by Sienna Mynx
Houston, Texas – America
I’M TIRED. IT WAS A running thought in her mind. When she woke, she would think it. When she prepared a meal, she would mumble it. When she slept she would dream about saying it. Exhaustion for her was the new normal.
And Shae couldn’t be happier.
She conceived in July. She didn’t know the day. That summer every day with Carlo was spent in his arms. If she had found out about the pregnancy sooner, she might have been able to trace it back to a special moment. However, her pregnancy remained a mystery to her until September. Three months had passed and all her body’s changes were dismissed due to her erratic schedule and stressful job at the girl’s home. How could she ever have known that such a precious gift developed into a little being in her womb?
Shae sat up in her bed. She had taken to napping during the day. A side-effect of being pregnant and the only defense to her growing weary state. It was dark in her room. The shutters were open to her windows. It had to be three o’clock. Where had the sun gone? She wondered. Then a flash of light exploded in her room followed by a big boom of thunder. The rain came right after. It was a hard-torrential downpour that hammered the window pane and roof. She’d taken the guest room above the garage. The house itself had six rooms and each housed four bunk beds. The girls she and Doris took in all thrived in their home. Her downsized life felt fine. At first. When she thought she could live with a dresser and a small closet. It was fine because she had no one to care for but herself.
Things had changed.
Shae eased off the bed and went to the windows. The storm was ferocious for the time of year. Everything was grey and washed out. The universe fit her mood. She dropped her forehead against the pane of glass and stared at nothing, so her mind and thoughts drifted to him. The day she found out she was pregnant was the day she knew for certain she couldn’t go through any of it without him in her life.
SEPTEMBER 12, 1994 –
“Shae? Shae! Shannon! Are you okay? Oh my gosh, call an ambulance! Hey? Wake up!”
Shae could hear her friend’s distress, but she was slow to respond. It was as if a heavy cloak was thrown over her head and she had to struggle to lift it to wake. Slowly her eyes opened, and she looked up into the face of the Director of ‘New Beginnings’. A woman named Doris Glenn who had a similar life of hardship of her own before they found a new purpose was now her best friend and business partner. Doris was on the floor? How did she and Doris end up on the floor?
The children, all girls who ranged in age from eleven to fifteen had gathered. They fought and shoved at each other to be the one to help Shae sit up.
“Are you okay? Say something? Omigod! Say something Shae!”
“I’m fine. Stop panicking,” Shae said and fought back her dizziness.
“Fine? Panicking? You blacked out.”
“I don’t know what happened?” Shae put a hand to her head. She looked around the classroom. She was giving the girls a lesson on nutrition before she collapsed. It was the first time she’d fainted in her adult life.
“Here Ms. Doris,” Angelica said. “I got her some water and the ambulance is on the way.”
“Ambulance? No. No. I’m fine.”
“Hush, drink this,” Doris insisted.
Shae accepted the glass of water and drank as the other girls looked at her with terror in their eyes. Each child was accepted into their foster program on a trial basis by the court. She and Doris were still currently under review by the State. And the children were just beginning to trust the safety of their new home. Shae’s fainting triggered the dread and foreboding that these young girls carried constantly. A catalyst that would toss them all back into the foster system.
“I’m okay girls. See!” she shook her hair with pink streaks and batted her lashes at them. A few smiled. One laughed. Most didn’t.
“Give her some room. Tasha and Teri help me with her. Help her stand,” Doris said.
“Oh Doris, I’m fine! I—”
She again felt light headed. She froze. She let the girls help her stand. She’d put on a few pounds in the past few weeks. Shae had decided to fast and detox her system. The fainting may have been because of her vegetable only diet. God knows she was hungry all the time and the diet drained her.
“Here you go, Ms. Shae.” A sweet girl named Sherika said. She had brought over a chair. Shae sat in it when standing became too much. They had turned the garage into a classroom. Here she had open discussions with the girls about the sexual abuse and physical abuse they’d suffered in life. Here she gave them lessons on hygiene, nutrition, and even discussed the teenage girl problems that came with the hard life they’d been born into. This was their safe place and Shae was fiercely protective of it.
