Terrible Things

Jack's POV

I was shaken awake by the sound of crying, but instead of getting up I rolled over waiting for Leah to go and sort out our daughter. It was 4am, and I sure as hell wasn't about to get up.

But of course Leah couldn't go to her.

When the crying never ceased, I lugged myself out of bed to go and pick up my one year old daughter, Evie. I rocked her in my arms, rubbing her back, and whispering comforting words to her.

I knew why she was crying. She missed her mom. Unfortunately I couldn't help that.

I traipsed down the stairs, singing softly to her, slowly calming her down.

I turned on the TV, and carried on bouncing Evie on my hip. I heard someone shuffle down the stairs; I turned to see my other daughter, Isla, rubbing her eyes.

"What's up honey?" I asked her.

"I couldn't sleep."

"Why not?"

"Every time I closed my eyes, all I could see was mommy."

I closed my eyes as I tried not to let the tears that threatened to spill over, well, spill over. I had to remain strong for my babies.

I put Evie in the baby bouncer and returned to pull my little girl into a hug. I knelt down so I was level with my four year old, and rubbed her back as she cried softly into my shoulder, burying her face in the crook of my neck.

"I miss her daddy" she sobbed into my t-shirt.

"I know sweetie. It's ok though, Daddy's here. Daddy will never leave you ok?" I whispered into her ear. We carried on like this as I thought about what had been going on in the past week since Leah had gone.

Leo, my eldest at 6 years old, had remained closed off throughout the past week. He refused to let anyone in. When we ate together at the table he wouldn't respond to anything I asked him with more than one word answers. When I didn't force him to sit with us he kept himself to himself, and wouldn't even respond to me. I don't think he'd even cried yet.

Isla came crying to me every night, telling me how she couldn't sleep. Usually I was awake as well watching shitty late night TV, so it wasn’t like she woke me up. She was much more open about how she was struggling to deal without Leah there, but I guess she is a young girl; they tend not to keep things hidden. I guess she took that after her mom, Leah never liked to keep secrets or her emotions hidden. I always knew what she was feeling, not because I could read her like a book, I mean I could, but because she never failed to let me know how she was feeling. One of the many things about her I loved, she never kept me guessing.

Evie had been the worst though. She cried constantly. At only a year old she had no idea what was going on, why she hadn't seen her mommy in the past week, and I could tell she missed her like hell.

Then there's me. I haven't cried since Leah had gone. I couldn't. My children were struggling enough as it was. They really didn't need to see their old man break. It tore me up to see my pride and joy so hurt and upset because I couldn't stop it; I had no power over this.

The hardest thing had been telling Leo and Isla that "mommy is not coming back from the hospital." It was the hardest thing I've ever had to do; I never want to do that to anyone ever again.

I finally felt Isla drift off on my shoulder, exhausted from the late nights of crying. I carefully stood up, ignoring the stabbing pain of pins and needles in my right leg. I cradled her in my arms, and carried her up the stairs to her room where I laid her down on the bed. She still looked tortured in her sleep, even though she should look at peace.

I closed the door quietly, and descended back down the stairs, to find that Evie had also finally cried herself to sleep. I carefully removed her from the baby bouncer, turned off the TV, and carried her upstairs to the nursery, before laying her down in her cot.

I made my way back to my room and lay down. I turned on my phone for the first time that week. I didn't want to see messages of sympathy from everyone, all the "I'm here if you need anyone" that kind of stuff would just destroy the walls I had built up in this past week.

I glanced at the message icon, and it only had a little 4. I opened it to see that there were one from Alex, one from Rian, one from Zack and one from Rian's wife Cassadee. I hesitantly opened the message from Cass, but all it said was:

"Come round tomorrow. We need to talk."

I opened up the one from Rian:

“I'm babysitting tomorrow; I'll be there at 10. You need to talk to Cass and Alex."

I left the ones from Zack and Alex closed for now as I fell into a shallow and fitful sleep.