Night, Forgotten

Original Edition - Chapter 28: Then

Spring was in full bloom as Owen and I drove to Dr. Syed's office for my first ultrasound appointment. It was the first clear day after nearly a week of nonstop rain, and the air was thick with the smell of fresh earth. Tree branches reached out to me from the other side of the car window with clusters of golden buds bursting forth from their fingertips.

At least, the buds appeared golden to me. But ever since that forgotten night, I couldn't be sure. One thing I lost that night was the comfort of knowing that my gold was the same as everyone else's gold, or my red or blue, for that matter. Things that used to be one color might suddenly be another color entirely. I felt my reality had slipped behind a different, darker filter, a lens that hung between me and the rest of the world and tainted everything.

The clear, April sky invited me to hope along with all the new things, including what was growing inside me. But I couldn't bring myself to feel anything about the very purpose of the appointment, the fetus.

Instead, I fantasized about what it would feel like to have a miscarriage right then and there in Owen's Subaru.

There would be a lot of blood, and it would stain the fabric of the passenger seat. Would whatever oozed out look like a human-shaped fetus, like something you'd dissect in biology class, or would it just be a lumpy mess?

It would hurt, of course.

I'd have to pretend to mourn.

I'd already made the decision to go through with this pregnancy and give birth. So I wasn't going to kill the fetus, as Diana would put it. I just did not care in the least if it happened to shrivel up and rot inside me.

What kind of mother did that make me?

Last week there was a news segment about a woman who'd looked on as her baby had drowned in the sink. The segment hadn't provided any context for the mother's mental health, other than to suggest she'd plead insanity at her trial. I'd just finished reading about "postpartum psychosis" in the book Dr. Almaden had recommended, Perinatal Mood Disorders, and feticide was its rarest but most devastating consequence.

I tried to imagine what was going through her mind as she watched her baby slowly stop struggling and become still.

The frightening part was not the clarity with which I could fantasize about watching an infant die. What alarmed me was the absence of feeling, the profound indifference, that image conjured in my heart. What if this mental state didn't go away? What if, after the baby was born, I tried to harm it?

"What are you thinking about, Juju Bear?" Owen asked as we arrived at Dr. Syed's office.

"Nothing. Just nervous."

Owen leaned over toward me and rested his hand on my knee for the pep talk he could see I desperately needed. "I know. This one is going to be tough," he said.

I sighed and turned to face him. It wasn't just that this was the first ultrasound appointment, the one where I was going to have to look at all the little fetus parts of the little fetus body. It was also that people expected me to be happy about it.

"Everyone's just so cheerful here," I finally said.

Owen's eyes twinkled as he offered me a generous smile. "Fuck them. You can do this."

He jogged around the front of the Subaru to help me out. It was a gentlemanly gesture, but unnecessary since I'd only gained about five pounds so far, and all of it was in my uterus. Food didn't taste good anymore and besides, I felt nauseated all the time.

We stopped just outside the main doors to the building and took a deep breath in together. Then we let it out.

In together – we waited, held our breath. And out. Together.