Chapter 1 - FIFTEEN DOLLARSI was nine months pregnant and already in active labor when my husband threw fifteen dollars onto the kitchen counter.
“Enough for a cab.”
For a second, I thought I had misunderstood him.
The kitchen seemed strangely quiet despite the storm inside my body. Rain tapped against the windows. The refrigerator hummed. A clock above the doorway ticked toward midnight.
Five minutes apart.
That was what the nurse had told me over the phone.
Five minutes apart meant I needed to go.
Five minutes apart meant our daughter was coming.
And Derek was standing three feet away from me, buttoning the cuffs of a shirt that cost more than the monthly rent of the apartment where I had lived before we married.
“You’re not coming?” I asked.
He didn't look at me.
“I have a client dinner.”
Another contraction tore through my abdomen.
I gripped the edge of the counter.
For nearly a minute, I couldn't breathe.
When it passed, I looked at him again.
“A client dinner?”
“Yes.”
“Derek, I'm in labor.”
“I know.”
“You know?”
He finally looked at me.
There was no fear in his eyes.
No excitement.
No panic.
Nothing.
Only irritation.
“You've been uncomfortable for weeks. You keep saying it's happening. I'm not canceling an important dinner because you’re nervous.”
“Nervous?”
I almost laughed.
Then I realized he wasn't joking.
I was about to give birth to his daughter.
Our daughter.
The crib Derek had complained about.
The nursery he had called a waste of money.
The baby monitor he had said we didn't need.
The appointments he had skipped.
The ultrasound where he hadn't shown up because he had “something more important.”
Everything suddenly connected.
This wasn't about dinner.
It never had been.
For three years, Derek had been teaching me how little I was allowed to need.
He controlled the bank account.
The credit cards.
The car.
The mortgage.
He decided what groceries were reasonable.
He decided whether I could visit Rachel.
He decided which friends were “bad influences.”
And whenever I complained, he smiled and said the same thing.
“You wouldn't last a month without me.”
I had heard it so many times that eventually, I started believing it.
Tonight, he reached into his wallet.
He pulled out a fifteen-dollar bill and placed it on the counter.
“Enough for a cab.”
I stared at the money.
Then at him.
“You're serious.”
“Yes.”
“What happens when I get to the hospital?”
“You call me.”
“And then?”
“I'll come when I can.”
When I can.
The words struck harder than the contraction that came next.
I slowly lowered myself into a chair.
“Derek.”
“What?”
“Look at me.”
He sighed.
“I don't have time for this.”
“I'm carrying your child.”
“And you're acting like I'm abandoning you.”
“You are.”
His jaw tightened.
The room went cold.
“I have spent three years taking care of you,” he said quietly. “The least you can do is stop making everything about yourself.”
Everything about myself.
My labor.
My pregnancy.
My baby.
My fear.
Apparently all of it was selfish.
I looked down at the fifteen dollars.
Something inside me became still.
Not calm.
Still.
There is a difference.
Calm is when you believe everything will be okay.
Still is when you finally stop expecting someone to save you.
I stood.
Another contraction began.
I breathed through it.
Then I reached for the drawer beside the refrigerator.
My wedding ring was on my finger.
Three years.
Three years of apologies.
Three years of shrinking myself.
Three years of believing love meant surviving whatever the other person called love.
I took the ring off.
Derek had already turned away.
He didn't see me place it on the counter.
He didn't see my hand shake.
He didn't see the tears.
That was the first thing he got wrong that night.
He thought I was leaving because I was emotional.
I was leaving because I finally wasn't.
I picked up my hospital bag.
Then I walked to the front door.
“Where are you going?” he asked.
I stopped.
For one second, I considered telling him.
Then I remembered Rachel's voice from three weeks earlier.
“If you ever leave, don't warn him.”
I opened the door.
“I'm going to the hospital.”
He laughed under his breath.
“Don't be ridiculous. Take the cab.”
I stepped outside.
The rain hit my face.
Across the street, a gray Honda was parked beneath a dead streetlight.
The driver's door opened.
Rachel jumped out.
She saw my face.
Then my stomach.
Then the hospital bag.
“Oh my God.”
“I know.”
“You're in labor.”
“Yeah.”
Rachel ran toward me.
I glanced back once.
Derek stood inside the doorway.
He wasn't following.
He wasn't worried.
He wasn't even asking me to stay.
That was the moment I understood.
There was nothing left to save.
Rachel opened the passenger door.
I got in.
“Hospital,” she said.
I shook my head.
“Not Riverside.”
She stared at me.
“Then where?”
“Anywhere he isn't.”
She looked at me for three seconds.
Then nodded.
“Okay.”
We drove.
Behind us, our house disappeared into the rain.
For the first twenty minutes, I couldn't stop shaking.
My phone began vibrating.
Derek.
I didn't answer.
Again.
Derek.
Again.
Again.
Seventeen calls.
Then a message.
WHERE ARE YOU?
A contraction came.
I squeezed my eyes shut.
Then another.
Rachel glanced over.
“You're getting closer.”
“I know.”
“Do you want me to call an ambulance?”
“No.”
“You need a hospital.”
“I know.”
I looked at the highway signs.
Pittsburgh.
That was where Rachel lived.
Two hundred miles away.
We would never make it.
Outside Zanesville, warmth suddenly spread beneath me.
I looked down.
“Rachel.”
She saw my face.
“Oh God.”
“My water broke.”
Rachel grabbed the steering wheel with both hands.
“How far?”
I couldn't answer.
Another contraction hit.
This one felt different.
Stronger.
Lower.
I cried out.
Rachel accelerated.
“Hang on.”
I gripped the dashboard.
My phone vibrated again.
The screen lit up.
One new message.
Not from Derek.
From an unknown number.
The message contained only six words.
DON'T TAKE HER TO RIVERSIDE.
My blood turned cold.
I stared at the screen.
Rachel glanced at me.
“What?”
I handed her the phone.
She read the message.
Neither of us spoke.
Then my daughter kicked hard beneath my ribs.
May you like
And I understood something terrifying.
Derek wasn't the only person who knew where I was supposed to give birth.
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