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Love Defined (Remnants)

By Elizabeth Maddrey

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“So, I guess that’s it?” Lead settled in July’s stomach and she leaned against the headrest of the passenger seat and closed her eyes.
Gareth’s fingers closed around hers and squeezed.
“I’m not wrong though, am I?” She cracked open an eye and held his gaze.
He shook his head. “No. Probably not.”
She turned and stared out the window as Gareth backed out of the parking spot and pointed the car toward home. Two more miscarriages. This time twins. Five babies she’d never know this side of heaven and none to hold. Even the ever-confident-in-his-ability Dr. DiCola couldn’t honestly recommend they try IVF for a third time. “What now?”
“I think we pray about what’s next. There’s no need to jump into anything, Jules.”
Flashes of colorful spring blossoms blurred together as they sped around the Beltway. He was probably right…though the ache in her heart screamed for action. Maybe they should go ahead and try a third time anyway. What could it hurt? July opened her mouth to ask, then snapped it shut. There were entirely too many ways it could hurt. Another miscarriage topped that list, followed closely by the stress on their marriage. Another miscarriage…even if they didn’t pursue IVF again, getting pregnant hadn’t been her problem. The thought had been that IVF would make keeping the babies easier, plus speed up the timeframe since she was working with just one fallopian tube.
But it was likely she’d end up pregnant again if they didn’t decide how to keep that from happening. She didn’t want to go on the pill…would Gareth ever consider a vasectomy? Though that was so permanent. Maybe she needed to look into natural family planning more closely. June had mentioned it to her last year and it might just be the perfect solution.
July blew out a breath. “Can I be honest with you?”
Gareth glanced over, brow knitting. “Always.”
“I’m not…I don’t know how to pray about this.” She twisted her fingers in her lap. She’d spent so much time praying for a child that now…what was left to say? God had given her children. Five of them. She just didn’t get to keep them long. Had she not been specific enough in her prayers? Surely God knew she’d meant that she wanted to hold her babies, nurture them…watch them grow to adulthood?
“I haven’t got an easy answer. I…” He sighed and flicked on the turn signal before pulling onto their exit. “Maybe we pray about that first? Ask Him to make His will clear to us. Because I’ll be honest, I thought we were doing what He wanted us to do. I don’t understand why we’re in this situation any more than you do.”
Gareth didn’t have any answers either? How did that work? He was always the one who understood when things went wrong. Her heart began to race and she swallowed the bile that tried to inch up her throat. Was this what a panic attack felt like?
“Hey.” Gareth pulled into the driveway and shifted into park. “It’s going to be okay. We’ll figure it out.”
Right. Sure they would.
With a gentle finger, Gareth lifted her chin and held her gaze. “We will. I know it doesn’t seem like it’s possible. And I don’t have any answers, but I have faith.”
She swallowed and offered a short nod. “Okay. You’re right.”
July took a deep breath in through her nose and held it. Her heart rate slowed as she let the air escape.
“That’s my girl.” He leaned over and kissed her. “Come on, let’s go in. You can put your feet up. Maybe we’ll find something good on TV.”
**
July crept downstairs to the office and prodded her computer awake. How was Gareth able to sleep? Every time she closed her eyes, babies floated through her head. The images wouldn’t leave her alone while she’d flopped from one position to another, so she’d given in and gotten up. Three girls and two boys. There was no way to know for certain that those genders were right. But they felt right. And there was no point dwelling on it.
She hovered the mouse over her social media shortcut. Did she really want to see everyone’s happy family photos? Or read about how terrible their jobs were? Not really. She opened her email instead. June had written—probably asking for an update. She swallowed the lump in her throat. That could wait ‘til tomorrow. Her gaze traveled to the list of adoption resources she’d collected in a draft email. Butterflies swirled in her stomach as she began clicking the links, opening each in a new tab. There was no point in putting it off any longer. Gareth had kept up his end of the deal, now she had to keep hers.
Okay…what had June said was step one? Decide between international or domestic, right? July blew out a breath. Where did you even start trying to figure that out? She clicked on the tab for an international adoption agency. The words swam across the screen. She blinked furiously to clear the tears that pooled in her eyes. Why wasn’t “neither” an option? Because she’d promised Gareth, that’s why.
She slid open the middle desk drawer and rooted around for a pen and pad of paper. She’d approach this logically. And maybe, just maybe, having lists would prove once and for all that this wasn’t the right choice for them. She ripped off the top sheet and wrote “International” across the top before drawing a line down the center of the page. She labeled one side “Pros” and the other “Cons.” Then she repeated the process on another sheet of paper, except the label at the top said “Domestic.”
Pen in hand, she began to read.
**
“Wow. Someone was busy last night.”
July looked up from her coffee as Gareth shuffled into the kitchen, sheets of notepaper in his hand. “Couldn’t sleep, figured I might as well do something useful.”
He grunted, laid the papers on the counter, and grabbed the coffee carafe. “And?”
She shrugged. She’d made so many notes last night it was all just a blur. No matter what she did, the information simply swirled in her head instead of coalescing into something that resembled an opinion. And still she circled back to the fact that she didn’t want to adopt. It didn’t matter international or domestic. She wasn’t interested.
Gareth tugged a chair out from the kitchen table and sat, lining the papers up in front of him. “So…nothing? No leanings either way?”
July frowned and set her mug down on the table so hard that coffee splashed over the lip. “I’m still processing, okay? There’s a lot of information out there—too much, really—I don’t know how anyone decides that this is something they want to do.”
“Wait—woah. I was just asking.”
“Yeah, well. I was just answering.” July shoved her chair back and stood, half-heartedly mopping at the spilled coffee with a napkin. “I’m going to take a shower.”
Why couldn’t he just drop it? Did they have to jump right into adoption? Couldn’t they wait even a week before he had to start harping on it?
She threw her clothes into the laundry basket and stepped into the scalding water. She heaved a sigh. He’d probably only brought it up because of the notes…but what had he been doing at her computer? And even if he’d just been looking for a pen or something, once she’d answered, he should’ve let it drop.
She stood under the showerhead, her blood beginning to boil as the conversation replayed itself in her mind. When she’d rinsed off all the soap, she cranked the handle to shut off the water, threw a towel around herself, and slammed open the stall door.
“Gareth!”
“Yeah?” A quizzical expression on his face, he looked up from his tablet that he was reading, reclined on their bed.
She stomped across the room and jabbed a finger at him. She wasn’t going to yell. Yelling wouldn’t solve anything. “Just because you’re in an all-fired hurry to adopt doesn’t mean I am. I did some research, sure, because I’m trying to keep up my end of our deal. But that doesn’t mean you get to push. Got it?”
His mouth dropped open.
July gave a curt nod and stormed back into the bathroom, shutting the door with a stern click.

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