Aveline

prologue: a life anew

"[...] when they finally hand you heartbreak, when they slip war and hatred under your doorstep and hand you hand-outs on street corners of cynicism and defeat, you tell them that they really ought to meet your mother."

-Sarah Kay, If I Should Have a Daughter

**

Prologue: A Life Anew

The clock on the wall read 11:58.

"Tick-tock." It seemed to scream. "Tick-tock-tick-tock."

All the woman could concentrate on were the hands of clock.

Time was passing. Was she prepared for what was to happen next?

The woman felt as if the world was passing by her too quickly. She could not seem to grasp the strands of the universe that were flying past her. It was as if she was standing still and the rest of the world was hurling past her, going so quickly everything seemed to blend into a colourful mess of lines and blurs.

Tick-tock went the clock. Tick-tock went the clock.

When the clock strikes the time fated for her life to change forever, will she be ready?

The women felt as if her body was on fire. She felt as if her insides have been carved out and then bleached. She felt as if someone was punching her repeatedly in the stomach, the kind of punch that knocks the air right out of you.

And she felt this all at once, a kind of pain that the more you concentrate on it, the more it blossoms, until it is all-consuming. 

The woman heard herself scream. She could feel cool fingers push back the matted strands of hair from her sticky, sweat-covered forehead, and squeeze her fingers tightly.

She knew what was around her, even though her eyes were squeezed shut in an attempt to drown out the pain. She knew she was in a bed, the kind that could move up and down and was never comfortable, no matter how many times she tossed and turned. She knew that she was attached to an IV pole and equipment that measured her blood pressure. She also knew, that attached to her belly were wires that monitored her baby's heartbeat.

Her baby.

She was going to be a mother.

Tick-tock tick-tock tick-tock.

11:59.

The woman's legs were stretched open as she lay on the bed. The nurses had to help keep them from closing, as the pain made the woman forget what she practiced.

"It's almost time. One last push should do it." The doctor told the woman.

The father-to-be was supporting the woman's shoulders and squeezing her hand, all the while whispering comforting things into her ear.

"One more push." The father-to-be whispered, maybe to himself, maybe to his wife.

And so the woman pushed. And if the pain she felt was like a pit of fire, the arms of the flames seemed to want to touch the sky. They roared and they roared, growing larger and larger, and angrier and angrier until, all at once, the fire died down to a pit of glowing embers. No trace of the fire that once burned so brightly save the hot ashes and smouldering cinders.

The pain came, and then the pain went.

And then, all the women could hear was the wailing of her baby.

Her baby.

She was a mother.

Maybe she wasn't as ready as she had hoped.

Had she looked up, the clock face would have read 12:00. A new day had begun.

Her eyes followed the arms of the nurse who was holding a little package wrapped in blankets.

"It's a girl." The nurse said excitedly. "A healthy girl. Ten fingers, ten toes."

"Would you like to hold her?" The nurse asked, although he was already crossing towards the bed, ready to hand over to the women the greatest thing she had ever created.

The woman nodded, and held her baby in her arms. Her husband leaned over, gazing his eyes unto the most beautiful sight he had ever seen: the love of his life holding his newborn daughter.

"Ain't she a sight for sore eyes." The father murmured.

And she was.

The woman looked at the little bundle of joy in her ams. And she knew, in that moment, that she was ready to accept the fate that had been bestowed upon her; to be a mother.

She was ready at last.

The woman thought she knew what love was before she laid eyes on her daughter. She loved her mother and her father. Her close friends was near and dear to her. She had thought her entire heart had been given to her husband. But when she clasped this new life in her arms, a different kind of love blossomed inside of her. The love a mother has for her child.

"Have you decided on a name?" The nurse asked quietly, not wanting to break the moment between a new family.

The woman didn't even have to think.

"Aveline." She breathed. "Her name is Aveline."

And just as a new day was beginning to unfold, so to was a new life.

**

Author's Note

hello! thank-you for reading the prologue of Aveline. the best is yet to come, so stay tuned!

dedicated to the lovely Raspberry-Penn, my very first reader! thank-you for your reads, votes, and comments. it means more than you think.

'till next time!

maria