Chapter 6 Gone

Carla's eyes opened to weak morning light filtering through Alexander's bedroom window, her body instinctively reaching for him before her brain fully engaged. Seven months pregnant meant sleep came in fits and uncomfortable starts, but she'd finally found a position that didn't make everything ache.

His side of the bed was empty and cold.

"Alex?"

No answer from the bathroom. No sound of the shower running or coffee brewing downstairs. Everywhere was quiet, the wrong kind of quiet that made her skin prickle with unease.

She sat up slowly, her belly heavy. The clock read 7:47 AM, leveraged herself out of bed, her back protesting, and padded across the room. His backpack gone from its usual spot by the door. His laptop missing from the desk where he always left it charging overnight.

Her heart started beating faster.

The closet door stood open. Empty hangers where his hoodies normally hung. His good interview shoes, gone. The duffel bag he used for weekend trips, gone.

No.

Her hands shook as she moved faster through the apartment, panic rising with each new absence. Gaming console, missing. Toothbrush, gone. The special coffee mug his mother had sent him, nowhere.

In the kitchen, a single piece of white paper sat on the counter, folded once. Her name written in his handwriting.

Carla

The world tilted. She gripped the counter for balance, her pregnant belly pressing against the edge, and made herself pick up the note and unfold it. She read.

Carla,

I'm sorry. I know that's not enough. I know sorry doesn't fix this. But I'm not ready. I thought I could be. I wanted to be. But I can't. Every time I think about being a father, I can't breathe. Every time I imagine our life with a baby, I panic.

You're going to be an amazing mom. You're already amazing. so organized, so strong, so sure about everything. You have your parents, your degree, your plans. You'll be fine without me. Better than fine.

I'm not the person you need. I'm not the person I thought I was.

I'm sorry.

I love you. That's not a lie. But I can't do this.

—A

The paper slipped from her fingers, floating to the linoleum floor like something in a dream. Except this wasn't a dream. This was her life. This was really happening.

He left.

Alexander who had held her through morning sickness, who'd gone to every doctor's appointment, who'd rubbed cocoa butter on her stretching skin and whispered to their child through her belly, had packed his things in the middle of the night and disappeared.

The sob that tore from her throat was raw and ugly, echoing in the empty apartment that wasn't hers, had never really been hers, was just another place she'd mistaken for home.

She'd been so stupid. So incredibly, devastatingly stupid.

Her legs gave out and she sat hard on the kitchen floor, her pregnant belly an obstacle, her breath coming in sharp gasps that felt like drowning. This couldn't be real. This couldn't be happening. They had plans. They had told everyone. His mother had sent baby clothes. Her parents had started converting the guest room into a nursery.

They were having a baby in ten weeks.

And she was alone.

The panic attack hit in waves. Carla pressed her forehead to her knees as much as she could with her belly in the way and tried to remember how to breathe. In through the nose. Out through the mouth. The way her therapist had taught her when she'd had anxiety about exams.

But this wasn't exam anxiety. This was her entire life collapsing.

She needed her phone. Needed to call Alexander, needed to hear him explain this properly, needed him to say it was a mistake. A panic attack. Temporary insanity. Needed him to come back.

Her phone was in her purse by the couch. She crawled to it, too dizzy to stand and found it with shaking hands.

Called him.

Straight to voicemail. That pleasant automated voice that felt obscene in its normalcy.

She called again. And again. And again.

Voicemail.

"Alex, please." Her voice cracked on the message. "Please call me back. Whatever you're feeling, we can work through it. We can talk. Please don't do this. Please—"

The words dissolved into crying. She hung up. Called again, Voicemail.

Called his friend Jake, who picked up on the third ring, voice thick with sleep.

"Hello?"

"Jake, it's Carla. Is Alex there? Did he say where he was going?"

Silence. Then, carefully: "He left early this morning. Like four AM. Said he needed to clear his head."

"Did he take his stuff?"

Another pause that said everything. "Yeah. Most of it. Carla, I don't—I'm sorry. I don't know what to tell you."

She hung up before he could offer more useless sympathy.

Sat on Alexander's couch and stared at the poster they'd hung together. Space. Planets. Stars. He'd said their daughter should grow up knowing the universe was infinite.

The irony was devastating.

Time passed. Minutes or hours, Carla wasn't sure. Long enough that her phone battery died. Long enough that the morning light shifted from pale to gold. Long enough that she had to accept this was real.

Finally, she called her mother.

"Mija? Why are you—is the baby okay?"

"Mom." The word came out broken. "I need you to come get me."

Margaret and Daniel arrived within forty-five minutes.

Her mother took one look at Carla's face and pulled her into a hug. Daniel stood behind them, his expression thunderous.

"Where is he?" Her father's voice was deadly quiet. "Where's that boy?"

"Gone." The word tasted like ash. "He left. There's a note. He's not—he can't—"

She couldn't finish. Couldn't say he abandoned me or he chose to leave or the man I love decided I wasn't worth staying for.

"Cabrón," Daniel muttered, and Margaret didn't correct him.

They packed her things in silence. Her clothes, her textbooks, the prenatal vitamins lined up on Alexander's bathroom counter. The unassembled crib sitting in the corner of his bedroom, Margaret started to take it.

"Leave it," Carla said, her voice flat. "I don't want anything from him."

"Mija, you'll need—"

"I don't want anything that reminds me he existed."

Her mother didn't argue.

The drive to her parents' house passed in a blur. Carla sat in the backseat, watching the city roll by, feeling hollowed out. Seven months pregnant. Nineteen years old. Abandoned by the man who'd promised forever.

How was she supposed to survive this?