From the direction of Connor’s room came an almighty crash, and the bedroom door exploded open, my brother charging out, snorting and huffing like a bull. “What the fu—”

“Something’s wrong with her!” Lili screeched.

“No…” I tried to tell them it was fine.

“She fucking pissed herself and then dropped to the floor!”

“Shut up, Lili!” I growled through the cramps. “I’m…I didn’t piss myself.”

“Then, what?” she screamed.

Kneeling in front of me, Connor’s eyes met mine, and he knew. “You didn’t tell anyone?” he asked.

I shook my head. “There was something wrong with it. I didn’t want Phil to know.”

Lili sucked in a sharp breath. “You’re pregnant?”

Not anymore, I thought. It hit me so hard that it had to be released by way of a wretched sob.

“How far along?” asked Connor.

“Little less than ten weeks. I don’t need to go to the hospital. They’ll just send me home again. I knew when I woke up this morning. That’s why I came home. Phil—” Another cramp tightened through my belly, and I breathed deeply and evenly to get through it. “I forgot my shot. I forgot it for four fucking weeks, and when I’d found out, I had the gyno at the hospital in Saskatoon check it, and the heart—” Another cramp, and a warm rush of blood flooded my underwear. The first wave of wetness had been amniotic fluid.

“Connor!” Lili barked sharply.

So much blood, a smear of it stained my inner thighs. Without a word, Connor scooped me up and carried me up to my room.

“Put her in the tub!” commanded Lili.

My brother set me on my feet, and with my best friend, they stripped the soiled shorts and underwear off me. Then, Connor helped me to kneel in the tub while Lili turned on the hot shower, letting the stream hit my lower back. Rivulets of brilliant crimson, bright against the white porcelain, swirled and mingled with the water.

Connor wrapped his arms around my chest, tightly hugging me at an awkward angle, his forehead pressed to the spot above my ear. “You’re gonna be okay,” he told me.

“I know,” I replied through the pain.

“We should find Alys,” said Lili.

“No. She doesn’t need to know.”

“You didn’t even tell Alys?” asked Lili.

“I didn’t tell anyone!” I snapped.

“Damn it, Kenna!” Lili cried. “Why do you insist on going through this sort of shit all alone? What’s the point of having us in your life if you won’t let us be there for you? Alys is going to want to help, and she won’t tell Phil!”

I laughed bitterly.

“What?” huffed Lili. “She wouldn’t.”

With hurt, fury, and jealousy, I told them how I’d found Alys and Phil this morning. Feeling petty and sorry for myself and perhaps a bit spiteful, I needed Lili to be outraged with Alys and Phil to feel justified in my reaction.

“You know neither of them meant for that to happen,” said Connor, being my voice of reason.

“I KNOW!” I roared, seized with the hardest cramp yet. My uterus tightened beyond belief, and something huge worked its way down.

“I think I’m going to be sick,” whispered Lili.

“Then, get out!” shouted Connor. “You think she needs to deal with you being a fuckin’ pussy right now?”

Lili smacked him upside the head. “Fuck you!” she snapped before storming out.

“Squeamish little fucker,” he said under his breath. “How the hell did you think you were going to deal with this on your own, Kenna?”

“Phil can’t know, okay? If I told a single person, then the danger of it would get out, and Phil would have been destroyed. More than anything, he wants to have children, has been asking me practically from day one. When I found out that it wasn’t going to make it, I just left it at that. He’d just lost his best friend. To lose X and then have this taken from him, too…” I couldn’t finish, taking a few minutes to breathe through the next round of contractions.

“Why didn’t you just get rid of it when you found out?” he asked gently.

“I couldn’t,” I sobbed. “We made Little Zephyr together. I couldn’t willingly destroy a part of him like that.”

“Okay,” he said softly. “I get it.”

“Don’t tell him, Connor. He’ll never forgive me.”

“There’s nothing for him to forgive.”

Another cramp blazed through me, making me cry out and grunt with it, and Connor tightened his hold on me, trying to absorb some of the pain.

After a few more minutes, I was ready to get up and lie down. More was to come, and I would need the hot water when it did. When Connor shut off the water, Lili marched back in and ordered him to get out.

Armed with an ancient pair of granny panties and black sweatpants, Lili got me dried off and dressed for bed.

“What the hell?” she asked when I told her to grab an after-birth pad from under the sink. “What sort of size is this?”

Somehow, I found that hilarious. “Gigantore.”

“You don’t say…”

The three of us piled into my bed. Lili had already prepared several blunts to pass the time and pain.

Exhausted, hurting in body and soul, I got seriously ripped off the first blunt and fell asleep.

Phil

“Kenna called you to take over for a few days?” I asked, looking down on Gavin’s shiny bald head.

“Yeah, she said she was feeling sick. You…you didn’t know?”

I wasn’t going to answer that.

Enduring two hours of physical-therapy torture with Gavin had me sweating, shaking, and reeking like the inside of a bottle. He finished up with a thirty-minute massage and acupuncture in my ass and groin.

“You know, if you quit drinking—” he started saying.

I waved him down. “It ain’t like it’s permanent, man. Right now, I just need somethin’ to shut my head up.”

“Weed won’t fuck up your healing process,” he told me.

“Yeah,” I replied, not committing to anything.

After he finished with my treatment, Gavin left, and a light knock came from the panel door.

“Yeah?” I called out.

Alys came in. “Phil?”

“What’s up?” I asked before chugging back a bottle of water.

Shit, she looked ready to cry. I didn’t think I could handle much more.

“D-do you remember what happened last night?”

“Um…we watched TV and drank a few bottles of whiskey?”

She nodded. “Do you remember passing out?”

“No. That’s why they call it passin’ out, Muffin.”

She really looked bad, going all pale. “Nothing happened, but I fell asleep on you. You were holding me. Kenna found us like that this morning, and—”

“And what?” I asked weakly. Panic and terror pounded through me. “And what?”

“She’s gone, Phil.” Her voice trembled, and her face quivered. “I tried to stop her. She looked…” She sucked in a deep breath, wringing her hands like she could squeeze the answers from thin air.

“You need to fuckin’ tell me what fuckin’ happened, Alys, or so help me God—”

“She was furious and told me that, last night, you showed me more compassion than you had given her in months…” The woman laid it all out there in great detail. “She said that maybe it would be for the best for her to walk away now instead of letting both of your misery drown her.”

My head was having a hell of a time processing this shit. “Where did she go?”

“I don’t know. She ran out—”

“You didn’t follow her?” I shouted, struggling to get off the stupid fuckin’ bed. “Fuck, Alys! She had to know that nothin’ happened!”

“Phil, what would you have done if you’d found Kenna sleeping in X’s arms? Even if it was an innocent accident…” She looked about ready to lose it.

Fuck, I was about to flat-out fuckin’ lose it. “I would’ve kicked his ass. I would’ve lost my fuckin’ shit.”

“Kenna doesn’t kick asses though. She simply removes herself from the situation. She pulls up her big-girl panties and walks away. She said she needed a break. Honestly, Phil…there’s nothing on this earth she loves more than you. I think…I think we’ve all been taking her for granted. We always lean on her. Always use her strength to help us pull through. She’s never not been there for any of us. Ever.”