Chapter 1 - The Birthday Abandonment (Recap & Title)
I was drowning in my own blood while my husband straightened his shirt, smiled at his reflection, and told me, Stop being dramatic. It's my birthday. Eight days after giving birth, I begged him to save my life, but he walked out the front door anyway, never imagining what he would come home to.
I was sitting on the nursery floor when I realized the bleeding wasn't slowing down. Every article I'd read, every experienced mom, and every parenting forum insisted postpartum bleeding was normal, but this wasn't normal. Thick, dark blood kept pouring from my body, soaking through my sweatpants and spreading across the soft cream-colored rug beneath the rocking chair.
My newborn son, Ethan, cried helplessly from his crib while panic tightened around my chest. I tried to stay calm, telling myself I was overreacting, but deep inside I knew something was terribly wrong.
Only eight days earlier, I had given birth. My body still burned with pain, my emotions shifted between exhaustion and fear, and I barely recognized the woman staring back at me in the mirror anymore. Every room in our beautiful home outside Scottsdale, Arizona, suddenly felt cold and impossibly empty.
Please, I whispered, struggling to breathe. I need to get to the hospital.
My husband, Ryan, barely turned his head.
Instead, he stood in the hallway adjusting the cuffs of his expensive white linen shirt, freshly shaved and looking like a man excited for a luxury weekend with his friends instead of a husband watching his wife bleed onto the nursery floor.
It was his thirtieth birthday.
Months earlier, he'd rented a massive cabin in Sedona for a weekend filled with whiskey, steaks, cigars, poker, and ATV trails. Apparently, nothing—not even his wife begging for help—was going to ruin those plans.
Ryan... My voice trembled. I'm getting dizzy.
He let out a long, irritated sigh.
Claire, stop ruining this day.
For a second, I honestly thought I'd misheard him.
I'm serious, I whispered. Something is wrong.
You just had a baby. He grabbed his sunglasses from the entry table without a hint of concern. My mom already warned me about this. Women get emotional after childbirth. They bleed. They cry. They exaggerate.
I'm not exaggerating.
You are.
Another wave of weakness crashed over me so violently that my vision blurred. I grabbed the edge of the crib to keep myself from collapsing while my son cried even harder, as if he could somehow sense the terror filling the room.
I can't feel my hands, I whispered. Please... call an ambulance.
Ryan actually laughed.
An ambulance? Seriously? So the neighbors can spend my birthday gossiping about how I abandoned my wife? Not happening.
Tears blurred my vision.
Then call your mother. Call anyone.
My mom will be here tomorrow. He shrugged without looking at me. Take a shower. Drink some tea. You'll be fine.
I stared at the growing pool of blood creeping across the nursery floor.
This isn't normal.
You know what isn't normal? he snapped, his patience finally gone. Eight straight days of crying, complaining, and drama. I've been trapped in this house long enough. I deserve one weekend where I can actually breathe.
Desperate, I reached toward him as he walked past me.
Ryan... please... look at me.
My fingertips barely brushed the leg of his pants before he pulled away like my touch disgusted him.
Don't try to guilt-trip me, he said as he opened the front door. I'm putting my phone on airplane mode. I'm not wasting my birthday answering hysterical messages.
May you like
Then he walked out.
The front door slammed behind him, leaving me alone with my screaming newborn, the blood still pouring beneath me... and the terrifying realization that if I didn't find a way to save us both in the next few minutes, Ryan's birthday would be the last normal day of his life.
