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2
~~*~~
BEEPING.
IT came in and out of her consciousness like a quiet alarm clock. She wanted to
turn it off, but then remembered: she didn’t have an alarm clock.
Elizabeth gawked down at her body. Her belly was no longer
round, but flat. She looked up.Elizabeth screamed and screamed.Elizabeth was too shocked to speak. She could barely draw a
breath.Elizabeth swallowed back the grief long enough to say, “My
stomach … hurts. Badly.”Elizabeth waited an hour for the doctor to show. By then
she was vomiting blood. She saw him walk in, and then she fainted.Elizabeth nodded. Shame kept her staring at her feet.Elizabeth nodded again, tears in her eyes. She couldn’t
bring herself to believe a parent could be so kind and caring, and felt
stinging anger that it had taken her so long to find one who did.Elizabeth could scarcely see it through the tears. “I can’t
take you away from college!” she cried after letting him put it on. “That would
be so wrong, so unfair!”Elizabeth missed her spider and tool friends, and the shed.Elizabeth kept daily count: it was only two months away.
She was eight months along and ready to pop.Elizabeth cried and clutched her vacant belly.Elizabeth sobbed. He didn’t say anything more for a while,
but stood and retrieved some tissues, which he handed to her.Elizabeth nodded, the plush whale securely in her grip.Elizabeth knew she would not sleep, even with sedative
coursing through her.
But
if she didn’t have an alarm clock, why was one beeping?
The
question nagged at her like a hangnail. She tried waking up, but found she
couldn’t. Every time she tried the sleep came and dragged her back down again,
and she’d lose herself, and the beeping would go away. But always it returned,
and she’d remember the last time she tried to wake, and vowed to try even
harder.
This
time she succeeded. She tried opening her eyes, but found she could only do it
partway, as though her eyelids were too heavy. Frustrated, she tried pulling
them up with her fingers, but discovered she couldn’t lift her hands! She
struggled and fought, but couldn’t lift them!
The
beeping quickened. (Why would an alarm clock quicken?) She heard a female
voice: “Get her back under.”
It
was a stern voice, cold. Not unlike her mother’s.
The
beeping went away again.
~~*~~
She
woke slowly. She felt very hot, and complained. Another voice, neither stern
nor cold, answered: “Let’s get this blanket off you …”
She
felt a weight lift off her chest and legs, and cool air descend down on them.
It felt wonderful. She tried lifting her hands, and found she could. She
touched her cheeks. They were wet with sweat.
The
kinder voice said, “Here. Let me help.”
She
felt a cool, damp cloth touch her face.
“Thank
you,” she groaned.
And
then it all came back.
She
opened her eyes. The nurse—a young woman probably only five or six years her
senior—smiled down at her.
“How
are you doing, Elizabeth ?”
She had a heavy southern accent.
“Where’s
my baby?”
~~*~~
She
lay curled in a ball and sobbed.
The
nurse hadn’t answered her question, even after Elizabeth screamed at her to, but left her
alone after saying, “I’ll get the doctor …”
Where was her baby? Where was it?
But
no one answered. “Oh, God!” she cried. “My God, my baby, my sweet baby …”
Many
minutes passed. No one came to comfort her or tell her what had happened to it.
“Miss
Finnegan.”
A
male voice.
She
turned her head. A doctor stood at the foot of her bed. She could scarcely see
him through her tears.
“Where is my baby?”
“I
must ask that you keep your voice down, or we’ll have to sedate you again.”
“WHERE—IS—MY—BABY?”
She
couldn’t shake the unspeakable image of her newborn infant in the landfill with
her stuffed toys.
“I’m
sorry,” said the doctor, “but it isn’t your child.”
“You’re
a minor, Miss Finnegan, barely sixteen years of age. You do not have the legal
right to your child; your parents do. On your mother’s orders, when you went
into labor we sedated you and performed a cesarean section to deliver the
infant, who went immediately into foster care. You may be experiencing pain due
to the stitches. If you cannot restrain yourself—”
Her
cry of anguish silenced him and echoed down the hallway. She shrieked
incoherently. Nurses rushed in and put restraints back on her. While she
writhed and fought them, they produced a hypodermic needle and jabbed it into
her IV. Moments later she was unconscious. The doctor’s cold, uncaring face was
the last thing she saw.
~~*~~
She
woke in a different room.
No
more beeping.
