Haven’t heard from you since you’ve been gone. Everyone’s been asking about Queen Molly. Hope you’re move is going smoothly, and you’re doing okay.
No. No, I couldn’t say I was doing okay. In fact, I felt about as far from okay as it was possible to be.
Tara was already in the kitchen preparing some food, but I couldn’t eat it. All I wanted to do was roll up in a ball and hide. I tried to tear my thoughts away from my imminent appointment, but I couldn’t. I kept imagining what that group of cells inside of me would look like if I let it evolve into what it was intended to be.
A baby.
Mine and Luca’s.
Would it have my straighter hair, or would it be curly like his? Would its eyes be dark and Varasso-like or a lighter brown like mine? Would it have his long nose and my bow-shaped lips? Would it have my sarcastic nature or his much more serious one? Would it have Luca’s rare but heart-stopping smile?
Would it be a boy or a girl?
This was torture!
My sister came up to me and massaged my back. “Are you hanging in there?”
Not able to speak, I shook my head. Even though I knew ending this pregnancy would be the right thing to do, the responsible thing, the logical thing considering all the factors involved, it felt… deplorable.
I felt deplorable.
Still, I needed to do it. I’d never tell Luca. It’d probably just upset him to know.
If he loved me, everything would be different, but he didn’t. And I couldn’t expect him to try to change the way he felt. Love wasn’t something you could force into being.
I should know.
I got a shower, put on some of the loosest-fitting clothes that I’d left behind, and rode with Tara to the clinic. For some reason, the ride seemed too short, too fast. And the closer we got to our destination, the more my stomach ached. It was like my body was cramping in advance. Or maybe it was just punishing me.
I managed to fill out the paperwork about halfway before everything went blurry. I blinked but it didn’t help much. I kept blinking and trying to finish the paperwork, but it was hard to make out the forms.
Eventually, Tara put out a hand, keeping me from writing one more word. “All right, enough is enough. If you really wanted to do this, you wouldn’t be crying.”
“I’m not crying,” I told her, just as a big fat teardrop fell right on the line I’d been in the middle of completing. It smeared the ink into an illegible blob.
“Then what do you call this?” she asked, rubbing her palm under my eye and showing me the wetness.
“Okay, maybe I’m crying.”
“Did you change your mind?”
“I think… I think I’m grieving…” I told her as my voice broke, comprehension dawning. Maybe that’s why I felt so bad.
“Well, that settles it, then.”
“It’s been already settled. I have to do this,” I said, my throat so tight I could barely say the words. Stand tall. Stand strong… But my mantra was no longer working. I felt neither tall nor strong. And what would I be standing for, exactly?
“Actually, you don’t,” Tara said, kneeling in front of me and putting her face level to mine. “You don’t have to do anything right now. But I want you to be honest. How would going back there pregnant and coming out not pregnant make you feel?”
I tried to answer her, I really did. But instead, tears gushed down my face, transforming me into a weepy mess. Tara embraced me. “See, Moll? You don’t want to do this. And you don’t have to. You can keep it.”
I could keep it.
Just the thought made me feel better. A lot better. I smiled at my sister through my tears and stood.
Taking a deep breath, I glanced down at the clipboard with its paperwork and strode back to the counter. “I’m sorry but I can’t go through with this.”
The medical assistant gave me a kind look and handed me a box of tissues. “Don’t worry, honey. It happens all the time.”