Sandwich

Rocky spends an exhausted, sleepless night trying unsuccessfully to fall asleep. When she wakes up, she wonders if her parents will still be leaving that day, as planned. She reasons that a “normal” person would extend their stay out of caution after taking a trip to the hospital, but her parents aren’t, by any means, what she considers normal. Beside her, Nick wakes. The two are gentle with each other and vow to find time during the next day or so to have a serious conversation. They head to the beach, where Rocky explains her decision. Nick tells her that he isn’t angry with her and that ultimately it was her choice to make. Rocky tells him how overwhelmed she was with Willa and Jamie, and how sure she was that she wasn’t ready for another child. However, she also tries to explain how complex and difficult it is to be a woman, to be defined by reproduction and your body but also defined by other people’s expectations for how you handle reproductive choices. She tells him that she knows that his response to difficulty is logic and reason, but hers is more emotional, and that she kept so much from him because she felt their different thought processes so acutely.