The Boy I Married [hold]

01 | Heart Configurations

two years later

The pale yellow walls in this office were constant reminders that trapped me in a time where optimism lived its best life. When my marriage was still in good shape and it didn't feel like there was a need to fight for my husband's attention. It taunted me because the very first time I sat in this room was by myself. Justin couldn't make it here because he was still touring. This office was a sanctuary harboring my inner need to be a mother. Everything was fine because there wasn't an issue that was preventing me from having a child except my fear of losing another one. No one knew that. Justin didn't. Yet either way it hadn't been something that inconvenienced him the way it did me.

Though we would never talk about it, a part of me blamed my lack of fertility on him. Maybe the real reason distance was creeping among us was because of my own insecurities eating at the relationship we'd been trying to develop. I lost a baby while he was on tour and nothing pained me more than knowing touring didn't give him the same distaste it gave me. I resented him for that. There was no way around it.

There was a faint knock at the door before it swung open and my usual doctor walked in with her usual optimist smile. In the beginning, I loved her eagerness and certainty that us conceiving a child was only tries away. I believed her back then. Now it all seemed like a collection of empty promises and a barren womb that I had to live with on top of the feeling of rejection from my husband.

"It's nice to see you again, Brooke," she smiled at me. As much as I wanted to smile back, nothing happened. "Justin. I'm glad you could join us this time."

Justin nodded, though his phone was obviously more interesting that anything either of us could say—not that there was anything other to expect from him. Out of seven appointments, this was the second one he had been to. It wasn't his fault. Work was highly demanding and Scooter never let him forget it. No matter what he was doing. "His social media presence must be as prestigious as his onstage presence." Scooters words—verbatim.

Dr. Caplin looked at me with a crooked smile. Somewhere along the lines of our many appointments, that would have easily stricken a thirty minute conversation. I had managed to spill every issue going on in my marriage on her. It was like word vomit spewing out of me all at once because I didn't have anyone else to talk to. She had become my confidant and I knew that with how today was going, we wouldn't be able to talk the way we normally did.

"So your test results came back," she paused. A sigh following quickly after. "The tests came back negative."

After hearing that same line over and over and over again, you'd think it would be a lot easier to hear, yet I'd never broken so hard like right now. Maybe it was because the burden meant to be carried by both Justin and I managed to tumble directly on me. I palmed my head to cover up the distaste and that's when we touched me. His hands softly caressing my back as if tension was a thing of the past. Geniality never felt as thick as his touch on my body. He reached down and grabbed my hands before pulling me into a hug so secure.

That hug lasted a lot longer than even I could've expected. He pulled away and tucked his phone into his pocket before pushing himself forward in his chair and turning his full attention to Dr. Chaplin. For some reason, my heart fluttered.

"What else can you tell us? Is there something we can do? Something I can do to increase our chances?" Justin looked over to me and grabbed my hand again, intertwining our fingers. A part of me was taken off guard. I shouldn't have been. He was my husband. This was supposed to be normal. "Anything?"