valentine's Day. I had cooked her a meal, and set up our coffee table in an elaborate romantic landscape, but Amaia was held up to observe a woman with triplets going into labor. She had found me fast asleep on the sofa with a cold, untouched meal on the table in front of me. She had woken me with a kiss, and had encouraged me to come to bed with her. It was the last time I could remember sleeping with her in my arms.