her remedy

25

I have always had dreams.

Dreams that I know will never come true, and dreams that have already come true.

But this was more of a dream crushed.

I should have never had to feel that awful tug on my heart.

He isn't a natural color, his hands are blue, and he isn't making any sound. This isn't what a healthy baby looks like, yet I wish that somehow it is.

The mood changes drastically, but not in the right way. Laura's expression went from joy and fascination to heartbreak. My mum silently looks at the floor, knowing too that the unimaginable has happened.

Simon looked confused at first when he realized the baby wasn't crying, and then he understood why.

The sudden look of realization he had his face will probably never leave my memory.

The doctor and the nurses exchanged glances and examined the awfully still and silent newborn.

Something is terribly wrong.

I close my eyes for a moment, hoping I have passed out from the pain and that I'm dreaming, hoping that none of it is real. How could anything like this happen? How could he go from being perfectly alive and functioning to still and gray? How did I mess up so badly that I killed my child before he could even see light?

Hesitantly, I open them back up and see the same agonizing sight of my stillborn baby.

"Is he-" I say, my voice cracking. I don't want the answer to this question.

The doctor gently sets the quiet baby on my chest. He grabs a stethoscope and sets it on the baby's chest, listening closely. I shut my eyes tight, hoping with all my might that he will wake up and cry.

The doctor's shoulders drop down and his eyes water. Telling any mother the reality is crushing.

"I'm so sorry, Miss Adkins. He is stillborn."

How foolish I was to think that my breakup with Alex was the worst pain I could feel. That feeling of pain doesn't even come close to the way I feel now.

My world crumbles around me, my heart shatters into dust.

This is something my heart will never recover from.

Never.

*

Somehow I had fallen asleep. Somehow, Simon had me in his arms. For a moment, I was at peace and happy. I remembered I had given birth and I started to look for my baby.

Then it hit me.

My baby is dead. I never did get to hear him cry, see him smile, see him open his eyes.

And I never will.

I've seen people fall apart before. I myself have fallen apart before. But this is different. This is pain that you wouldn't wish on anyone. This is when you start to genuinely wonder if you can ever go on.

Simon stirs in his sleep, his eyes puffy from crying with me. He is the only thing in the world that has kept me from completely breaking.

There's a knock on the door. The doctor that delivered him comes in with a baby in his arms. I almost smile and think that maybe he came back to life.

But I just took one look at the baby in his arms and knew he hadn't come back to life.

He handed me the lifeless baby. I held him in my arms, breathing his scent and wondering what could have been.

"W-why? How? How did I kill him?" I ask, my voice hoarse.

"You didn't kill him. This happens a lot. On his way out, he got stressed and his body couldn't keep up and everything just shut down. The stress wasn't your fault, or anybody's fault. It just happens." He explains, his expression pained.

"How can we fix him?" Simon asks. He must have woken up from hearing the doctor.

"You can love him while he's still here. You have a few hours with him before he has to be-"

"Don't finish that sentence, we know." I say.

He leaves the room, leaving the three of us alone.

The three of us; what was supposed to be our little happy family. From the moment I had found out I was pregnant, I couldn't wait to become a family.

Now we won't be leaving as that happy family.

We won't get to wake up at all hours of the night to feed him.

We won't get to comfort a crying baby, or make him laugh and smile.

We won't get to see him take his first steps, hear him say his first word.

I'll never hear this child call me mummy.

We'll never see him grow. We'll never see the color of his eyes.

We'll never see him go to school or graduate.

We'll never see him make friends.

We won't see him fall in love and get his heart broken.

We won't see him get married.

We won't see him have a child of his own.

We won't see him again.

The nursery is useless. All those doctor visits and ultrasounds are meaningless. That beautiful sound of his heart beating has never seemed so heartbreaking.

I truly don't know if I can go on.

Sobbing in Simon's arms, I say my thoughts out loud. We tell each other all the things we'll never get to see him do.

Then Simon says, "We can't spend our last hours with him like this. Let's be happy, let's show him how much we love him."

"Angelo. That's his name." I say.

"Angelo James Konecki." Simon says.

I look into Angelo's little expressionless face.

"Mummy and daddy love you, Angelo. With all our hearts." I say.

"You're going to be happy up there, baby. I promise." Simon runs his hand along his soft hair.

I hold his tiny hand.

"Watch over us, because sometimes we do stupid things and get ourselves in trouble." I continue. "And always send us little signs that you're there, alright?"

There's a little tap on the window behind us. We each turn to look and find the most unusual thing.

In the cold, pouring down rain, on the roof of the hospital, a blue bird stands and stares at us.

I look back at the baby in my arms, and I realize this is our sign.

"He made it, Simon."

He takes my hand and holds me close. The three of us hold onto to each other in one embrace.

"He made it, Adele."

A/N: I was really unsure about making him stillborn and even changed the story so that he lived and it was a happy ending. But I changed my mind and went back to my original idea so, here you go.