Things were better compared to yesterday after Kurt came back. We didn't speak much about how he just left, but we just laid together in silence, embracing one another.
We decided that today we should go to the park with Frances and have a picnic there. We're trying our best to make our lives as normal as possible, especially for Frances.
Although Kurt and I have done some things in our life to deserve what has been happening to us, Frances has not done anything wrong. After all, she is just a baby. So we want to treat her like one and make sure she's spoiled and doesn't suspect that anything is going wrong.
Arriving at the park, Kurt and I realize just how many kids are actually here. Us three walk to a random part of shaded grass, lay out the picnic blanket, then put down the basket, and Kurt checks Frances' diaper.
Kurt and I have barely even spoken a word to each other today. The only things we've talked about is going to the park and whether or not Frances was changed.
I want to make a comment about the amount of adults with their kids here and how it's a lot, but it just feels like it would be wrong.
Frances props her hands down on the ground, then pushes herself up, standing and balancing on her own. Kurt stares at her in awe, softly laughing at her.
I stand in front of her and hunch over down to her level, holding my hands out for her to grab. She reaches forward and takes steps on her own.
For the past month, she's been learning how to walk. She doesn't know how to entirely do it on her own, but while holding someone's hand, she can do it.
Just then, I feel something soft bump into my butt. My eyes widen and I quickly grab Frances, then rest her on my hip, holding onto her back, as I turn around and see a middle-aged man staring down at me with his eyebrows furrowed.
"Sorry," I chuckle out of embarrassment. "I didn't mean to bump into you. I just--"
He begins to chuckle. "You're fine. I see you're teaching her how to walk."
"Trying to, yeah."
"How old is she?"
"11 months."
He grabs her hand and bounces it a little up and down while saying in a baby voice, "Well, you're old, aren't you?"
Out of shyness, she tugs her arm away and buries her face in my neck, turning away from the man.
"Oh, Frances," I laugh along with the man. I'm glad that he's not offended by it and is instead laughing.
I've never interacted with other parents before since Kurt and I rarely go out with Frances. It's also weird for me to talk to them and hold a conversation as they describe the struggles that they go through as a parent, when I'm not biologically her mother. I'm just her stepmother.
"Well that wasn't very nice," The man rests his hands on his hips and frowns at Frances, but she doesn't even notice. Her face is still tucked into my shoulder.
"Hey," Kurt abruptly says, approaching us. "Who is this? You've never introduced us before."
The man's face turns to pure shock. Even with glasses on, Kurt is still very recognizable. It must be because he gets those obnoxious circular ones that no one else in the world would wear besides him.
"That's because I just met him," I say, sensing a sort of attitude in his tone.
"Oh, I'm Kurt," He says to the man, then holds his arms out for Frances to go to.
Without hesitation, she reaches for her father and he takes her, resting her on his hip like I once did.
"I--I--I--" The man tries to get out a word, but he's obviously too starstruck to even do it.
"Yeah, yeah," Kurt rudely says.
"Kurt," I gently nudge him in the arm, trying to bring some awareness to the fact that he's not being nice to the man.
"Nice meeting you, man," Kurt walks away towards the swings. Surprisingly, no one else is in them.
I awkwardly wave goodbye to the man, then race towards Kurt and Frances. By the time I reach them, he's already setting her down in the seat and she's kicking her legs back and forth vigorously, excited to be in the swings.
"I had no idea she loved swings this much," I chuckle as Kurt begins to softly push her.
He doesn't look in my direction, but instead continues to push her. Even after a couple seconds, he still hasn't said anything. He's just delibaretely ignoring me.
Ever since this morning, he's barely even acknowledged my presence. How has so much changed from yesterday up until now? I didn't even do anything to him to make him upset about this--at least not that I know of.
I try to act like I'm not bothered by it, but deep down, I'm truly upset that he's ignoring me and just pushing his daughter on the swings.
I'm not the only one he's being rude to, though. He was rude to the man taht I was talking to while I was holding Frances.
I have no idea why he's acting this way, but I'm not a fan of it.
I notice how giggly Frances is and how much fun she's having on the swing. I turn to Kurt to make sure he can hear me this time. "Can I push her?"
He abruptly stops her and scoffs. "Fine." Then, he walks away towards where we set our things down.
My jaw is dropped by his reaction. All I did was ask to push Frances. I didn't think that it would be this big of a deal. If I would've known, I would've never even asked in the first place.
Frances whines softly behind me, waiting to be pushed. I force my attention away from Kurt and back onto Frances.
She continues to giggle as I gently push her--no more than what Kurt was doing. I don't want to be too harsh with her and have her break her neck or something.
I'm already nervous that I'm going to break a baby's body part when I'm near them just because of how fragile they are.
No matter how hard I try to get the interaction with Kurt out of my head, it still keeps coming back. I whip my head around and see him walking back towards us.
Quickly turning around, I act like I didn't notice him and begin to make faces at Frances, trying my best to hide my nervousness. I don't know how Kurt is going to react to me now or what he's about to say, so I internally prepare myself for any sort of backlash.
He clears his throat and stands to the side of me as a sign that he wants me to look at him, but I don't give him that attention. I still focus on Frances, pissed with how he reacted to me asking to push her.
"K," He calls my nickname. "Hello? You're seriously ignoring me?"
I jerk my head in his direction. "Really? I'm ignoring you?"
He ignores what I just said and continues to talk about what he wants to talk about. "I forgot to tell you but one of my friends called me earlier this morning--before you were even awake--and asked if I could visit his house today so I could pick up some of his new guitar equipment. I'll be right back."
"Wait, wait," I say as he turns around to walk away. "You're leaving right now?"
