Chapter 4
Luna
This memory settles over me like a summer breeze, unlike the others. There is just warmth, a slow unfolding of a piece of my past that I hold dear.
I’m floating somewhere between sleep and waking, my body heavy, my mind drifting …
The bright light shines red through my closed eyelids.
A memory.
It is raining this morning.
The light drizzle seeps into everything without ever becoming a storm. Isaac is pacing by the window, phone in hand, messages lighting up the screen every few minutes as he tries to get everything ready. The contractions started an hour ago.
He is thirty-three, and I am twenty-seven—the perfect age for our first one.
We got married two years after we met. Waited four more until I got promoted, until things were “stable.” Until life looked like it was going in the direction we both wanted.
We planned this baby. We already love her with all our hearts.
“Breathe, Luna. Come on. Look at me.”
His voice sounds unfazed. His hand holding mine? Not so much.
I clutch his hand, my short nails digging into his skin hard enough to leave purple crescents.
“I am breathing,” I snap, sweat plastering my hair to my face, “What do you think I am doing? Playing bingo?”
“You’re holding your breath between contractions.”
“Well, maybe I like holding my breath, Isaac. Would you like to swap places? Aaaaahhh.”
He lets out a huff of laughter which is quickly smothered by my killing glare and leans closer, his forehead brushing mine.
“You’re doing incredible, baby.”
I would roll my eyes if the contraction didn’t hit at this very instant. As if Isaac would know what he is talking about.
Instead, another contraction tears through me, and I swear loudly enough that the midwife coughs to hide a laugh.
Hours.
God, it feels like forever.
Time stops meaning anything. It’s just pain and pressure and the tired, creeping understanding that this isn’t going the way it should.
I see the consultant’s face after the midwife called her to examine me. Things are not progressing as they should.
“We think it’s best to proceed with a caesarean,” she finally said
Isaac’s hand tightens around mine. Worry draws lines around his mouth and eyes.
“Is she—”
“She’s fine. Baby’s fine. We just don’t want to prolong this and risk endangering the baby or Luna.”
I nod.
Too tired to argue.
Too tired for anything. All I can think is, this kid is the size of a watermelon and there is no way it is exiting my vagina.
The theatre is colder than I expect. Nothing like childbirth to lose all dignity.
The spinal goes in, and the pain dulls. They move me like a puppet.
I lie here, staring at the ceiling, aware of movement behind the screen. Pressure. Tugging.
And Isaac in scrubs with wide terrified eyes. I guess this is nothing like those YouTube videos he watched.
God.
Isaac.
“You don’t have to stay, you know,” I murmur, my voice faintly amused. Whatever they have given me is the good stuff. I feel like talking.
He looks … green. Maybe he needs some of the good stuff. I am not opposed to sharing.
“I am staying,” he says quickly.
“Are you sure? You look like you’re about to—”
“I’m fine,” he says abruptly.
I try not to smile.
“I am absolutely fine. Fine. Fine. Fine,” I sing.
Another pregnant pause from Isaac. Pregnant pause…ha ha...I made a funny.
“Do you want to sit down?” a nurse asks gently.
“I am—”
He sways slightly.
“Yes,” I say drily. “Sit him down before he becomes the second patient. You don’t get to be the star today, Isaac.”
I don’t see everything.
But I hear it. I feel my body being moved around, and more tugging and pulling and pushing.
A loud, lusty cry of protest.
I don’t blame her. It’s cold in here.
“She’s here,” the junior doctor chimes in.
The words don’t feel real.
And then they lift her just enough for me to see—
Tiny. So impossibly tiny and just so perfect.
Dark hair plastered to her head, her skin flushed, little fists clenched like she already has opinions about the world. She is going to rule it.
I am holding my breath now.
“She’s—”
Perfect.
Isaac still looks green.
“I thought there was only one baby.” He sounds faint.
“Oh, we still need to deliver the placenta,” says the nurse with a smile. I can see his eyes go wider. Isaac looks like he needs a vomit bag.
And then the nurse places Amelie on my chest, and he is immediately distracted.
He looks … undone.
Isaac sits beside me now, staring at our precious daughter like she’s the moon on a cloudless night.
“Look at her,” he whispers, not daring to touch.
I turn my head, exhaustion dragging at me, but I won’t miss this for the world.
“She’s so small.”
“She’s got my eyes,” he says, in awe.
“She’s got your everything from your point of view, I bet,” I mutter. “I didn't sign up for that. It has to be 50-50.”
Isaac huffs a relieved laugh. But he doesn’t look away from her.
“Amelie,” he says softly.
We have already decided to name her after his great-grandmother. She was a pilot and a trailblazer. Everyone thought she was mad.
“She’d approve.” I grin. “Reckless women run in your family.”
He smiles at that but doesn’t look at me yet.
***
Later, it’s just the three of us in a little corner room.
The adrenaline has worn off, leaving only exhaustion. I can feel the edges of pain creeping back now, the spinal starting to fade. My left leg feels a little more numb than the right.
I shift slightly and wince.
“Hey,” Isaac says, immediately alert. “You okay?”
“For now,” I reply. “Ask me again in an hour.”
His hand finds mine, squeezing gently just as there is a knock, and the door opens.
“Ah, there she is.”
Manon.
And behind her—
Chloe?
I feel it immediately.
That small, uncomfortable feeling in my chest. The one that sits there every time Chloe comes by.
She looks exactly as she always does: perfectly put together, blonde hair falling neatly around her shoulders, her small, delicate frame in a perfect jumpsuit that looks like it was tailored for her.