Her
belly hurt.
She
gazed up at the ceiling. It was dark in here, almost gloomy, and smelled of
Clorox.
She
glanced left, right. She was in a small private room. There was no nightstand
or bathroom, just a silver tray on a stand and a desk, both left; to the right
a blue-tiled wall.
She
wasn’t tethered to an IV.
The
door was five feet past the foot of her bed. A small rectangular window in it
provided the light, which was cold and white. The adjacent wall was bare and
the same blue tile.
Her
belly hurt. Her baby was gone.
And
Owen … Owen. Dead. He was dead.
The
ring he had given her was gone too.
She
gazed down at her person. Tears streamed down her cheeks. The thin sheet
covering her came up to her breasts, and was tucked neatly and unruffled, as
though she hadn’t moved. She tried moving, and found that the tucking was very
tight. She struggled to free herself, but not too vigorously, because her belly
hurt even more when she tried.
A
thick plastic cable was tied loosely to the left slide on her bed. It ended at
a bright red button. She grabbed the cable and pushed the button repeatedly.
A
loud female voice sounded out above her head: “I’ll be there in a minute.
Please be patient.”
The
intercom clicked loudly and fell silent.
She
groaned through her tears. Her belly … its emptiness felt solid. It pressed
angrily on her spine and made her heart skip. She shook with grief, and
struggled to hold to her sanity. She could feel it fraying and slipping away.
Her
baby was gone. Her parents took it from her. It was gone. She would never get
to know it, or raise it, or love it, or even know what its face looked like.
Was it a boy or a girl? Was it healthy?
Did it cry for its mommy?
She
gazed down at her breasts. They were swollen and ached, and were ready to feed
it.
Her
baby … her baby …
Gone
forever.
Owen.
Gone forever, too.
She
wept and wept, and the nurse didn’t come, and she felt her soul dying, and
images of her beloved belongings in the dump, and her baby too. Nothing was
hers, nothing …
She
wanted to die. She wanted to kill herself. She could no longer bear the agony
of this life, its unending heartbreak, its despair, its injustice.
Her
belly hurt. It hurt so much that when she gulped, she could feel it twinge in
her navel. She grabbed the button and punched it without thought.
The
door emitted a loud electric clicking sound and swung open. A nurse stood under
the doorjamb.
“That
button is not for your personal amusement!” she scolded. “Now what do you
want?”
The
nurse put her hands on her hips, as though at a child who had been caught lying
again, and then approached the bed and gruffly pulled the covers down past
Elizabeth’s thighs. She pressed on Elizabeth ’s
stomach. The pain was so severe that Elizabeth
yelled and slapped her hands away.
The
nurse straightened, put her hands back on her hips. “I’ll get the doctor,” she
said with an impatient sigh.
~~*~~
~~*~~
She
woke in the same room. The same cold white light barely held the gloom in
check. Its sterility echoed in the wounded chasm of her being and returned as
indifference.
Beeping.
The same as before.
Not
an alarm clock. She looked over her left shoulder. A heart monitor glowed green
above her bed. It changed every few seconds: 81 … 78 … 80 … 84 … 81 … 77 …
Her
arm had been rehooked to an IV. Clear liquid dripped into her veins.
Her
belly didn’t hurt anymore.
But
her heart ached more than ever. It renewed and refreshed her tears.
She
sang weakly:
Morning
has broken, like the first morning
Blackbird has spoken, like the first bird
Praise for the singing, praise for the morning
Praise for the springing, fresh from the world
Blackbird has spoken, like the first bird
Praise for the singing, praise for the morning
Praise for the springing, fresh from the world
She
thought of her baby, of her violin and her song ... and Owen. Sweet, sweet
Owen.
She
cried for death.
~~*~~
She
had practiced her violin diligently each Wednesday and Saturday for three
years. Without her parents’ knowledge, she had gone back to Claremore Junior
High and had sought out the music teacher, Mr. Clayborne. Mr. Clayborne had
always been very nice to her. She told him she was in the church school now,
but wanted to know if he could teach her a little violin now and again. He
readily agreed, and so once a week, on Wednesday, she got on her bike and
hurried to CJHS’ music room, where Mr. Clayborne waited. There he taught her
scales, chords, progressions, and many other things. An hour later, sometimes
more, she’d leave him with thanks and pedal quickly home. Her parents never suspected
what she was doing.
