32. Epilogue — Years Later
Epilogue — Years Later
Chi
It’s been many long, arduous hours. I think a day, but I’m not really sure. I thought being shot was the worst pain one could endure, but apparently, I was wrong. I was very, very wrong.
We got to the hospital early this morning, and it’s dark out again. That’s all I have to go by to tell the time since my brain can barely make sense of the numbers on a clock. I’ve been screaming for hours. The epidural didn’t work; pregnancy and the subsequent labor is definitely not all rainbows and butterflies, that’s for goddamn sure.
But when it’s over, there’s a teeny tiny little human in the doctor’s arms, crying her head off with unabated vehemence.
Andy looks back and forth from me to the small bundle that just came into this world, his dark eyes alight with emotion. “Holy shit! Holy shit! She has curly hair! It’s black! Like mine!” I’m not sure what other color it would be, since Andy and I both have black hair, but he is right. It’s curly, like his. For now. Who knows what it’ll be in just months? Or years? Only time will tell.
“Give her to me,” I sob, my body knowing that something integral has left it and is outside of it for the first time. Like she’s part of me but not with me, and it’s almost wrong, and so very right at the same time.
The doctor cuts the umbilical cord quickly and lays her in my arms. Andy stares at us from above, shellshocked, blinking hard, mouth gaping open.
I suddenly feel the deepest urge to giggle. The love and trauma that I’ve felt leading up to this moment intertwine, and my chest feels like it’s about to burst.
I lean my head down to her impossibly tiny ear and whisper, “I know it seems crazy, but you will rule the world one day.” I lean back and look into her wide open eyes, the same almond shape and dark shade as mine, and she stares back at me. I know there’s no way she’s got the presence of mind to understand anything that’s happening around her. But maybe some part of her does understand something important about this moment, at the very least.
So, I continue, as if it’s a secret that only we share: she, Andy, and I. “You will rule in whichever way you choose, little girl.”
Then Andy bends down to kiss us both, and we get lost in this new reality we have made for ourselves.