Influences of Stars

Chapter 23

Constance paces the floor, pain throbbing in her back with each movement. Every so often she thinks she finds a position she can be comfortable in, but each time it is disrupted by a searing pushing, almost like an explosion, around her body. The only relief she experiences from this, as fleeting as it is, is seeing her mother come through the doors. She reaches out her hand for her mother to take, leaning almost all of her weight upon her, who takes it gladly.

"The first child tends to take it's time in coming out," warned the mother, "Your sister said she shall come along in a few hours and between us we shall sort you out."

"Will it hurt terribly?"

"Yes. It is the most painful thing in the world," she says simply. As she walks alongside Constance around the house, easing her step by step, she adds, "But you must think of the benefits. Imagine when you give a healthy child amongst this, Leon shall love you forever."

Constance knows this well enough. They all will- no witch hunter will lay their eyes upon her for an age, at least not until she is old and withered but she shall be sensible and quiet as an old woman where many turn to scolding. She runs her hand over her stomach, feelings its stretching pressure, and thanks the child within it for the admiration it will garner her. She does not acknowledge that it could be sickly, for she can feels its life bursting from her. No, she was never made to fail at this.

With determination, strength sears within her body. She shall scream and cry and sweat if she must, but she will do this well. She doesn't care how long it takes- and lord it takes hours!- for all will be well in the end. She presses so hard into her mother's, and then her sister's, hands that their flesh almost bursts as it feels like her entire body is being ripped in half, but there's nothing to be done. All she can do is think of the end- a child, a never life in the world and a new life for her.

Leon anxiously stirs outside, drifting in and out of sleep. Everything stays quiet for hours and hours; it is not until the last of it where Constance begins to cry out. He knows then that his child is coming, and soon he shall be a father.

As he considers this, her sounds become more like exclamations than cries because he knows what they mean. They mean that, amongst all this ugliness- amongst the grey, cloudy skies that peer upon this dry land of shrivelled branches and frost licked crops- the rosy glow of spring shall push through the frozen cluster of grass soon. Soon her cries shall turn to someone else's. A little boy, Leon thinks. Yes. How happy his father shall be with a little boy!

Time lasts forever. Constance can feel every breath, every second, every movement. Tiredness ravages her completely but the pain keeps her awake and whilst she is alive in this strange suspension- when nothing else is going on in the world- she is overly aware of everything within her. She has never felt closer to her body and to her mind.

The baby's arrival is some kind of ecstasy, not because of a love for the child but because she can hear her heart. The easing of her agony clears her mind as her head falls back onto the pillow, and the sound of her heart thudding against her chest sounds so human and so utterly remarkable.

It seems like an age until she wakes up to reality once more, although it is probably only a second or two. The moment she does, she asks, "Is it a boy?"

"Yes!" her mother says, wrapping up the little body in a white blanket. His little hands still push out from this confinement.

"And is he well?"

"He looks perfect and he's crying like any healthy baby would."

Constance's face collapses into a grin which both her mother and sister share, laughing at her joy; of course she would be able to deliver a healthy son. "How marvellous!" Constance says, dropping her tired head back down and shutting her eyes. She raises her hands as if in triumph, though they soon drop down once more because a weight pulls at them. However, even as fatigue envelopes her, a shadow of a smile rests upon her lips.