He Sees the Spring but Not the One He Lost

From the day I was diagnosed with postpartum depression,

every single day, Felix was guarding against the chance I'd kill myself.

The piano at home gathered dust; a soundproof door was added to the nursery.

The rooms were papered over with words meant to encourage me.

No matter how hard the baby cried,

Felix would always go to me first, to the wreck of me.

"Don't be afraid. I'll stay with you, and little by little you'll get better."

Then, with the baby's first-birthday party coming up, Felix was busy going to taste the dishes.

To set my mind at ease, he divided out my pills for me as usual.

I had just peeled off the sticky note on the medicine that read "You can do this,"

when new words surfaced on the paper.

My whole life, Felix Sanchez's life, has been ruined in your hands.

The "Be happy every day" on the dish saucer became:

Let me go. Why didn't you just die on that operating table?

The "I'm here for you" on the fridge became:

Jade Henson's back in the country. When she was lying in my arms, I kept wondering why my wife isn't her.

And last, the "Stay with the treatment" on the medicine box became:

I don't regret switching your pills for her.

The tears on my face had already gone cold.

I stumbled downstairs,

took a taxi to the banquet hall.

Inside, the two of them, tasting dishes close together, froze in an instant.

I stood there and looked at them.

"Best friend of mine, you're back in the country? Why didn't you tell me ahead of time?"

...

Jade's hand went slack, and her chopsticks clattered to the floor.

Felix bent down on reflex to pick them up, then halfway down realized how wrong that looked.

He straightened without a trace of hurry.

"Nellie Ellison, what are you doing here?"

Jade finally snapped out of it and let out a couple of laughs.

"Right, if I'd known you were coming, I wouldn't have rushed straight over from the airport to help. I didn't even have a second to message you."

"Honestly, Felix is something else. He felt bad for you and wanted you resting at home, so he dragged me in here to work for free."

"Is that so?" I looked at the two of them, and at the table full of dishes.

"Yesterday you posted that you were flying to Los Angeles today."

One of them told me ahead of time he had a business trip to Los Angeles,

the other thoughtfully reported she was tasting the dishes alone today.

All of it lies.

Why were they so confident I'd never find out?

A staff member came out carrying a big platter of fish,

and the moment she saw me, she smiled on reflex.

"You must be a good friend of Mr. and Mrs. Sanchez? Mrs. Sanchez was just worrying about the tasting a minute ago. Good thing you're here."

"If you don't know how to talk, then don't!"

Felix, who always gave people a smile first, went completely dark in the face.

He told the staff member to set down the plate and leave, fast.

Then he turned his head to check my expression.

He was afraid I'd have an episode, afraid I'd make a scene at the venue.

But the arm he'd half-raised on reflex in front of Jade told me

he was more afraid I'd hurt her.

Because of the postpartum depression, I quit my job. I hadn't set foot outside in a whole year,

and Felix handled everything in my place.

On so many late nights I cried,

believing I was no longer the Nellie he'd been proud of.

Yet the one who never stopped encouraging me was still him.

He said I was the person he loved most, so even if it was the baby's first-birthday party, it was fine if I wasn't there,

that all of it was for the sake of my health.

I picked up the run-of-show sheet from the table.

At the top was a passage for the baby's father to speak.

It felt like all the air around me had been wrung out.

"Thank you to my wife, standing by my side at this moment. Without you, there would be no Felix Sanchez as I am today, and no healthy baby today. Thank you for giving me the love I once wanted most."

I read it out, word by word.

By the last word, my cheeks felt strange, almost itching.

I brushed at them without thinking. It was tears.

My tear-cupped palm was shaking, and I couldn't quite breathe.

Felix took the run-of-show sheet away.

"Nellie, breathe deep, just calm down first"

The dishes on the table were the ones Jade loved.

The flowers on the floor were her favorite, fairy's kiss lilies.

While I was on antidepressants, losing hair in fistfuls,

while I looked at the balcony and wanted to jump,

Jade had simply, as a matter of course, taken her place at Felix's side.

"Nellie, you really have this all wrong."

Jade stepped forward, trying to take my hand.

I yanked away hard and swung my hand back across her face.

