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fourteen

Evie comes back to see Camelot almost every other night. I know, though, that now, she's never there to see me anymore.

I also know that she goes through great lengths to avoid meeting me again. She hangs around backstage with Andrew until the show starts. Through our dressing room door that Delphi and I now keep strictly shut, I hear her voice, her laugh, sometimes, as she drifts through the halls, talking to some of our other cast mates, Andrew mostly- but I never actually come face to face with her, as if she times her excursions out of Andrew's dressing room exactly so that she doesn't have to see me.

It was excruciating, being in her presence, knowing she could no longer stand being in mine. Her voice kept constantly replaying in my mind, one of the last things she's ever said to me: You're exhausting. It takes everything in me not to burst out into tears every time the words repeat themselves in my head in painful, constant reruns. And it only seems to get worse and worse.

Every time I think about her, I have to clutch at the necklace Steve had given me, now constantly around my neck, trying to remind myself that I didn't need her- because I had him, because he was going to change enough to give me the peace and rest that I wanted so badly from him. Sometimes, it actually works to make me forget her.

One night though, as we're doing our bows after the show, I see somebody else with Evie, sitting beside her in the front row, as she blows proud kisses up at Andrew. There, beside her, a young girl clapping so happily that she's practically jumping in her place. She has dark, catlike eyes and darker hair, so entranced by the show that she's smiling so hard her eyes have almost disappeared- Evie's smile. My heart wrenches at the sight. I have to rush backstage quicker than everyone else, my stomach turning with nausea.

I realize that tonight, Andrew might have pulled enough strings to get two tickets for Evie. One for herself, and another for Olivia, her daughter.

I hear from Jordan that some of Andrew and Evie's dates involve Andrew taking Olivia and Evie out for breakfast on weekends. I don't dare ask where. A part of me already knows- and just thinking about it aches.

Evie had never thought I was worthy enough, a significant enough part of her life, to meet her daughter, much less have breakfast with them both at the Sub Rosa.

If I really think about it, I can't really blame her. Picturing her, with her daughter at her usual table, their dark eyes lit up because they're sitting across from the ever kind and gentle Andrew- even I could admit, they were the spitting image of a perfect family, the kind you only see at the happy endings of romcoms, and in stock photos in new wooden picture frames shelved in stores. I could never give her that, not like Andrew could.

She was finally getting all the good that she deserved, and I wished I could just be happy for her. Instead, thoughts of her kept me awake at night, the dull ache in my chest a constant reminder of what I'd lost.

Soon enough though, as more days pass, thoughts of Evie slowly get eclipsed as the day for my first ultrasound draws closer and closer.

Of course, I was meticulously doing everything I was meant to do, constantly anxious that I would do something to hurt the baby- I was eating healthy, tried not to miss meals, taking the prenatal vitamins the doctor had instructed me to take, avoiding coffee, keeping out of anything too stressful or physically strenuous, and reading up on articles about pregnancy on the internet almost every other hour of the day.

But I was just so used to fucking everything up without meaning to. Despite everything that I kept trying to do right, I was still terrified something had slipped my mind, and I had done something wrong enough that I had managed to harm this baby regardless.