Talmer-Grey Terrace (or Hilter and his Beating Heart)

Chapter Eight: As a Minute Became Two

It had been officially five years ever since I left the Old City and started a new life with Hilter. I would have never guess I would be living with him in all my life. There really isn't much to say. Although, I'm carrying his child would be something to be excited for. It felt strange to say "I'm carrying his child" within the first few months, but he got me used to saying it. And now, it has been eight months and the child should be close soon.

          We have been living quite far from the Old City, and we keep moving as much as we can. There really isn't any place we can be in that would satisfy what we're looking for. As we move from place to place, I've been exposed to many things within the first two years that were never there in the Old City and have made me question their way of living.

          I met this woman when Alfred and I went to a club not far from the ocean, and she has told me of the many horrible things she was exposed to and what she was forced to do. I felt sorry for her. She told me she couldn't quite otherwise her children would die of starvation. She regretted her life so much that she wanted to end it, but I told her to keep her head up. I still feel that there are so many opportunities that she needs to be exposed to.

          I met this young girl at a schoolyard that was being picked on my older boys. When I was young, it was the complete opposite. I needed to do something to show those boys a lesson, but Alfred made me keep moving. I left that poor girl in tears, and sometimes, I can see her in my dreams and hear her cry as I did that day.

          I was sitting on the bed in a house we rented while Alfred was doing who knows what in the other rooms. The TV was playing and there were women wearing the most undignified clothing I have ever seen. In the Old City, women were never portrayed in this way, and it made me sick. I switched the channel, and more women appeared. Their faces were noticeable overdone with make-up and everything was just fake. The show I was watching came back on, and it made me even more mad.

          There were princes on horses and princesses locked away in a tower. I got mad when I realized the prince had to save the princess with something called "true love's kiss". I knew what was going to happen, but I got confused when the princess was sleeping and the prince was coming to rescue her. I didn't like it one bit. I turned off the TV and lied back against the bedpost.

          Alfred came into the room. "Are you all right?"

          I nodded. "It was just a show." I rubbed my stomach.

          Alfred sat beside me and kissed my belly. He took my hand and smiled. "I love you," he said.

          Every time he says that, my heart melts and I smile. "I love you too." I was about to raise his hand to kiss it, but he was going to do the same thing. We stared at each other for a moment, but he let me kiss his. It would have been strange for me to let him even though I've let him done that for the past two years.

It was late at night, and Astrid lay silently on an empty bed. Alfred was in the bathroom, looking at himself in the mirror as he hated what he saw. He walked back into the room and stared lovingly at the woman who was laying across the bed. He walked to her side of the bed and sat in the chair beside her and watched her sleep peacefully for a moment. He stood and hovered over her to plant a gentle kiss on her forehead. While he stood over her, he grabbed a pillow next to her and stripped it of its case. He stared at Astrid with his dead eyes and without single thought crossing his mind, he covered her face.

          Astrid slowly began to kick for air, but Hilter remained his hand over her face. Astrid's hand grabbed his, trying to pry it off, but he would not move. As a minute became two, Astrid laid there as still as ever and refused to move again. Hilter kept the pillow to her face for another minute for assurance then removed it and sat back down on the chair. He sat alone in the dark, quite streets that he knew as Talmer-Grey Terrace, and awaited for the next to rise.