Part 14: Taking the Sin from Serenity

14.1

Miss Fiona Cross was unlucky.

Desperately so.

A one night stand with a stranger at a house party had landed her in hot water.

She’d known the signs were there; late period. Constantly feeling exhausted.

Feeling sick every morning.

But she was in denial.

Things like this just weren’t supposed to happen on your first time.

Though she tried to deny it; she’d never have mentioned it to any of her family for shame of having to explain her situation. She was only seventeen and doing well in school.

Things like this just weren’t supposed to happen to grade A students.

Still, she’d known deep down.

She’d known since the morning after.

Something had felt different and it wasn’t just the fact that her innocence had been taken.

Sure enough, three months later she’d began to show and her worst fears were confirmed.

In spite of the stigma that young motherhood had inspired in that day and age, she was warming to the idea of having a little one of her own, someone to dote on night and day.

Her family hadn’t shared her passion for the idea, so she’d moved out, got her own place and began working as many hours as God sent to provide the essentials for her child.

The dad wasn’t in the picture, she didn’t want to spring it upon him like that as she was sure he would’ve wanted nothing to do with her.

So she’d gone it alone.

And her pregnancy had gone well.

Right up until her scan.

Her best friend, Mary, was by her side, holding her hand tight enough to bruise the bones.

The smiling orderly had moved the ultrasound scanner around her belly and smiled as he revealed the kicker; ‘There are two of them in there.’

*

Unfortunately, Fiona had not planned for this and the blow was devastating.

She broke down in tears, leading the orderly to mutter, ‘I’ll let you two have a minute,’ before skulking out.

‘Oh, Mary,’ she’d sobbed. ‘I don’t know how I can cope with two. I won’t be able to afford it, for one. And how am I going to look after two babies? I’m only a kid myself.’

‘I’ll help as much as I can,’ Mary said. ‘You won’t be going through this alone. But you’ll get used to it. Mams are tough.’

‘Thank you,’ Fiona said.

She ran herself ragged working overtime to save up enough money for the incoming children.

And she came to an agonising decision.

She had planned for one baby.

Had enough money for one baby.

Had enough love for one baby.

When the babies were born, she would reassess, but her gut was telling her to give one of the children up for adoption.

*

Six months later, she brought her beautiful babies into the world.

They were perfect in every single way.

And were identical in every way; like a reflection of each other.

Their first day on earth went fine; they slept through most of the day and night due to the painkillers in their systems.

Maybe this isn’t going to be so bad after all, she thought with a smile.

But it was as though this boast had been heard and something was sent to royally rectify the situation.

At exactly four a.m. the following morning, her twin boys simultaneously began to scream the place down.

Her nerve endings were shattered.

She was already exhausted from the pregnancy, the brutal ordeal of the birth and the frantic work leading up to it in preparation.

She was unprepared for this.

Panic shot right through her.

Which fucking one do I feed first? she thought.

She smiled.

Feed them both at the same time.

She picked them both up, whispering to them soothingly.

They screamed harder at the sound of her voice.

Their cries were like acid in her eardrums, but she pressed on.

‘Hush, hush, it’s ok,’ she began in her finest sing-song voice.

They cried louder as if to mute her song.

She pulled her gown down, exposed her breasts.

She moved the smaller one – Simon she’d called him after her father – towards her breast as he had been shrieking the loudest.

He didn’t seem to want to latch on, in fact began screaming even louder.

And he was right next to her ear now.

Her ear began to ring, blissfully blotting out some of the cries.

She tried Wayne, the other child.

He latched on pretty much straight away and began suckling.

The silence on one side was bliss.

Got this fucking noise in stereo, she thought.

Simon still cried, still refused to latch on.

One of the nurses, a kind soul named Kirsty, had come in and given Simon a bottle of expressed milk.

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

He took to her well, settling down as soon as she picked him up. He suckled contentedly in the nurse’s arms and fell asleep after draining his bottle.

Why can’t he do that for me? Fiona thought.

Wayne was already asleep.