"Crack!"

Except that slap never landed on her cheek.

Half of Felix's face had gone red.

"Ah! Are you okay?"

Jade panicked, pulling out a handkerchief and pressing it to his cheek.

I noticed that handkerchief. It was Felix's.

Jade never carried so much as a tissue when she went out.

A handkerchief was beneath her.

The reason I recognized it was that it had started as a sample from a collaboration between my company and Boston.

Felix and I had gotten one each.

During the stretch when my postpartum depression triggered acid reflux,

he'd used this handkerchief to wipe away my tears.

"Don't be afraid, Nellie. I'll be with you always."

I was shivering, cold all over, and yet suddenly I laughed.

Seeing it, the people around me drew back, none of them daring to come closer.

I picked up a potted plant beside me and smashed it down at their feet.

Felix pulled Jade back, away from me.

Then I stamped down on those pink bouquets, one after another,

until they bled out their juice.

Inside every bunch of flowers was a little note that said "I love you."

Felix would stay by my side no matter what,

would dote on me.

But he rarely said he loved me.

He always got too shy.

Even on the day we exchanged vows, he blushed all the way down his neck, and it took me holding his hand and coaxing him just to get him to say it once.

And on the day my labor went wrong,

he came in wearing sterile scrubs, his face covered in tears.

"Nellie, I love you. Please don't go, okay?"

"I don't care about the baby. I only want you."

So after I was discharged, he was the first to notice I'd fallen into depression.

His mother said something was wrong with me,

and told him to divorce me.

Felix waited for me to wake, and said it openly, without shame.

"She's not crazy. I will never divorce her, not in this lifetime."

I'd always thought that was the best love he had to offer,

even if it went unspoken.

"Are you done throwing your fit?"

But right now, deep in Felix's eyes there was only disappointment and exhaustion.

He looked at me standing in the wreckage across the floor,

strands of hair plastered to my forehead with tears.

Like he was looking at an actual madwoman.

All at once everything felt meaningless,

yet there was no one behind me holding me up, telling me to be careful, not to hurt myself.

Jade finally found her chance to speak.

"You do you want to take your medicine first?"

"Or maybe I should just go. I, I know I'm in the way."

By the end her eyes had welled up, her voice catching a little.

Felix took hold of her wrist,

the concern in his eyes nearly spilling over.

Just then the nanny came over carrying the crying baby.

"Mr. Sanchez, the baby's crying again!"

I reached out on instinct to take the baby,

but Felix pushed my hands away.

"Go take your medicine first."

The baby was passed to Jade,

and one of them rocked it gently while the other wiped its tears.

To anyone watching, they looked like a couple in perfect sync.

And I was the outsider.

Somehow, shamefully, a cowardly urge to run rose up in me.

It was as though the whole world were watching me,

condemning me for being an unfit mother.

Before long the baby really did stop crying.

The baby blew bubbles and even made Jade laugh.

"Thank you, baby. Are you cheering up Mama Jade?"

The words were barely out when Jade caught herself,

looked up at me, cautious.

"I'm sorry, Nellie, I didn't mean anything by that just now"

"You don't need to apologize."

The smile in Felix's eyes faded, and he gave me that weary look again.

"You'd make a better mother than some people."

I finally drew back the hand that had reached for the baby.

A year ago I struggled twelve hours on the operating table,

hemorrhaging, nearly dying to bring the baby into the world,

and in the end,

Jade, a woman who had never felt the pain of childbirth, was somehow more fit for it.

I walked out to the front doors alongside Jade, who was carrying the baby.

Cold rain swayed down outside,

Felix's car was parked right there,

and Jade got into the passenger seat with the baby.

"Take a taxi home. I've booked a checkup for the baby."

Felix dropped that line and drove off.

He didn't see Jade smile at me,

and he didn't see that I had no umbrella.

I looked down at the taxi app on my phone.

The nearest driver was fifty minutes away.

I canceled the ride and stepped out into the rain.

By the time I got home I was soaked through,

but I couldn't bring myself to dry off.

On my phone, Jade had put up a social media post.

Just a few simple wordsTaking the baby for a checkup.

She'd snapped a photo of Felix from behind.