“I’m really better now. Promise,” she told all the staring faces crowding around her. Doris, didn’t look convinced. She and Doris had just opened their non-profit a month ago. Shae had sold her jewelry, emptied her accounts, gave it all up to support their mission. They had a good foundation, and she was able to pull in some investors, but they had to be careful. Not everyone in the community wanted to see them succeed.
The ambulance sirens sang in the distance.
“Tell them to go. I don’t need them,” Shae demanded.
Doris walked out, and she knew that meant her request was going to be denied. She sighed in defeat.
“Why did she faint?” One of the younger girls asked.
“She’s drunk.”
“What?” said another.
“She’s not drunk stupid. Eating them nasty veggies she keeps shoving on us did it,” said another girl. Shae smiled. A few of the girls laughed and she could sense many of them relaxing. Shae’s eyes connected with the only girl who wasn’t smiling. Her name is Jilly and she’s fourteen. Jilly had lived on the streets since she was ten. She was sold into prostitution by her gang at eleven. Jilly was extremely distrustful of Shae and Doris. Out of all the young women Jilly was found to the catalyst for the tension or strife within the group. She had become Shae’s special project.
“She’s not drunk and it ain’t no diet.” All the girls fell silent. Shae stared at Jilly who glared at her with her arms crossed over her chest.
“She’s pregnant.” Jilly announced.
“What?” gasped Angelika. “She is?”
“No, no girls... I’m not pregnant.”
“Yes, you are.” Jilly shouted. “Every time my momma got knocked up she fainted. Just like you. Who the daddy that’s what I want to know?”
“You’re pregnant!” the girls exclaimed.
“Girls... calm down, I’m not... pregnant.”
The paramedics walked in rolling the stretcher. The girls were ushered aside so they could check Shae. They asked her a few questions and took her pressure.
“I’m fine, I’m telling you it’s my diet.”
“No,” Doris spoke up. “She hit her head when she fell. You need to take her to the hospital to be sure.”
“Doris!” Shae exclaimed.
“I’ll go with you,” Jilly volunteered.
Doris and Shae looked at Jilly with surprise. The kids all did too. Jilly shrugged. “What? I just want to make sure you’re okay.”
Shae smiled. “Can she come with us?”
The paramedic looked at his partner then at the kids. He must have sensed the need for the ride. He nodded it would be fine. Shae allowed them to bring her out on the stretcher with no further objections.
“I DON’T LIKE HOSPITALS.” Jilly paced.
“Why?” Shae asked from her hospital bed. Jilly rubbed her arms as if she were cold. “Three of my homies died in them. They never saved them. And when we came to the hospital to get information they wouldn’t even let us see any of them. Useless. I think the doctors let them die. They choose who can live, you know? They do.”
“That’s not true.”
Jilly shrugged. “You don’t know how it is. Being scared, needing help when people think you are trash.
The people that are supposed to help you never do. Not the police, not the hospitals, not the fake preachers trying to drag you into their church. It’s all fake.”
Shae had learned to listen to the kids when they talked without judgement. So much of Jilly’s life was filled with violence and trauma she often wondered if the young girl would benefit from help she wasn’t capable of offering. Jilly’s mood changed. She put her hand on Shae’s tummy. She smiled at Shae.
“What do you want? A boy or a girl?”
“Jilly, sweetheart, I’m not pregnant.”
“Why do you keep saying that? I saw you, you know.”
“Saw me?”
“Yeah? Three months ago, I was in my room. I heard someone, so I went to my window. You were by the garbage can with a man. He grabbed you. He put you over his shoulder and kidnapped you.”
“Kidnapped me?” Shae scoffed.
“I saw him. He forced you into a car.”
“If you saw him why didn’t you say anything? To me or Doris? To anyone?”