"Yeah. It's around the time that we agreed on and I'm already running late; I don't want to keep him waiting any longer."
"Are you taking our car?"
"No, no, I'll just take a cab." He then turns around behind him, pressing his foot against the ground repeatedly in an anxious manner. "I really have to get going. I'll be back."
"No, just meet me at the house," I tell him, then he walks away without even saying goodbye or that he loves me.
I have no idea what to think about what he just told me. I know that he wouldn't lie to me like that, especially about grabbing guitar equipment. He knows that I support him no matter what he wants to do, so I know that he's telling the truth about where he's going.
What I can't seem to figure out is why he was in such a hurry to leave, and why he didn't tell me bebforehand that he needed to go somewhere. He'd rather go without talking to me than explain that he needed to go grab something from a friend.
Frances begins to fuss, so I continue to push her and she immediately stops.
He left me alone with this daughter.
I don't know whether or not I should feel honored or like a piece of shit, as if he just abandoned his daughter and left her with me.
----------------------
As soon as Frances and I arrive back at the apartment, I put her down to sleep, then shut the door quietly behind me and call Krist.
"Hello?" He answers immediately.
"Hey," I say quietly. "Is Kurt with you or Dave?"
"Um nooo, Dave's with me...why?"
I sigh. "I don't know. I just don't know."
I begin to panic. Who else could he have gone to besides Krist or Dave that has guitar equipment?
It's fucking with me that I have no idea where he's actually at. He could've left the state for all I know and I wouldn't even find out for a while.
This is exactly what we talked about yesterday--him disappearing. At least this time he told me where he was, but he didn't give any details as to where he could be.
"Are you alright?" Krist warily asks.
"Yeah, yeah," I quickly say, almost as if I'm trying to comfort myself more at this point. "I'm fine. I just--"
A thud coming from the master bedroom interrupts me.
My heart skips a beat as I breathe heavily.
"Kaitlyn?" Krist repeats over and over again. "Kaitlyn, we're coming over. I don't care. You're not answering me. Something happened."
He hangs up the phone, but I can't even fully comprehend that he did that when my mind is directed towards the bedroom and what lies on the other side of the shut door.
My mind immediately goes to Frances and how she's the closest one to the door. Whoever's in there could hurt her or take her away.
Rushing into the kitchen, I grab a kitchen knife out of one of the drawers and hold it in my hand as I slowly walk up to the door.
Out of all the times Kurt had to leave, this is the time that he's gone--when there could possibly be an intruder in here?
I somehow manage to have the courage to open the door. I see that the bathroom door is open, the light shining onto the bed in the middle of the room--my new one. I got rid of the one Cash bought me for my birthday after we broke up.
"Hello?" I softly call out before I make any decision that comes to hurting another person. "Kurt?"
No reply.
I take a deep breath, then step into the front of the bathroom where I see a pair of legs hanging from the edge of the tub.
Everything else from there happens in slow motion.
The knife falling from my hand, my feet racing towards the bathtub as I collapse onto the ground, gripping the edge of the tub and peering over inside, seeing Kurt laying down, unconscious.
His hands are laid down in front of him, also hanging on the edge of the tub, his fingernails purple and blue.
I back away and reach for the phone in our bedroom, then call 9-1-1. I scream into the phone that my boyfriend had a heroin overdose. I give her the address, then hang up and go back to Kurt.
I'm not experienced in this--I've never seen this before--so I have no idea how to handle it. I decide to turn on the bathtub and turn on cold water, splashing it onto his face as a way to wake him up, but it's not working.
This isn't really happening.
It can't be happening.
It can't.
Some sense is knocked into me and I reach for his hands, lift him up, and drag him out of the tub. He doesn't weigh a lot, so it was easy to do it.
I close his nostrils and breathe air into his cold, blue lips, hoping that I'm doing it right. I press my ear to his chest, trying to feel any sort of heartbeat, but when all I hear is pure silence, that's when I panic even more.
I breathe harder into his mouth repeatedly, hoping that it'll be like the movies where they'll jerk up and gasp for air, choking on something, but then realize where they are and all is well.
This doesn't seem to happen.
Not for me.
It isn't until I hear my own wailing echoe in the bathroom that I realize I'm crying. Frances begins to cry, too, but I can't get her right now. I can't let her father die on the bathroom floor. I have to help him.
Just then, I hear a banging on the door and someone yell that they're the medics. Without hesitating, I push myself off of his chest, grab the knife off of the floor, put it in one of the cabinets in our bathroom so they don't think I killed him, then open the front door.
"He's in the master bathroom!" I shriek and they run past me, towards the end of the hall and into the bathroom.
I clasp my hands over my mouth, sobbing into them, feeling out of control once again.
Frances' cries only grow louder and louder, so I go into her bedroom and take her out, holding her close to me and gently rocking her back and forth as we both cry softly.
"Kaitlyn?" A familiar voice calls.
I rush out of Frances' room and see Krist and Dave entering the apartment, looking confused.
"Why are there ambulances--Why are you crying?" Krist asks me, but he slowly puts two and two together as he sees me cradling Frances. His voice cracks as he asks me, "Where's Kurt?"
"Get out of the way!" Someone shouts from beside me, so I disappear back into Frances' room and hope that Krist and Dave move out of the way.
Even as the medics rush past me, I still notice Kurt on the bed.
His lifeless body on the bed.
Once they all leave, I slowly walk outside of the apartment. A hand touches my shoulder and I turn around, seeing a female officer. She tries speaking to me, but I can't understand anything that she's saying. It's just gibberish.
All I can think about is that for all I know, Kurt Cobain is dead.