She
couldn’t practice with them anywhere near, as they’d inevitably scream at her
to stop. If she persisted, her father would slam open her bedroom door and whip
her. And so she practiced in his tool shed, but only on Saturdays, as that was
the day both he and her mother went into Tulsa
for “errands,” which often took several hours. When Elizabeth asked what the “errands” were and
why they never produced groceries, her mother screamed, “It’s none of your damn
business what we’re doing! If you are going to be a Nosy Nelly, I’ll send your
father to talk to you! Do you understand me, little girl?”
The
tool shed was dark. It made the notes sound as though she were listening to
them through headphones. As her eyes adjusted to the darkness, she’d spy
spiders sitting in their webs, listening to her. Her father had abandoned this
shed; his tools lay scattered about on benches, and were covered in dust and
rust. Like the swingset, she felt bad for them, and so she cleaned them and
talked to them. She felt bad for the shed, too.
She
knew she could practice in her room, but didn’t want to. She wanted to be here
for her inanimate friends. They were her audience, and she’d pretend they were
listening, and then chastise herself: who was to say they weren’t listening, and the spiders too?
So
she played for all of them, and wished them well when she left them, with the
promise of returning in a week. Even without her violin she could hear her song
in there, in the dark, and that brought an uneasy peace. That was enough.
After
leaving the shed one day, she heard: “That’s not bad.”
It
was a boy’s voice. It came from the other side of the fence, through a
knothole.
His
name, he told her through it, was Owen. He was seventeen and her new next door
neighbor in the big house adjacent to hers. He had heard her playing many times
but only now decided to talk to her. She went to the alley next to both houses
where she could look at his face and talk to him properly. He met her there,
and they talked for a long time.
Months
passed. Always he was waiting for her at the knothole; always they would go to
the alley to talk.
She
fell in love with Owen. Sweet, sweet Owen.
They
started meeting after midnight. She would climb out of her bedroom window and
sneak through the back yard to the gate, and then down the alley to the gate to
his back yard.
Owen
was an only child, and had no father. His mother often worked the graveyard
shift at the local slaughterhouse. She was something called a “comptroller” and
did the slaughterhouse’s books and was paid really well. It didn’t matter. The
only thing that mattered was that Owen’s house was parentless most nights from
ten until seven, which was so heavenly that Elizabeth struggled to believe it was real.
They
made love for the first time a year after meeting. She got used to spending the
night in his bed. She’d leave him at five, well before his mother returned, and
an hour before her own parents got up.
She
didn’t give up her violin. Her tool-shed practices seemed to take on a
passionate life of their own, as though her love for Owen gave the bow and
strings some strange power, something beyond anything she’d ever felt before.
He joined her when he could (he had since taken a part-time job at a local
pizza restaurant), and always clapped enthusiastically when she finished. Elizabeth ’s two younger
brothers, Jeff and Nick, nosy and insufferable, were, mercifully, taken to her
aunt’s on Saturday during her parents “errands.” Elizabeth offered once to babysit them (and
give up her practice and seeing Owen that day), but her mother snorted with
derision and said, “And let you fill their heads with whatever crazy notions
you’ve got brewing in there? I don’t think so.”
Her
life was desolate save for her violin and Owen. There was nothing else she
wanted to live for.
When
she discovered she was pregnant, she made plans to run away. She knew if her
parents found out they’d beat her to within an inch of her life. Owen wanted to
run away with her; she refused. He had a good relationship with his mom, and
was a good student at school. Several colleges, including the University of Oklahoma
She
met Owen’s mother. She was a very hawkish-looking woman who was very upset with
the news, but said after calming down: “We all make mistakes. You seem like a
bright young girl. Owen has told me about your parents. He assures me that
talking to them would physically endanger you. Is that true?”
“I
didn’t raise my son to be a sloucher or a dead-beat,” said Owen’s mother.
“He’ll help you. I’ve called my sister in Austin ;
she has offered to put you up through term. We will face any crises as they
come. Would that be acceptable to you?”
Owen
emptied his savings account for her: almost eight hundred dollars. His mother
helped as well: another eight hundred. Elizabeth
packed her belongings and her violin, and at 3 A.M. on a stifling July night
crawled out her bedroom window. She was almost four months pregnant and
beginning to show. She went to the toolshed one last time and said goodbye to
it and the tools and spiders inside it. She thanked them for their friendship.
