Making Babies #NewAdult

~Forty Seven~

          Arden was crying. Or more like wailing. The long overwhelming sound coming from her tiny lungs that had not stopped since It had started probably over ten minutes ago, resonated through my bedroom and was showing no sign of ending. I sat on my bed in my darkened bedroom staring into nothingness in a fetal position, my knees pressed to my chest, my arms around them while I felt the tears steadily falling down on my cheeks, the cries of the baby serving as background noise in my shaken stage.

            I heard someone knocking on my bedroom door, my name being called, then finally the door was pushed open, allowing the light from the hallway to pierce through the darkness, revealing a human silhouette entering the room which I saw walking in from the corner of my eye.

            The silhouette had a female form which meant it could only be Billie or Christin. I kept staring straight ahead, the room not as dark as it was only a minute ago. She didn't waste any time, moving rapidly towards the baby's crib whose wailing died down to soft cries the second she was picked up.

            There was soothing noises being said to the child while she started moving towards the door, intending to walk out of the room with her. My heart jumped as my eyes finally followed them.

            "Where are you taking her?" I called out after them with a shaky voice. Billie smiled softly as she turned her head towards me.

           "She needs to be fed, Eva. I'm taking her downstairs to prepare her a bottle then we'll be right back." She assured me before continuing to make her way out of the room.

            I took a deep breath, my attention now focused on the door she had walked out of until a few minutes later, she was back, entering the room with a now quiet Arden who was sucking on her bottle as if her life depended on it.

              Billie, who was still holding Arden while she fed from the bottle came to sit next to me. "What happened, Eva? What's going on?"

            I took a moment before answering. Maybe because I needed that time to find the words which would come out of my mouth, or simply because it took that moment for her words to pierce through my state of nothingness that was everything.

             I turned my head to meet her eyes. "She's not taking my breast or maybe she doesn't love me but I can't produce the milk if she doesn't even try." My eyes were filling up with unshed tears while I looked down at my daughter, a sad smile forming on my face. I shook my head slightly.

           "She's so beautiful," I whispered, wiping away at a tear that had escaped my left eye. "She's so beautiful but all I can see when I look at her is Karlie cutting me open with that knife while Dexter held me down." The words came out as a whisper with the hoarseness of my voice.

             "I can't sleep because the moment I close my eyes, it's all I can see, the pain is all I can feel and it is as if I'm experiencing it all over again. It's overwhelming and there's nothing I can do about it. They invaded my nightmares and my dreams. I can't escape them and the fear is paralyzing." I choked as I said the last words.

            I hadn't noticed the fact that I was rocking myself back and forth or the fact that I was trembling all over until Billie placed a hand over mine and looked at me with teary eyes. I stopped shaking for a moment as I held her gaze.

             "You, Eva Chambers, soon to be Eva Halter, are so much stronger than this; so much stronger than them, so much more courageous than they will ever be, all three combined." She started while still gazing into my eyes intently. I kept my eyes on her, holding on to every word she was saying because that's what I needed.