“Because I hated you. For forcing me to come here and the courts for making me wear that ankle bracelet. It was your problem not mine. At least that’s what I thought.”
Jilly turned and walked away. She paced and tried to explain herself.
“I went downstairs to see. I went to the window and saw you in the car. You two never left. And when you got out of the car he drove off damn near running over people in the street. I knew he was someone mean. A mean white man.”
“He wasn’t mean. He was upset.”
Shae’s smile faded. She remembered her talk with Carlo. Remembered the hurt and pain in his eyes. She hated that memory of him. It was the last time they spoke.
“You’re pregnant. By a white man.”
“I would love to have a child, Jilly. By any man. It’s one of the reasons I care for so many of you. But I’m not pregnant. I can’t have kids. When I was younger I had a terrible pregnancy. One that started in my tubes. I was told I would never be able to have kids after.”
“You get a period, don’t you?”
“Yes... but it’s still not possible to conceive—.”
“Then you can have kids.” Jilly smiled.
Shae shook her head and laughed. “We’ll let the doctor tell you the truth.”
“Ladies?” A female doctor came inside the room. Shae was given a trauma room to herself in the hospital. The doctor’s smile meant there had to be good news. She knew it was a simple fainting spell and nothing wrong with her.
“How are you feeling?” the doctor asked.
“I’m okay now. Are they coming to do the x-rays?”
“No. I’ve cancelled them. I have news.”
“Something wrong?” Shae asked.
“Good news. You’re pregnant.”
“See! Told you!” Jilly shouted. “Told you!”
“What? Wait. Wait. No, I’m not.”
“Ms. Dennis. Shannon Dennis? Correct?” The doctor looked at her iron tablet.
“Yes, it’s me but—”
“The blood work came back positive. You’re pregnant.”
“How?” Shae asked.
“Sex!” Jilly laughed.
“I know about sex. Not what I mean. I had an ectopic pregnancy. The doctors took out my tubes but left my ovaries. I can’t have a baby.”
The doctor frowned. “The doctor took both your tubes?”
Shae nodded.
“I don’t believe so. I’m not sure what you were told but you are pregnant. Since you informed me of the ectopic pregnancy let’s do some more tests to solve this mystery. Okay?”
Shae couldn’t answer. Jilly kept singing ‘I told you so’. Shae wouldn’t believe the news. She couldn’t be pregnant. It wasn’t possible. Was it?
JILLY HAD CLIMBED IN the bed with Shae. For fourteen she was a very petite girl. She looked more like twelve without all the hair extensions and the makeup she liked to wear. Shae held her and stared blankly at the television. After her vaginal and abdominal ultrasounds, the nurse told her the doctor would review the images and come speak with her. The wait was torture. For the life of her she tried to remember the time when she lost her child. The pain and loss were all she carried from that memory. What had the doctor said? Why did she not question her diagnosis? How could she think for so many years she couldn’t conceive? She watched the latest episode of Seinfeld and cleared her mind of false hope. She knew the truth. There was no pregnancy. The diagnosis was wrong.
July 1994 -
“Omigod!” Shae put her face in her hands. “I can’t do this!”
Carlo started the car. He was going to take her no matter the cost.
“Carlo. Let me go. I’m begging you.”
“No! No! No! No! No!” He punched the dashboard repeatedly until the vents popped out and his knuckles bled.
“I’m broken!” she shouted back at him. “I’m broken, and everything I’ve ever done has been to cover it up, pretend I’m normal. I’m not! Everything I’ve ever wanted has turned to shit, including my love for you! Do you understand? I close my eyes at night and I see those girls. I close my eyes, and I see myself. I'm back there. Hearing them crying and screaming. And it never ends! For any of them. For me. If I can't love myself, how the hell can I love you, Carlo? I can't be with you; I can't! I don't want to be with you! Do you get it? Damn it! You want me to say it. I don’t want you!”
Carlo wiped his tears.
“Say you understand. Please. Forgive me.”
“Get out,” he said.
“Carlo, please.”
“Get the fuck out!”