Owen’s
mother drove her to the Greyhound stop. Owen sat in the back seat with her. She
kissed him and cried in his arms next to the bus after she got her ticket.
“My
aunt will take care of you,” he said out of earshot of his mom, who had gone
back to the car. “She’s a Christian in the true sense of the word.”
He
kissed her again. “When the baby is born, I’ll come for you. I want to marry
you, Elizabeth. I want to raise a family with you.”
He
produced a small diamond ring from his pants pocket and gave it to her.
He
shook his head. “I’ve already started the paperwork for a transfer to the University of Texas
Owen’s
Aunt Madelyn looked just like her sister: like a hawk in human form. Like her
sister, she was unfailingly kind and helpful. She got Elizabeth enroll in an after-hours
high-school program and helped her with the forms for government assistance and
medical insurance.
She
didn’t mind if Elizabeth
practiced her violin. In fact, she enjoyed it.
She
didn’t miss her brothers. She didn’t miss her parents.
Owen
was true to his word. He wrote three times a week and completed the admissions
paperwork to the University
of Texas
She
didn’t think of her family, not once, not until Owen brought it up. In a letter
that came in late October, he reported that her house had been put up for sale
and that he had heard “through the grapevine” that her folks were divorcing.
They hadn’t searched for her; at least no public ones searches were announced.
There were no posters in windows or lampposts with her photo on them, no
articles in the newspapers, no television coverage. It was as though Elizabeth had never
existed.
She
never saw or spoke to her brothers again.
~~*~~
She
went for a walk to a nearby park just three weeks before she was due. Owen was
on his way from Oklahoma .
His
grandfather had recently willed him his 1968 Camaro. Owen had written her very
excited, announcing that he would drive to Austin and that he couldn’t wait to show it
off. She held his letter and the accompanying photos as she swung gently to and
fro on a swingset she visited frequently.
She
felt a sharp, cold pain against the back of her head, and then she felt
nothing.
When
she woke up, she was back in Oklahoma ,
in the hospital. She was in early labor. Her father had found out where she was
and had driven to Austin .
While she sat on the swingset, he had snuck up and knocked her unconscious with
a lead pipe. He kept her drugged in the back of the family stationwagon all the
way back to Oklahoma .
By the time she got to the hospital, she was severely dehydrated and had a
serious concussion, and was in real danger of losing her child. Her father
literally dumped her onto the hospital’s curb and sped away.
He
was arrested crossing the border into Arkansas .
The police were looking for him, but not just for kidnapping and assaulting
her. He had brutally assaulted Karla Boyd, Owen’s mother, and then had run Owen
off the road in Texas
after a high-speed chase, killing him instantly when his Camaro slammed into a
concrete median.
~~*~~
Hours
passed.
The
door opened. It was the nice nurse. She had a tray of food. She approached the
bed and put the tray on the slider and pushed it up to her chest. She smiled
consolingly and then went to check her IV, then checked her vitals.
“I
want to say something to you,” she said. “I don’t know if it’s right, but I
don’t really care.”
She
hesitated. “You’ve gotten the royal shaft, and a lot of nurses are very upset
at how you’re being treated. A few of us are going to speak to the head of the
ward to get you moved down to a regular room.”
“Where
… where am I?” asked Elizabeth .
“You’re
in the mental ward,” said the nurse, looking ashamed. “The top floor. You don’t
belong here. A lot of the nurses feel the same. We would’ve been just as angry
as you were if what happened to you happened to us. It’s obscene.”
“I
agree,” came a male voice at the door.
The
nurse swung around.
The
doctor standing in the doorway had thinning, curly red hair, gold wire-frame
glasses, and a long face. Before she could speak, he said, “Thank you, nurse.
I’d like some time to speak to this patient.”
She
hurried past him and away.
The
doctor stepped in and turned on the lights. Their sudden brightness made Elizabeth squint. He
grabbed her chart at the end of the bed and took a long look at it, then at
her.
“My
name is Dr. Ronald Grier,” he said. “I’m here to get you moved to a regular
room out of this ward. I’ll get a wheelchair sent up in just a bit.”
He
set the chart on the bed and came around to her left side. He grabbed the chair
at the desk and put it next to her bed and sat.
“I
want to say how sorry I am for all you’ve gone through,” he said. “But … I’m
afraid, Elizabeth ,
that I’ve got more bad news.”