She caressed his cheek with her thumb, being careful not to wake him.

The nurse came over and gently set Simon down in her other arm.

She’d been comfortable holding one baby, but two seemed hard.

Almost impossible.

Even more so when Simon woke up and began screaming again.

Kirsty poked her head round the door. ‘He’s probably just got wind.’

Fiona set Wayne down. He remained sleeping, snoring peacefully.

Simon was still crying an hour later, the cries getting shriller and shriller.

Kirsty was about to clock off, but she came round last thing to see how she was getting on.

By this point Fiona was in tears, rocking backwards and forwards with her hands clamped tight to her ears.

‘I can’t do this with both of them. There’s only me. What’s it going to be like when I get home?’ she sobbed.

‘You’ll be fine,’ Kirsty said, stroking her hair gently. ‘It’s a steep learning curve, but you’ll soon get the hang of it. And it’ll get easier the more you do it.’

*

Fiona had trusted her, but in the end she discovered she’d been full of shit.

Two babies was too much for a single parent, she decided well into the first night.

She went with it for a while, trying to cope as she desperately didn’t want to give one of them up.

But she wasn’t sleeping.

She was skipping meals.

Bills were mounting up on the doormat.

She had no help from anyone whatsoever.

She spent most of the day sobbing.

Wayne was sleeping well, until Simon woke him up.

And he just wouldn’t settle no matter what she did.

She took him to the doctor.

‘He’s a baby. Babies cry,’ the doctor explained, patronising in the extreme.

‘Thanks for nothing,’ she sobbed, storming out with both babies in her arms.

Fiona hated herself for not being able to settle him.

She felt a failure as a parent.

She hoped that the nurse had been right.

Desperately prayed that this would be the case.

But she wasn’t.

Simon seemed to hate her.

And she was beginning to hate him, as much as she hated herself for saying it.

*

In the end there was only one thing she could do to save her sanity.

And possibly Simon’s life; the lack of sleep had destroyed her mental health and she had no idea what she was capable of doing.

The thoughts that were beginning to spin around her head scared and repulsed her. But they were seeming more and more like the right thing to do.

So she reluctantly gave Simon up.

She gave him one last feed, then dressed him in warm clothes.

She put him in his car seat, drove to the next town.

Sobbing her heart out, she held him for the last time.

Kissed his forehead.

Said goodbye to him.

The nauseating screams in her ear were confirmation to her that she was doing the right thing.

Her reaction to the screams – hissed curses, a balled fist and gritted teeth – were an exclamation point on her decision.

She put him in his Moses basket, wrapped him up carefully.

Tears dropping onto his forehead, she kissed him for the last time, uttered, ‘I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry,’ and put the basket on the porch of one of the detached houses on the expensive estate.

She was sure that they had enough money to look after him properly, to give him the life he deserved.

Then before she had time to change her mind, she got into the car and drove away.

*

Fiona had barely gotten five minutes down the road before she realised that she had made a huge mistake.

She needed to turn round right now, go and pick her son up and return him to where he belonged.

‘Shit, Simon. I’m so sorry,’ she said aloud.

She prayed hard that nothing had happened to him in the short time since she’d left him.

There was nowhere to turn around on this long dual carriageway.

Every minute felt like a week to her.

She stomped her foot down, almost shoving the accelerator pedal through the floor of her decrepit vehicle.

Finally, she found a place she could turn.

Her view of the road was blurred by a haze of tears.

She spun a fast U-turn, just missing a cyclist who had appeared from nowhere.

Her heart lifted a little as she realised that she was drawing nearer to him.

‘I’m coming, Simon. I’m coming!’ she shouted.

She was doing sixty in a thirty zone right up to the curve of the hill where the house was.

But her triumphant grin faded when she saw blue lights flashing all around.

She was still a good way from the house when she saw the Moses basket containing Simon being bundled into the back of a police car.

The car sped away.

The other police cars followed just as she pulled up outside the house.

She chased them, flashing her lights, but it was too late.

Simon had gone from her life for good.