Her

Chapter seventeen: Miscarriage

Chapter seventeen: Miscarriage

I stand outside the door of Abigail's room and knock three times before proceeding. When I enter Abigail is lying on her bed, staring up at the ceiling with tears flowing free from her face. However, when she hears someone come through her door, she instantly wipes the tears from her face and flicks her head over to me. Yet when she sees it is only me she sighs and allows more tears to come from her eyes. I walk across the room and come to stand beside my friend's bed. I place the flowers I have in my hands on her bed, but Abigail doesn't acknowledge there existence. She keeps her eyes fixated on the ceiling above her and doesn't move her gaze for anything. She doesn't even utter a word. For a moment I stand there just staring at her, thinking she will say something, explain to me what happened, but instead she says nothing.

I remember how when I had said to Abigail she was bleeding, she flung up from her position on the floor. I remember how her whole body was covered in blood. I remember as Abigail's eyes seemed to register what I had realised only the moment before, before going wide. We both knew in that moment where the blood was coming from; it was coming from her vagina. I remember how Abigail screamed; this piercing, electrifying scream that made my ears ring and security guards instantly rushed to us, followed by nurses and doctors. I remember how Abigail was taken away. She was taken away from me towards the hospital and I wasn't allowed to go with her. They had kept her in there for a week before they finally released her back to her room. I came as soon as I heard she was back. But now all she did was lay there silently, staring up at the ceiling.

"What happened, Abigail?" I ask her and for another moment Abigail is silent, but then in the next moment her mouth opens and she speaks.

"I lost it," she whispers, but keeps her eyes on the ceiling. I gasp, sitting beside my friend on the bed.

"Oh Abigail, I'm so sorry."

Dianne had told me about Breeders loosing babies before. She had called it a miscarriage. She said that miscarriages were usually pretty rare, but there was certain Breeders who had them. Dianne said it was usually caused by stress or strenuous activity and I couldn't help but blame myself for Abigail's loss. Perhaps if I had never found out from the nurse that the deformed babies lived, then we would have never gone to the library, then we would have never gone to Marge and Abigail wouldn't be as stressed as she had been after it. Maybe it was all my fault. Maybe I shouldn't have told Abigail the truth, maybe I should have kept it to myself. But even as I thought it I knew I couldn't do that, I knew I couldn't keep something like that from Abigail especially when she was in such a bad state. But I couldn't help feeling guilty anyway.

Dianne had told me that the Doctors, nurses, security guards and even some of the other Breeders looked down on Breeders who had miscarriages. Mostly because they believed they weren't looking after their baby correctly. Most people thought a Breeder being inattentive to their babies' needs caused a miscarriage and that if you had one, there was something the Breeder was doing wrong. Of course there were other Breeders who did not think that, like Dianne, who simply believed that miscarriage were something that just happened sometimes to some breeders and there wasn't anything a Breeder could do to prevent it. But unfortunately not everyone shared her views. The doctors and nurses looked down upon it and considering Abigail was already in trouble for causing to much unnecessary commotion in the Breeders Wing, this wasn't exactly seen as being on the track to recovery.

"I'm happy it's gone," Abigail's words break me out of my train of thought and I have to do a double take to make sure I've heard her correctly.

"What?" I still end up asking.

"I don't think I would be able to handle them taking another one of my babies... especially if that baby is deformed..." but Abigail trails off as more tears start rolling down her cheeks.

"But Abigail that's your job as a Breeder, you have to give birth to –"

"I just can't stop thinking about it," she interrupts me.

"Thinking about what?" I ask even though I know what she's talking about. Her eyes flick over to me.

"The baby, the deformed baby... I can't stop thinking that it's lying out there somewhere, in the rain or in the heat... crying... I can always hear it crying... as though its crying for me."

I look at her sympathetically. "Abi –"

"Atleast with the others I knew..." she stares back up at the ceiling. "I knew they were safe, because I knew where they went... but this one I don't and I just... I can't stand not knowing."

"I'm sure its fine Abi, I'm sure it's okay –"

"Where is it?" she asks up to the ceiling to no one in particular. "Is it okay?"

I sigh and take Abigail's hand from under the covers. "Abi, you got to stop stressing yourself out, that is probably what caused the –"

"I don't care about the miscarriage!" she yells and I jump. "Don't you think I know what the other Breeders think of me Leah! I hear what they say, in the cafeteria, even when everyone thought my head was off in the clouds... I still heard them. I know they think I'm crazy, I know they think I don't belong here and I know they think I'm not going to make it as a Breeder –"

"Everyone wants you to make it Abigail, it's just that –"

"I'm obsessed with knowing where my deformed baby went?" she finishes my sentence. "I think any other Breeder who has had a deformed baby would want to know Leah."

"Well none of them have."

"That's because they know they can't. That's what you're meant to do here Leah, do your job and not ask questions, be in the dark when it comes to the things which are coming out of our own bodies."

"That's what being a Breeder is. We give birth to the babies Abigail, we don't raise them."

"I know," she says with a sigh. "The Institution does. But who raises the deformed babies?" I shrug, but then I realise her eyes are still on the ceiling.

"I don't know," I say.

"Well I'm sick of not knowing and I'm sick of being a Breeder –"

"Abigail!" I try to protest.

"I don't care if I lost my baby," she says. "Quite frankly I don't care if I loose them all."