He
held up, then said, “I’m so sorry, but you won’t be able to have any more
children. There were complications during the last surgery and your ovaries had
to be removed. I think it’s because of your kidnapping and treatment back to Oklahoma by your father.
The truth is, I can’t be sure. I wasn’t here when all of it took place, and the
doctors here have been less than helpful.”
“I’m
from the University of Texas Medical Center. I was sent here at the urging of
Madelyn Stores, your aunt, and a court order mandating that your care be given
by me.”
“She’s
not my aunt,” blubbered Elizabeth ,
shaking her head. “She’s …”
She
couldn’t go on.
Dr.
Grier nodded.
“She
cares about you. She’ll be here in a day to collect you and take you back to Austin . She wants to take
care of you. The court has also granted you emancipation. You don’t have to
return home or see your mother again—”
“She’s NOT my mother!” raged Elizabeth .
“She’s a monster! A monster! A MONSTER!”
He
reached for her hand and held it as Elizabeth
shook.
“You’re
in safe hands now,” he said after she began to calm. “You’re in my hands, and
in Mrs. Moss’ hands. We’ll see that you get the best care available.”
He
didn’t leave her, but stayed until she stopped crying. When she got hold of
herself, he said, “We’ll get you moved out of this room shortly.”
He
gave her hand a tight squeeze and left her alone. When he walked out he propped
her door open and then barked at a passing nurse: “Leave this patient’s door
open! If I come back and find it has been closed, I’ll personally sue your ass
and the entire department’s, you got me?”
The
nurse was one Elizabeth
knew. She was cold and mean—but not in front of Dr. Grier, who had her nodding
with fright. “Of course … of course …” she mumbled.
Dr.
Grier held his icy gaze on her, then stalked off.
~~*~~
They
moved her out of the mental ward to a private room several floors below. Dr.
Grier gave her a long, careful examination. Before he left, he said, “I forgot.
I brought you some company …”
He
hurried out for a minute. When he returned he was holding a large plush blue
whale. He handed it to her. With fresh tears streaking her cheeks, she thanked
him.
“Mrs.
Moss will be here tomorrow,” he said. “She phoned ahead. You’ll be released
after tomorrow’s exam. I want to make sure the bleeding has stopped.”
He
gave her a pained smile.
“It
looks like that whale and you are going to be very close friends. I’m going to
have the nurse give you a light sedative to help you sleep. She’ll be here
shortly. In the meantime, if you need me, just press the button, all right?”
“I’ll
see you tomorrow morning,” he said, and closed the door behind him.
She
held her new friend and thought of her swingset and her old plushies. She
squeezed the whale and wept into its big, soft body. She thought of Owen. She
thought of her baby, and her mother, who had never bothered to visit her or
talk to her, and how her father was now a murderer and kidnapper.
The
nurse came in and pushed a needle into the IV. Elizabeth had never seen her before. She
seemed nice. She checked her vitals, then left her alone.
She
thought of her violin, which was back in Texas ,
and then she thought of her song. She tightly closed her eyes and forced
herself to imagine herself playing it. She tried feeling each note as fully as
she could. She sniffled and cried and clutched the blue whale to her chest, and
tried singing the melody quietly to herself.
Throughout
her life, she had always wanted to be special, to be somebody. For sixteen years there was nothing to indicate that
she was, that she ever would be.
Until
just then.
That
moment, as she concentrated on the song with the whole of her being, it came
suddenly to life. Like a flower seeing daylight for the first time, it bloomed
widely and swiftly inside her, a rising, triumphant symphony of blinding grace
and power. It went beyond what she had ever learned of it and filled her entire
being.
It
was the light of Heaven turned to music. The violin sang like victory through
her, chasing away the grief and desperation. She was certain that it could have
been played by no other than one of God’s highest angels. It pulled her out of
the quagmire of her grief and catapulted her into skies free of doubt and pain,
and then beyond them to where the stars mated with the very life force of the
universe. It gave a promise and a pledge: that she, Elizabeth Barbara Finnegan,
would heal, and in so doing, would find herself and her reason for living. She
need only hold to this moment, hold to it for all she was worth when the
depthless shadows returned, and to those days when she would be forced to walk
through them once more.
The
melody pulled her higher, ever higher. Up here a heady sense of rest overcame
her, and she floated free. It felt almost as though she could breathe …
forever.
~~*~~