Grey eyes watch everything.
“Oh, she’s beautiful,” she whispers.
I give a tired smile.
“Thank you.”
“They’ll want you to try feeding her again,” Manon says, already stepping closer with that no-nonsense manner I secretly hate. She is in nurse mode now. She worked in Obs Gyne for the longest time.
I swallow, suddenly aware of everything—the gown, how exposed I feel, how vulnerable this moment seems. I also know I don’t want to breastfeed in front of Chloe. I want them both out.
Instead, I hear myself say,“I—yeah. I’ll try.”
Chloe steps closer.
“Can I hold her?”
The question is soft.
My instinct is immediate.
No.
Too soon. I feel like a lioness guarding her young.
I don’t even know her well. Not beyond the edges of Isaac’s world and that quiet, persistent presence in our lives ever since she moved back here six months ago with Manon occasionally admonishing Isaac to help her out.
But the word ‘no’ doesn’t come.
It gets stuck somewhere between politeness and exhaustion and not wanting to seem … difficult.
“It’s alright,” I hear myself say, like it is not me, but someone else.
Chloe smiles—small and grateful—and takes Amelie carefully.
“She’s perfect,” she murmurs. Then, she gives Isaac a long, lingering look. One I do not like at all. I give him a look as well, which has him moving closer to me.
***
Feeding doesn’t go well. Chloe does not leave, though I try to send her the get lost vibes.
Amelie fusses, turns her head, and refuses to latch.
I try again.
And again.
My arms start to tremble, frustration building under my skin. I think I am going to cry.
“I don’t think she’s—” I can feel my lip wobble.
“She will,” Manon says insistently, oblivious to the fact that I don’t want anyone here … Not her, or her daughter from another mother, or even my stupid, stupid husband, who has not shooed them out yet. “Sometimes, it takes a few tries.”
Chloe hovers nearby, watching everything.
She is close … too close.
Heat creeps up my neck.
“I know,” I say, sharper than I mean to.
Isaac steps in finally, blocking them from us with his broad back.
“Maybe she needs a minute,” he says, meeting my eyes.
I look up at him, grateful.
He’s watching me.
Not the baby or them.
Me.
“I’ve got her,” he adds, reaching for Amelie.
Isaac settles beside me again, crowding in while blocking their view with his broad back.
“Hey,” he whispers. “No rush. We’ll figure it out.”
I exhale slowly, my shoulders dropping just a little.
And this time, she latches. Relief hits me so suddenly it almost hurts.
“There you go,” Isaac whispers, a small smile on his face.
I let my head fall back, eyes closing. It hurts, but at least I did it. I wish Mum were here. She is still a couple of hours away.
But for a moment, everything feels right.
And then the memory fades.
The warmth slips through my fingers.
I wake like I’m being dragged through quicksand, as though my body has surfaced before my mind has quite caught up, and the first thing I notice is the pain in my head as the bright light blinds me—a pressure that sits behind my eyes and spreads outwards each time my heart beats, making even the idea of moving feel like a mistake.
There’s a sound somewhere—steady, rhythmic, like everything is louder inside my skull.
Even my own breathing echoes in a way that makes my stomach roll.
When I try to swallow, the dryness in my throat sends a dull ache upwards that folds into the headache until I can’t quite separate where one ends and the other begins.
I try to open my eyes and immediately regret it because the light is too sharp, slicing through me. I flinch, closing them again as the pain spikes. For a few long seconds, I stay completely rigid, instinct telling me that stillness is safer.
A memory comes in fragments, but the moment I try to hold on to it, the effort alone makes the pressure in my head throb harder, and a slow nausea builds.
When I try to move my hand, it responds sluggishly, as if there’s a delay between what I want and what my body understands. That same delay follows my thoughts, too, everything thick and slightly out of sync, like I’m moving through water.
“Don’t move.”
A sleep-roughened voice cuts through the fog as hands hold me still.
Isaac.
Relief comes first, followed by something I don’t have the clarity to name yet, and I try to turn towards him. But the moment I do, the world inside my head lurches, and pain blooms again, forcing me to stop halfway.
“Hurts,” I try to say, but the words come out slow, blurred at the edges.
“It will get better,” he promises.
I try to focus on him, but it takes effort. My eyes struggle to settle, everything slightly out of place, as though my brain is a step behind what I’m seeing.
“Head hurts,” I mutter.
“You fell,” he tells me, and a vague memory flickers again before the effort of thinking makes my head throb harder. I let it go, retreating instead into stillness, into the strange awareness that something is not right inside my skull, that this is more than just pain.
My thoughts feel slow, stretched, difficult to hold on to, and when he asks about the headache, the nausea, the dizziness, I answer in pieces, each word taking more effort than it should, until even that feels like too much.
“Isaac.”
“I’m here.”
I don’t open my eyes at first. I don’t need to; I can feel him here, close, solid, holding me in a way that keeps the drifting at bay.
“Don’t let me fall asleep,” I whisper, because somewhere beneath the fog, I know that matters.
“You’re not going anywhere,” he says, his hand almost bruising tight around mine.
For a moment, I let myself sink again. Then, slowly, carefully, I open my eyes.
His face is right here.
It’s fuzzy at first, like it takes my brain a second to recognise what I’m seeing, to piece him together from light and shadow. There were two of him, but now there is one.
He came.
He came at last.
The thought drifts through, soft and confused, and I feel a small, tired smile tug at my lips as something else floats up from nowhere, slipping past whatever filters I still have left.
“I still dream about you,” I say before I slip back into the darkness.