My name is Charlotte (BWWM)

Reach Out, I'll Be There

James and Charlotte moved into a small apartment in Cincinnati. James went to work at a hardware store and Charlotte worked as a seamstress. The lady that Charlotte worked for was from London, England. Her name was Katherine Smith. Katherine was a few years older than Charlotte. Katherine was about five feet and six inches tall and she had long wavy black hair.  Charlotte liked Cincinnati but she missed her family in Lexington.  Charlotte noticed that Cincinnati was different than Lexington and that people were more tolerant about different races living together. A few weeks before Christmas of 1966, Charlotte noticed that she was a month late for her monthly cycle. She went to the doctor and found she was two months pregnant. 

Charlotte was so excited and she could not wait to tell James. When she got home she went and told Katherine the exciting news. Katherine was a like a sister to Charlotte and she was thankful to have someone like her in her life.  She went home to the apartment above where she worked as a seamstress.  When James got home from work, Charlotte was finishing up cooking dinner. She had made fried pork chops, macaroni and cheese and apple pie. After dinner, Charlotte sat down and told James her great news. James was surprised but he was happy.  Charlotte called her mother and told her the great news.  James started to fix up the extra bedroom in the apartment as a nursery.  On February 1, 1967, Charlotte woke up with pain in her back and stomach. She got up and went to the bathroom to take some aspirin for the pain. As she walked to the bathroom she started to feel like there was a gush of liquid leaving her body.  She looked down and noticed she was bleeding.  She started to hold her stomach and screaming for James.  James woke up and ran to see what was wrong.  James noticed that she was bleeding. He grabbed some towels and picked her up and put her in his black Bel Air and rushed her to the hospital.

 Charlotte was in the emergency room for a few hours before he had heard anything. When the doctor came to talk to James, he had been pacing the hallway for about thirty minutes. The doctor came out and started to talk to him. " Your wife is doing fine but I am sorry but the baby did not make it. Your wife is ready to see you now." James walked into the hospital room where Charlotte was.  Charlotte's eyes were  red from crying.  James just held his wife and let her cry.  After a few hours, James and Charlotte went home. Charlotte laid in bed for a few days and did not eat much.  A few weeks went by and slowly Charlotte got back into the groove of things. She went back to work Katherine and started reading a lot again. In the beginning of May, Katherine told Charlotte that she was moving to Lexington, Kentucky to be close to her mother at  the beginning of June. Charlotte was stunned and sad to see her friend leave. Katherine wrote down her new address and told Charlotte to look her up if she came to Lexington.

I decided to make this chapter shorter but my next chapter will be regular length.