The first to like it was the groom's sister, the second was my mother-in-law.

The sister praised the baby for being cute, then asked.

"Have you blocked Nellie yet? Don't let her see this. If she finds out you never went abroad last year, she'll definitely lose it."

Sure enough, the next second the post vanished.

I stared at the black screen of my phone, at the reflection of a woman with lips gone deathly pale,

and, biting my lip, I turned the handle of the study door.

Felix's computer stayed synced to the messaging app year-round, and I'd never been in the habit of checking his messages. After the baby came, I had even less mind to care about any of it.

I sat in front of the chair and dragged slowly through the chat history.

Last year, Jade told me she was going abroad for a study program. But the program was a lie. Those overseas scenery photos in her posts were a lie too. The whole year I spent in postpartum depression, she spent that same year at Felix's side.

At first they were just online friends. Felix would ask her what I liked and what I hated. He'd share how my treatment was going. Then, little by little, their conversations drifted, and I stopped appearing in them at all. Literature, travel, moviesthey talked about everything. And when Jade asked about me, Felix usually said he was tired. Worn out.

I finally understood that Felix's talent wasn't limited to his work. His acting was seamless. The day he poured his heart out to Jade about being at his most exhausted was my birthday.

Felix had been rushing around prepping the meal. Because I was no good at comforting the baby, I made the baby cry, and Felix came running out of the kitchen to soothe it. Watching him hold the child in his apron, I said,

"Felix, I'm sorry"

I fought to hold back the tears, and still they came. I wasn't fit for this. I wasn't a good wife or a good mother. After giving birth, I'd become someone I didn't even recognize.

Felix settled the baby, then pulled me into his arms. He wiped my tears.

"Don't say sorry. I'm your husband. This is what I'm supposed to do."

I laughed softly. My tears dripped onto the desk mat.

Reading further down, I finally understood what that post earlier had meant. My sister-in-law and my mother-in-law had met Jade long ago. They'd all had meals together. Sometimes Felix even brought the baby along.

Last month, Jade posted a group photo from her phone and fished with it.

"That day your mom even said it would be nice if I were her daughter-in-law."

"Nellie's been sick a whole year now. Taking the meds or not makes no difference. Mostly, I just don't want her holding you back."

So that was why Felix had been swapping my medication.

I shut off the computer and made a decision.

That night, a fever took hold of me. Burning, half-conscious, I suddenly heard a baby crying.

Every hair on my body stood on end. I pushed myself upright and found I was sleeping in the guest room. The door was locked from the outside, and only the occasional flash of lightning lit the floor-to-ceiling window.

"Felix. Felix, is that the baby crying out there?"

This whole year, the hardest thing to bear had been the baby's cries. Every time I heard the baby cry, I remembered the unbearable agony of the day I gave birth. Felix had always known this, so at night he stayed watchful over whether the baby might cry.

No answer came. But the crying only grew louder.

I pounded at the door until my hands were swollen and flushed with blood, and the fever left my body weaker, the strength draining out of me.

Outside the door came Jade's laugh.

"See? The desensitization therapy is working. Looks like it won't be long before Nellie's back to normal."

Felix's voice carried a smile too.

"Thank you."

Then he spoke to me through the door.

"Nellie, that crying is a recording Jade and I made ahead of time. It's all to help your treatment. Your illness hasn't improved this whole year. Maybe I've been too soft."

"It'll feel uncomfortable at first, but you'll adjust quickly. Jade and I will both be here with you."

As he said it, he let Jade turn up the pre-recorded crying.

Only then did I realize a hidden speaker had been installed in the guest room. Every door and window in the house had soundproofing, so from outside the door you couldn't hear how loud it was, and the neighbors knew nothing at all.

I clamped my hands over my ears and dropped to the floor, my whole body convulsing.

The door opened. Felix saw me collapsed on the floor and instinctively stepped forward. But Jade caught his arm.

"Felix, don't rush it. Nellie needs time to adjust. Let's go back out and give her some space."

She had Felix leave first. Jade looked down at me and suddenly smiled.

I forced my eyes open, and then everything went black.

When I opened my eyes, the fluid dripping through the IV had left half my body cold and numb.

