Willa

Chapter Twenty Seven: A week *

It was a week in the summer, the sun scorched every inch of Utah, summer break was coming to an end in two short weeks. Harper would start kindergarten in the blink of an eye. My baby would be out in the world, and out of my safe embrace. It was a thought I could never quite get used to, sharing her, with the world. I was so accustomed to Harper being pressed to my thigh, wanting only me and all that I had to offer as her mama. This was my last two weeks of being her entire world. I would now be taking on a slightly less important part of my daughters day. I was about to become a supporting role, no longer the main character, but how I longed to pick her up, to hear about how her little world was forming, her friends, her teachers, and her loves and likes. I couldn't wait to watch her grow and develop into who she was as a little human.

The house was humid, my night dress slipped down my shoulder, my body slumped against the bathroom door, my hand lifting once again to reveal the red blood that dripped from my finger tips. The morning light streaks through the bathroom window, throwing the light through the windows crackle effect glass, and causing beautiful patterns to dance around the room. Tears have long dried as my eyes gaze upon the lights, like angels flitting about, allowing me to feel their presence as my pregnancy's presence is lost. It's strange what you remember from moments of trauma, because years later when I would think back to this first, of many, miscarriages... I would remember not the words of others, what day it was, or what I wore, but this pattern dancing around the room, it stayed, and it would imprint there with the trauma, angels dancing in the lights.

I gaze down to what was once a white linen night gown, but now is crimson red as the blood seeps from between my legs and into it. I should be doing something, anything, but I can't move, my heart is so heavy it feels like I could drown. The lump in my throat is so oppressive, it feels like my wind pipe may close up entirely. Ben would be heartbroken, Harper luckily had no idea, our families knew nothing of it either, and now I would silently deal with it, alone. I had got up in the middle of the night, pulling back the bed sheet and finding the pool of blood beneath me. Ben had jumped up and stripped the sheet as I ran to the bathroom. He knocked once, an hour ago, and I told him I was okay and to go back to bed, and he did, he hasn't been back. I know he's probably not asleep in there. I should think he's upset, but he's not been back, he's not pushed the door open and scooped me up into his arms. It's all I wanted, a hand to hold through it, but sat here on the floor I felt paralysed, like it would be easy to let it consume me right now, to leave with the blood, seep away into the black and escape my confines... confines I had willingly placed myself in.

A vibration catches my eye upon the sink. I slowly pull myself to standing, feeling weak as I do. My cell is jumping around on the vanity, and I remember I had left it there after brushing my teeth last night. I reach for it, the blood transferring from my finger tips to the white phones exterior. I see the only name I ever long to see, lighting up my phone "Willa"

I wonder why she is ringing me so early. I usually called her of a morning. I click the green accept button, and with trembling hands I lift the phone to my ear.

"Allie" she whispers quietly, like she is purposefully being quiet as not to wake someone.

I feel tears fill my eyes at the relief of her voice. "Willa" I begin, wiping my tears away before they fall "you don't usually call so early"

She moves in the background, it sounds like she has moved outside. I feel like I can hear waves crashing as I focus on the sounds, wishing to be there, anywhere that Willa was, anywhere but here.

"Allie are you okay" she asks me a little worriedly. I hear it in her voice, a slight panic.

"Did Ben call you" I ask.

She instantly sounds more worried "why would Ben call me. What's wrong...has something happened to you"

I don't know what to say. I don't want her to see me this way, or to know what state I'm in, what life I chose, and the heartbreak that seems to find me at every turn. Perhaps it was my karma, for marrying Ben, and forcing us both to live this half life. Nothing ever felt quite right, secure or content. I was half in, half out, always, and not for want of trying, but because I didn't really belong here, not in the the way that fate had planned. You can feel that you know, when your path is off, when the life you lead isn't as it's meant to be, you feel it. There's an ache inside that reminds you, turn back, change your route, redirect your path. It is insistent and torturous, to walk this road whilst your inner GPS screams "make a u-turn... For goodness sake woman make a fucking illegal u-turn"