Cleopatra

Chapter 25 - Isaiah Karter Harris

~Change is inevitable ~

O M N I S C I E NT

"Cleo honey just breathe, everything's going to be fine." Even though Tyra was trying to help her the look Cleo gave her was slightly scary. Taî was scared to be so close to her. Athena was driving, Aiya was in the passenger seat trying to reach Reuben and Taî was given the lovely task of holding Cleo's hand and trying to calm her down.

"I am breathing, if I wasn't breathing I would be dead." Cleo groaned. "Why is this happening, he's not due for another two months." What Cleo really wanted to do was blame this whole thing on Indya, maybe if she hadn't chosen to drop a bomb on her then this wouldn't be happening. But deep down she knew that was stupid, even though she was told there was a tiny risk of going into labour early she didn't think too much of it because of how small the doctors made it out to be.

"Cleo just try and calm down, Aiya's going to get Reuben-" Taî tried to reassure her but Cleo cut her off.

"-Do NOT call Reuben...actually, call him and tell him that I'm going to snap his neck," Obviously Taî did understand that Cleo must be finding this whole thing absolutely terrifying but she was sounding a little bit crazy. And then came the contraction came. How did Tai know? Because whenever one hit Cleo, Cleo hit Taî. Asin she slapped her on the leg, continuously.

"We'll be there in 5 minutes." Athena replied then briefly looked into the mirror so that she could see Cleo. "Are you okay CeCe?"

"Noooo." Cleo said but it came as a muffled groan. It was more like the sound a cow would make if it were being strangled. "It hurts so bad." She whined into Tyra's shoulder.

Meanwhile at the front of the car Aiya had finally gotten through to Reuben. "What happened? Is she okay?"

Aiya rolled her eyes. "What do you think Reuben?"

"Lemme speak to her." Aiya sighed and put her phone on speaker before passing it back for Taî to hold.

"Reuben." Cleo said through gritted teeth. "I am going to kill you, I swear to Go-" Cleo stopped and groaned as she was hit with another contraction and Taî winced as Cleo held her hand even tighter.

"Yeah I don't think Cleo wants to talk to Reuben right now," She said before handing the phone back to Aiya. She told Reuben to hold on as Athena had just pulled up at the hospital. Taî went out to get a doctor and a wheelchair and everyone else got out of the car so that Athena could find somewhere to park. It didn't take long before Taî came back and Cleo was taken inside.

***

C L E O

Isaiah Karter Harris was born through an emergency C- section. He weighed 4lbs 110z and was absolutely tiny. The doctors said that his weight was actually good considering that he was born early. The whole process was just surreal to me, I just wasn't expecting it to be like that as well. After the contractions it was practically painless. Well, besides some aching and discomfort when I woke up. That was about 4 hours ago. I was put to sleep during the procedure and since I've woken up a nurse has come in to check my stitches, I went to see Isaiah before Reuben came back with clothes that I could shower. Since then people have been in and out to see me and Isaiah. I've already been discharged seeing as there's nothing actually wrong with me. However, Isaiah has to stay the in NICU for a few weeks. He's too underweight for me to take him home and his lungs haven't fully developed yet so he needs help from a machine to breathe. It was scary seeing all the tubes and wires attached to him but knowing that he's stable makes everything better. This whole thing is scary really. I didn't even expect to be giving birth so early, to be honest, a small part of me still wonders if I'm even ready to be someone's mum yet.

"He's so small," Aiya squealed in a baby voice. Not everyone could be in the NICU at the same time. I was showing her a picture whilst Reuben was in there with Roxie. It's actually crazy how the baby shower was yesterday. In fact, it's crazy how yesterday I was pregnant and now I'm not. I just feel kind of empty now. At first I was scared to hold him because of how small he is. He definitely looks more like Reuben except he's a little darker. He can't open his eyes fully but you can see that they're really dark, almost black so he definitely got that from Reuben. One thing he did get from though is his hair. It's really thick and curly even though he's only a day old.

"When can you take him home?" Malika asked me. They had both just arrived and right on cue Naomi left. I'm guessing everyone was worried as they were all there when my water broke so they had all come as well. This was the second time Aiya had come and Tai and Athena had basically spent the whole night here.

I sighed pushing my hair back, it's growing too fast, I slyly was to cut it again. "It depends, it could be two weeks, and it could be five. Once his weight is normal and he can breathe and eat on his own then I'll be able to take him home."

Soon Roxie came out with Reuben behind her. Her eyes were all wide like she was in shock or something. Me, Aiya and Malika all looked at each other confused. She's only seven and she looks like she's just been told that Santa Claus isn't real.

Reuben looked at me then started laughing. "She's shocked because of how small he is."

"His fingers are "this" small." Roxie whispered indicating how small they are with her thumb and index finger. She looked so genuinely baffled it was too funny.

"Come, I need to talk to you." Reuben said to me.

"M'kay," I replied so Aiya and Màlika took Roxie to get something to eat so that we could talk in private.

I already knew what this was about. I'm still mad about this Indya baby news that she informed me about so I haven't exactly been civil towards. I wasn't even planning on bringing it up until we left the hospital but clearly he has other plans.

"Why are you acting like this? You haven't said shit to me since yesterday." He asked me jumping straight to the point.

I rolled my eyes without replying him. I was trying to collect my thoughts so that I could contain my anger. I didn't really want to start screaming seeing as up until now my thoughts have been elsewhere. Now all the anger I had before is resurfacing.

"Cleo." He said clearly becoming angry because I was ignoring.

I finally looked up to meet his gaze. "Why'd you lie to me about Indya?"

He frowned. See this is exactly why I didn't want to talk about this now. We're both tired which means we're both gonna be cranky which means this argument is just gonna escalate. "Man, it's always some shit about how I'm lying. What have I lied about?"

"You got Indya pregnant. How come you never told me that?" I said and he dropped his gaze from mine basically looking everywhere else but at me. "You're never completely honest with me, you always tell me half of the truth and then you wonder why I don't trust you."

He sighed. "It wasn't important."

I actually had to pause for a few seconds because I was close to seeing red and beating him up. "Reuben, I'm about two seconds away from punching you in the face I swear to God. How is something like that not important?!?"

"Cleo, the shit she did was foul, she couldn't even come tell me to my face. I found out through social media, Twitter knew my girlfriend was pregnant before I did. Then she comes chatting about an abortion and to make it worse she cheated. For all I know that baby weren't even mine." He said. "And how are you gonna chat about how I don't tell you shit. You never told me about that bullshit that happened before."

"Because that "bullshit" never came between you and me. Don't you get that whenever you don't tell me something, I find out from someone else and it's always 10 times worse. Indya knew you wouldn't tell me, she wouldn't have come to my house if she thought that you had." I said my voice rising to a point where I was almost shouting.

"Chill with all that shouting.

"Nah, fuck you Reuben!"

He shook his head. "Look yeah, call me when you've calmed down cos I ain't gonna argue with you here." He said then he turned and walked out of the NICU leaving me on my own.