Vacancies and Voids...

Yesterday marked two years - 730 days... 17,520 hours - since The Appointment.

And today... today is two years since our D&C.  Because of this, I've tried to get this part of The Story completed in time for posting today - it's proven to be difficult to find the right words... to find the right mindset, as I receive texted pictures of a smiling 10-month old little boy...

I really want to get at least part of this posted today, so I will publish a "Part I" and continue to write...

But I just wanted to leave a prologue:

I didn't realize, in the numb and mindless hours and days two years ago, the emotions - the despair, the darkness, the emptiness - that came clattering down and crashing in.  I find myself reliving, refeeling, things that I may not have been able to acknowledge or fully explore two years ago.

If you find yourself in a bad place to be reading this, protect yourself, close the page.  (Spoiler alert - you know the ending, no need to read the mystery if you already know whodunnit...)

****

She couldn't breathe.

Her body continued its mindless minute-to-minute tasks - her heart kept up its pumping and relaying of blood, her lungs still expanded and contracted, her brain still fired off synapses - her nervous system registered that her legs were beginning to tingle and cramp, having been tucked up for far too long, hours without moving...

It was a nightmare.

She dreamt that she would be able to slowly pull the stifling comforter from over her head, and see that the clock was rewound just 24 hours; see that it was Tuesday morning and she was getting dressed for work, with no threat or reason to believe her beautifully cherished and revered pregnancy was anything but perfect.

Instead, she relived the nightmare over and over: the Tuesday morning that involved delicately laying on the couch, watching the minutes tick by; watching the time deliriously creep by, each minute one less until all was revealed.

She had been certain of one belief: if It had already happened, the course of things couldn't be changed.  There would be no beseeching pleads.  All that was left was to discover: Yes or No.  Happy or Sad.

Life or Death.


Prepare for the worst, hope for the best.

Each traffic light and turn she had navigated as if on auto-pilot:  Left-blinker... It's over, just accept it - you'll either be prepared or pleasantly surprised.

 Each heavy foot up the stairwell to the doctor's office had been one less step in the Before, and one step closer to The After.  One step closer to knowing.. Yes or No.
Happy or Sad.

Life or Death.

The walk down the endless hallway to the last room on the right - the only ultrasound room - had been her own Bridge of Sighs, the last view she would have Before Knowing.

And the music - the depthless, inconsequential soft rock that haunts her, trickles in even through the heavy comforter - it became her dirge, as the sonographer brusquely snapped it off just moments after touching the wand to her abdomen.  She found herself on the receiving end of pleas, being asked to "hold on just one more minute" as the wand was waved this way and that, no magic forthcoming.

Lifetimes transpired, then expired, as the words leaked from the sonographer, as if air from a deflating tire: "I'm so sorry, I don't have good news for you..."

And with that proclamation, her world, which had been precariously teetering over an abyss, finally stumbled, tumbled and plunged into black.