Metamorphosis

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Chapter 74

Showtime

A little over halfway through April, Mira was more than ready to have this freaking kid.

It was April seventeenth, Mira's last day of school. She was sitting on the couch at Paige's house with her three friends, watching a movie. A large bowl of popcorn was in Ava's lap. Sara sat on the floor in front of Paige, who was braiding the curly brown hair.

"Don't go in there!" Sara squealed, covering her face with her hands.

"Sara, we're watching Scary Movie," Ava said with a roll of her eyes, "The whole thing is a joke."

"I get scared easily," Sara said defensively. Paige and Ava exchanged looks. Mira would have laughed at her friend, but her mind was elsewhere. The baby was wildly kicking her, and she was really in pain.

"You okay, Mira?" Paige asked, looking at her friend in concern.

"Hm? Yeah, my back is just hurting… again." She groaned and stood up after a moment. "If it's alright with you guys, I'm just going to call my dad and ask him to take me home."

"Sure." Her friends looked concerned. Paige paused the movie and walked over to her.

"Are you going to be okay?" She asked, placing a hand on Mira's shoulder. Mira gave a weak smile.

"I'm fine. The baby's not due for another three weeks; it's just my back that's killing me."

Paige, Sara and Ava looked at each other.

When Mira arrived home, the first thing she did was take a nice long bath to try and relax her back. She remained in the tub for almost half an hour before her skin became prune-like.

She hadn't told her parents of the pain she was feeling because she knew they would freak out. She had convinced herself that it was just back pain. She got out of the tub, dried off, and changed into her pajamas. She hoped to feel better after a good nights sleep.

Hours later, in the middle of the night, and something still felt off. She didn't know how to explain the feeling.

She tossed and turned in her bed for hours, trying to get into a comfortable position. But it seemed no matter what position she was in, she still felt weird.

Mira looked at the red boxy letters on her alarm clock to see it was almost three in the morning. She sighed heavily and stared up at the ceiling through the pitch black.

"I'm so going to the doctors today," she said to herself. Mira sat up and waddled over to her computer. Starting it up, she sat in the desk chair, which creaked under her weight.

Mira typed 'baby names' into the Google search engine and clicked on the first link. It was a site that showed pretty much everything there was to know about having babies. It even showed which celebrities were expecting.

"She's pregnant again?" Mira said, looking at the picture of the movie star. With a shrug, she continued scrolling down the page.

By four in the morning, she lie on the window seat staring up at the sky. An open book was on her stomach, but she paid it no attention. She looked back down at the book, but found her eyes too fuzzy to see the text clearly. She rubbed her eyes with the back of her hand and blinked hard. The pain was fading. It hadn't completely gone away, but she had drunk some water and took a pregnancy-safe pain killer in hopes that it would go away.

She closed the book and tossed it to the side, not caring where it landed. The baby seemed to have settled to sleep and stopped kicking so hard, so she stood up and walked over to her bed.