Tina sits down at the desk crying. She gently places the pictures side by side on the desk. She looks down at the pictures. ‘Oh my god, she’s been carrying these with her?’ She picks up the ultrasound image of their son. She gently outlines the image of their baby. ‘How long has she been carrying this with her? I never knew that she had this.’ Tears flow freely down her face. ‘Our baby…’

Tina looks over at Bette, who is sleeping soundly. ‘Why didn’t she tell me about this?’ Tina remembers how she couldn’t bear to look at the image of their son after the miscarriage. Bette never said a word about it, just put the pictures away. Obviously not all of them. ‘She carries him with her. She carries all of us with her, even me.’ Tina looks down at the picture of herself. ‘After all I’ve done to her, she still carries my picture with her.’

Tina stands and walks over to the window. She looks down at the spot where she found Bette and then the pictures. ‘She must have had them in her hand when she went to the floor.’

Tina looks out the window and remembers back to the days after the miscarriage. Bette was trying to be so strong, she didn’t show much emotion. ‘She was trying to be strong for me.’ Tina thought. ‘I was dying inside, I know that she must have been hurting, too.’ Tina continues to think back. It seems like such a blur to her, from the miscarriage to the affair. What went wrong? What could they have done differently?


Tina turns to again look at Bette. “We didn’t really talk, did we?” she whispers. “We just stopped living when he did.” Tina remembers that pain that she felt then. ‘I never knew how Bette felt,’ she thought. ‘I didn’t think about how she felt. I never imagined the pain that she must have had.’


She walks over to the bed and looks down at Bette. “We both just shut down, didn’t we?” Tina whispers. “God, I remember all of the things that were happening then. The miscarriage, the CAC, the protesters, the Fae Buckley interview-how did you deal with all of that, baby?” Tina sits down and brushes the curls away from Bette’s face. “I guess I never realized all that was going on at one time. It was, and you never had the opportunity to stop and grieve. I was angry with you for that; I thought that you were too busy to think about what we lost, and I’m sorry.” Tina gently touches Bette’s face. It’s as if she can see the pain etched in her expression, even as she sleeps. “I never meant to hurt you, baby,” Tina whispers. “I love you so much.”


Tina watches Bette sleep and thinks of the last few months. She thought that when Angelica was born, things would be perfect. They would finally be a family. But then Bette was fired from the CAC, the birth was so difficult, and they both had to adjust to having a third person in their lives who required most if not all of their attention at times. ‘That was when we should have been able to lean on each other.’ Tina thought. But she had been so invested in the idea of the life that was planned before everything went haywire that she could not adjust to the reality that was their lives. Tina expected to be a stay at home mother while Bette supported the family. Then everything changed when Bette was released from her contract. Tina expected Bette to immediately find work and continue with the plan. But that didn’t happen. Tina began to resent Bette’s need to find work with “passion.” She worried that they would be unable to provide for Angelica as planned. She resented Bette’s nonchalant attitude about everything as well as Bette’s refusal to curb her spending. Tina distanced herself from Bette. It didn’t help that she felt that the body that Bette Porter worshipped was a mess due to giving birth and then feeding a child. The last thing that she wanted was to disappoint Bette physically. So she began to shut down.

Tina looks down at Bette and sighs. She knew that she pulled away from Bette. She resisted everything that Bette tried to resume their physical relationship. Tina admitted that she still needed Bette to be the caretaker for the family. That was the plan, wasn’t it? When Bette did not fulfill that role, Tina felt that she had to go back to work. Again, not in the plan. And she did resent Bette for that.

‘What was I supposed to do?’ Tina thought. ‘Trust your wife, that’s what you should have done.’

“Why did I have to have everything my way?’ Tina whispers to Bette. “Why couldn’t I let you find your way?”

Tina stood up and walked to the window. The next thing she remembered was the online interaction with Daddyof2. ‘What was that about? Why did I let myself go there?’

She tried to remember what she was feeling at the time. Tina knew that she wanted someone to be in control. To take care of her. Bette had always been the Alpha, and now she had no interest in that role.

So was that the reason men became so attractive to her? She needed a dominant figure in her life? Why not another woman?

‘The carpenter,’ Tina thought to herself. She remembered how she felt after Bette’s affair. Tina was devastated that Bette gave herself to another woman. She swore that she would have never done that to Bette. She’d never cheat on her wife with another woman. ‘So I cheated on her with a man.’

“Jesus, what is wrong with me?” Tina said. “I really must have been out of my fucking mind.”

So now what? Tina walks over to Bette and lowers herself beside the love of her life. “I love you, Bette Porter,” Tina says as she brushes back Bette’s hair, “and I know that you love me too. I have done a horrible job of showing you how I feel.” Tina bends over and kisses Bette on her brow. “I promise you that I will spend the rest of my life loving you and showing you how much. You are the love of my life and my everything, and I will never forget that again.”