I turned my head a little and saw Jade sitting close beside Felix.

He hadn't looked that relaxed in front of me in a long time.

Jade speared a piece of fruit and lifted it to his lips.

"You're always taking care of her. Let me take care of you."

Felix leaned in and bit down,

the whole motion easy, practiced, as if they'd done it a thousand times.

The older woman in the next bed hid a smile behind her hand.

"You two make such a sweet little couple."

I forced the words out, my voice raw.

"Honey."

She let out a startled little cry and turned away.

The smiles froze on Felix's and Jade's faces too.

Felix came over and felt my forehead.

"You've got a fever. Why didn't you tell me?"

I said nothing, but what I thought was this:

when he'd carried me to the guest room, hadn't he felt how wrong my temperature was?

The old Felix had always been so careful.

He'd notice if the bathwater was off by even a couple of degrees.

Jade leaned in and bent to tuck my blanket around me.

The pearl necklace slid out from under her collar,

glowing with a soft, wet sheen.

"Felix has always cared about you, Nellie. He and I are only good friends. Everything I did was just to help you get better faster."

I stared at that string of pearls,

then asked Felix.

"You stole the necklace my dad gave me and gave it to her?"

Felix couldn't stop his frown.

"Don't make it sound so ugly. Jade's done so much for you. It's just a necklace."

Right. What was one necklace my father gave me,

when I'd already handed her my husband.

But even so, I wasn't willing to let it go.

"Take it off. Give it back to me."

Jade's eyes reddened.

The moment she unclasped the necklace,

the chain snapped, and the pearls fell like rain.

Jade kept apologizing,

Felix only glanced down, indifferent,

and stopped me when I tried to get out of bed.

Neither of them made any move to pick them up.

Felix's phone rang. He answered it,

and left the room with Jade.

A few hours later, Felix sent me a message.

"My mom just told me the baby isn't feeling well. Come see him when you're up to it."

But when I got there, it wasn't the scene I'd pictured.

The room was ablaze with light.

Josephine Sanchez and Felix's sister sat on one side,

Felix, Jade, and the baby in his high chair on the other.

Any outsider walking past would have taken it for a family dinner.

And I was the outsider who didn't know how to read a room.

Josephine gave a cold snort.

"The madwoman shows up uninvited."

Felix's sister put food on Josephine's plate and chimed in.

"Exactly. If only Jade were my sister-in-law. Then I wouldn't lose face like this."

"When people ask, I can't even bring myself to say my sister-in-law is a lunatic who screams her head off every single day."

Felix shot his sister a glare

and told me to come sit by him.

"I didn't call you because I know you don't like crowds."

I didn't go over.

"The baby isn't sick?"

Jade, busy fussing over the baby, turned her head at that.

"Don't go cursing a perfectly healthy child, Nellie. It doesn't look like you've taken your medicine today. Maybe you should just go home first."

Josephine's face went black in an instant. She slammed the table.

"Nellie, the Sanchez family has gotten nothing out of marrying you this whole year, and now you come here to curse my grandson? I'm throwing you out today, and I'd like to see anyone try to stop me!"

In the past, sounds like these would have closed off my throat.

But right now, I could stand there, steady.

"Jade, being a nanny to my son and a warm-the-bed maid to my husband, does it feel good?"

Felix set down his chopsticks, his brows drawn tight.

"Nellie, you really haven't been in your right mind these past couple of days. Jade has done so much for this family, and you smear it all with one sentence!"

"Felix, I told you long ago, you spoil her too much." His sister crossed her arms and sneered.

"Postpartum depression, what a joke. Never heard of it. She's just being difficult, wanting the whole world to coddle her and give in to her!"

"Since everyone's here today, the two of you should divorce, and you should marry Jade!"

"Shut up!" Felix snapped.

Jade finally rose, the same old routine.

"Please, stop fighting. I'll go. You all eat"

"You don't need to go."

I walked closer, one step at a time,

taking in his sister's spiteful eyes, Josephine trembling with rage,

and Felix's arm thrown out on instinct to shield Jade.

My hand closed around the tablecloth.

"Since you want to eat, let me treat you."