The first sight Lucy Gray caught of herself with her shirt off in the mirror reduced her to tears. Her stomach looks mangled, like a carcass, like the flesh was fighting to get itself off of her. There's a fresh cut about five inches across at the lowest part of her abdominal line, and a vertical one down the middle going up through her belly and evading her bellybutton but stopping at the dip in her ribcage, like a 'T' upside down. It's stapled and sown together like the doctors were trying to trap her organs inside and stop them from escaping. It was a grotesque portrait.
Worse, it made her stomach only flat-ish, the incision bumpy and uneven due to swelling. The little pocket of fat grown there is what helps her body get strong enough to produce enough milk for her baby and now it's gone. She had twins, she needs to make as much milk as she possibly can and she lost the fat that would've made sure she could make it without needing anymore damn Capitalist medical intervention. This should come naturally, like it did with her Si. The whole endeavor of the twins' birth was harrowing and traumatic, the only thing she could tell Coriolanus after that was "Just take me home."
She'd meant with Livia, as she'd been living for the better part of the last year. But instead he took her back to the penthouse. In a way it's more comforting, being where Silas Ochre and Holly May live so they don't have to plan out when to see her. But she misses Livia more than she thought she would. She'd understand exactly how she's feeling right now, like of the hideous mutts from the games. Corpus and mutilated and ugly.
It's been two days and the twins have been sleeping remarkably well for newborns, she's made just enough milk for them both and Coriolanus has been the definition of a doting, attentive new father. Bottle-feeding them when Lucy Gray was asleep so not to wake her, rocking them to sleep, whispering sweet nothings to them as he did, even changing their dirty diapers after Aporta Hayes taught him how, seeing as he'd never done that for his other children. He's positively obsessed with their girls. She frankly doesn't have the energy or will to stay angry at him anymore, it feels pointless.
They've practically been sleeping in the same room. Coriolanus hasn't gotten into bed with her but he feels it's pointless to trek from his room, back to their room every time he checks on them, only to go back to his room and get restless sleep for two hours or so and do that all over again. So he sleeps on the couch at the end of the bed, she only noticed him doing that just now as she got up to pump. No matter what size breasts you have, you have the potential to produce an endless supply of milk. The storage capacity however is...a stretch for her. She's never been particularly well endowed in the chest area, and it's less painful now than it had been with Silas Ochre. But still doggone uncomfortable.
It wasn't until this moment when she's had the chance to properly take a look at herself and it left her sobbing. She was trying to be as quiet as possible, the last thing she needed was to cry as her girls cried with her and let him witness how well she wasn't. She was rubbing one hand over her disfigured midsection and put the other over her mouth to muffle the sounds. She didn't realize she'd woken him until she saw his reflection behind her own in the mirror. He says nothing as he approaches her and wraps his arms around her tightly as she cries, her tears dripping from her chin and down his front.
"Is there anything I can do for you?" He asks quietly
She finds herself wrapping her own arms around him too, burying her face in his chest, not knowing who else could comfort her now. She knows it's vain. She should just be happy her baby girls came into this world safe, healthy and loved. But she can't help feeling robbed. Robbed of her birth story since she can't remember most of it and what she can is terrifying. Robbed of her appearance, when her body is something she's always been proud of. Robbed even of her little fat belly pouch, that's been replaced with a maiming. A hack job sloppily sewn back together.
She shakes her head, just wanting him to keep holding her. To keep looking at her the way he is.
