Khwezikazi.
The heart beat echoes around the room as I stare at the screen at the little bean like shape in black and white, I can barely even make out that there's a human being in there the way my stomach is so flat and also because how tiny the foetus is and it's so hard to believe that something so tiny can cause me so much grief.
I am three months pregnant now and it's been almost a month since I came back from my aunts house and life has been a bit better since coming back from there, it's like something healed inside of me by just being in their presence alone made more forget about everything that tormenting me that night that still continues to haunt me since aunt Juli told me the truth and it's like since then everything that I'd forgotten about that night keeps coming back to me.
Him pinning my against my bed while I could barely even move to defend myself, my cries for mercy, everything. Nolwazi and ma insisted that I saw a psychologist so I can have somebody to talk to but I feel comfortable with speaking with them but at the same time I know I can't burden them with the details of everything that's happened to me I've already done that enough I feel like I'd be dragging them down with me and they don't need this from me, it would be wrong of me to pass my trauma onto them too.
Ma calls me almost everyday to check on me in the morning and at night telling me about the gossip from her stokvels and that one woman that wanted Baba long long ago that she always makes it a point to show her that Baba chose well by marrying her during their stokvel meetings and Nolwazi ,any time that she can when she's not holding herself apart from her busy life and demanding job, we talk almost everyday. I didn't meet her husband that weekend but I promised to visit again the last weekend of the month because I don't mind driving if it means I get to escape from the life I am living here. Nolwazi is already giving me mommy advice and at times I want to tell her that this isn't my first pregnancy I've been here before.
My last pregnancy Nkululeko was there to support me through everything even when I didn't need his help he was just there, and now I am doing this alone, I am alone but by choice, I am the one that let him leave.
"So the baby looks healthy and strong but still a little tiny but, I am happy with the development thus far."
"So there's nothing wrong it ? It's healthy ?"
I ask just so I can double check and ease my conscience, I had one glass of wine the other day, It was another one of those awful days at the office and I needed to take the edge off. I'm starting to take big cases again and I am enjoying it right now so I am making use of the little time I have until I have to start focusing on being an actual mother in a few months from here.
"The baby is healthy, one glass of wine every long once in a while doesn't do any actual harm to the baby but I am not advising you to do so too often."
"Of course."
I answer as I take the paper towel and I wipe the gel from my lower belly before I roll down my shirt and we move back to the consultation room. She starts giving me pamphlets on Doula's and birthing hospitals and mid wives and and and, and at this point I haven't even thought about things that far and I don't know how long I plan on putting this off for.
I thank her when our appointment is over and I head out of the practice and I decide to pass by the grocery store instead to get some groceries on a meal I am planning on making tonight. I am thinking of making shrimp pasta so i get all the creams and sauce I might need, the pasta and of course the shrimp and the spices as well before I move to the wine section I stock up on some de- alchoholised wine and I checkout.
When i get to the house Faye is waging her tail waiting to get kissed and cuddled and I do exactly that. I kiss and cuddle her on the couch after popping my heels off until she feels that she's had just about enough of my affection and she hops of me almost an hour later from our cuddles.