He got out of the car and went around to her side. He snatched open her door and yanked her out. Shae dropped her head in defeat. She couldn’t stop crying. When he shoved her aside to slam the door shut she stumbled back onto the street. The boys hanging on the corner all paused to watch the scene. And then Carlo turned to deliver the final death blow to their love.
“I hate you. Satisfied now? Do you want me to say it in Italian, so you can believe me? Ti odio! Ti odio! Ti odio!” he shouted at her. “I’ll never forgive you.”
“Ms. Dennis?”
Shae glanced to the doctor who had entered the room. The memory of Carlo burned in her heart, but she managed to smile. Jilly didn’t move. The young girl continued to sleep in her arms.
“Finished with your tests doctor?” Shae asked.
The doctor pulled a chair over and took a seat. Her face was serious. Shae’s heart sank. Even though she had prepared herself for the truth the mere mention of a baby cut her in a place so deep she was sure she would suffer the heartache of the sad news all over again.
“So, I was right. I’m not pregnant.”
“There’s definitely a pregnancy,” said the doctor.
“I don’t understand any of this. How? My tubes literally exploded in me. I had surgery. The doctor—”
“You had an ectopic pregnancy. That’s true. But you didn’t have a full hysterectomy. Not even a partial. You have your uterus and your right fallopian tube. There is scarring to your uterus. This pregnancy is high risk and will be until you deliver. Without knowing your medical history I have some concerns.”
“I was told they took my tubes, both. I was so young and so confused and scared. All I remember is the pain.”
“But haven’t you had gynecological checkups? Inquired about your health?”
Shae felt another sharp sting of embarrassment. Here she was teaching girls about their body and she did little to nothing to care for hers. It was ignorant.
“What kind of danger is my baby in?”
“Carrying this baby to term is a big challenge for you. You are three months pregnant.”
“How big?”
“Looking through your ultrasound I can’t say.”
“Guess?”
The doctor gave her a small smile. “Full term with no toxemia or hypertension, I give you a 55% chance of delivering.”
“That good?”
Shae smiled.
The doctor winked. “I have a OBGYN I want you to see. She’s pretty good with dealing with pregnancies like yours. And this diet you were on. Stop it. You need to eat. To take care of yourself, like you are doing with her.”
The doctor referenced the girl sleeping against her breast. Shae smiled. She nodded her obedience. “Thank you. This is the best news ever.”
“The father is a lucky man.”
Shae’s smile faded. “I hope he thinks so.”
THE RETURN HOME FROM the hospital was very awkward. Jilly of course delivered the news of her pregnancy to Doris before Shae could frame her thoughts. And Doris knew all about her history and heartbreak over Carlo. Neither women mentioned what an unplanned pregnancy from a mafia hitman who lived in Italy really meant.
Once alone she asked Jilly and Doris for space. She went to her room and closed her blinds and turned off the lights. In the dark quiet she sat on the edge of the bed and cried. She stared at the phone until her eyelids were heavy with fatigue and exhaustion won out. She fell back onto her pillows and slept. And she dreamed. She dreamed of him.
When Shae woke she knew for certain what she wanted. She wanted another chance at happiness. First, she paged Carlo. She used an International number he told her he’d answer whenever there was an emergency. She kept a hand to her tummy while she waited for his call back. She waited all night. It never came.
The next day she called Sorrento Italy and tried to reach Marietta. The person on the phone informed her that Marietta no longer resided at Melanzana and hung up on her. That was it. She had the greatest news of her life and no way to share it.
PRESENT—
“You okay?”
Shae turned from the window. Doris had come inside her room without knocking. She was so fixated on the storm she hadn’t noticed.
“I’m fine. Something wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong, I haven’t seen you since this morning. Everything okay with the baby?”
“Yes, Doris,” Shae almost laughed. They had one scare of spotting and Shae panicked. That sent a tidal wave of panic through the women and girls. She had to keep her cool for them and for the baby. “What about the girls, are they okay?”
