Deadbeat Dad | COMPLETE |

WHAT?!

I'm lying in a hospital bed, dressed in a gown, my stomach thrusting forward. I got out of bed and reached for my phone, which was conveniently placed next to my bedside table.

    My mother's name flashed on my phone, and I took the call. "How are you feeling, honey?" she inquires.

    "I'm doing fine," I said.

    "I just wanted to call and remind you to tell the doctors you want an epidural," she said.

    "Does it hurt?" I worriedly inquired.

    "Not really," my mother told me, "you'll barely feel it."

    "Okay, thank you, mom. I'm going for a walk; I'll call you later," I explained.

    "Bye, honey, and good luck."

    And with that, I hung up the phone, grabbing the wheeled pole that held all the fluids to which I was linked. I gazed out the window as I walked out of my room and down the halls.

    I just walked and walked, my head free of stress or worry. There was no one there for some obscure reason. There isn't a single soul. No nurses, physicians, or patients. But I didn't question it. I simply kept walking.

    I'm back in bed, this time with a baby on my chest. It was my child. I couldn't tell if it was a boy or a girl, but it was the most adorable baby on the planet.

    I closed my eyes, and then I was walking out of the hospital wearing a matching set and carrying my baby and a bag.

    The strange thing was that my father was present. He led me to a location where I recognized a man.

    "Yeah, her spouse left her," my father began talking with the man.

    I was taken aback by his candor. I was not notified that he had left. I felt really hurt and perplexed. I was also confounded as to why my father did not tell me after finding out. And why he would not take me directly home.

    I glanced at him, shaking as I held my baby, and exclaimed, "What do you mean he abandoned me?"

    He ignored me; my father ignored me. He kept staring at the man as if I didn't exist. As if he couldn't hear what I was saying. Why is he ignoring me?

    "Why did he leave?" I asked again.

    Again, no response.

    I had to ask my query three more times before I got a response. And it wasn't the one I was expecting.

    "He left because you demanded too much, like going out places," he stated flatly, staring me down.

    I turned over to my side to see if the man with whom my father had previously spoken was still there, but he wasn't. I sobbed as I looked back at my father. I couldn't figure out why my father was being so mean to me.

    I'm perplexed as to why my husband abandoned me after I asked him to take me out after I gave birth to his child. I'm not sure how I was the last to find out.

    The shock and confusion rendered me immobile. I couldn't get up.

    I exhale a sigh of relief as I awoke from my nightmare. I was sweating and feeling bewildered. I quickly wrote down what I had dreamed of and attempted to reconcile everything. I'm 16 years old, single, and in high school, and I had a dream that I was dumped with a baby.

    What did my dream mean?

    Who was that man my father talked with?

    Who is my husband?

    Is it a . . . warning?