ZMayarDesouki


 * PUSH **

//Chapter One// From her hospital room she heard screams echoing throughout the halls outside. Cries of children and seniors rang alike. The infirmary was being overwhelmed with the masses of people now. Looking out of her room window, she could see the mob of people break yet another window. She turned her head away from the scene and looked at her enlarged stomach. Had she known what an awful world she would be bringing this child into, she would have aborted it while she still could. It was too late now though, and she hadn't gone through all this trouble to not bring a new life into this world. Maybe this would be that one life that could change this awful world. The pain in her back seemed to be multiplied as she got into the proper position, with a pillow behind her back and legs spread out. Her body aced to scream out loud, but she held back the screams. Screams would only draw attention to her hospital room and could cause the people to come into her room. She didn't know what those people were capable of and would probably kill her and her child if they suspected them of having the virus.

// Push. I just have to push // she thought, but her heart raced beyond belief. The world was about to explode and she knew it. It was a million degrees fahrenheit, screams surrounded her, everything was broken. The moment her husband knew she was pregnant he brought her to the infirmary and she had only seen him twice since. He probably thought she would catch the virus, or the baby would. Maybe she was just slowing him down and he wanted to get rid of her early since she was bound to die. The contractions were coming faster and faster now. The damn son of a bitch was probably out with new women already, thinking she must have died by now. // Push. // She would prove him wrong though, and he would regret his decision to leave his family. // Breathe, don't forget to breathe. // The screams outside the room were getting louder. The temperature in the room was getting hotter. // Don't scream, they'll hear you //.

The rest of what happened that night was a blur that never actually occurred to her. She woke up to the sun beaming on her face. The window was broken and she could see pieces of broken glass with blood all over the floor. She stared at the glass and blood in amazement, and for a moment, the world was no longer broken. Until reality slowly started to set back in. The window hadn't been broken last night. As she looked around the room, things were stolen, knocked over and broken. She touched her stomach, but something wasn't right. Suddenly she heard the cry of a baby. // The baby! // Panic struck her like death had struck so many people with the virus. But the panic was short lived as she turned to find a baby wrapped in white laying by her side. She had no memory of wrapping the baby up and did not even know what its sex was. She lifted and unwrapped it quickly. A boy. Good, a boy will be able to stand up to his father for abandoning them. Looking around the room she saw that everything was destoryed and the door was wide open. There were still screams in the hall but they were coming from downstairs. How was she still alive? Why didn't they kill the boy? A smile formed on her face. Maybe the world that she had brought him into wasn't as bad as it seemed. Maybe there were still good people even during these hard times.

The next step was to get out of that infirmary. Even if she had caught the virus, both of their lives were at more danger in the infirmary. Without the machine shop to supply the infirmary with weapons, anybody could sneak into the infirmary. Everybody wanted the berries that were claimed to be the cure to the disease. More people probably died in search of the berries than from the actual disease. The length some people went to in order to get the berries was unimaginable. From her hospital room she had heard stories of how a mob of people attacked the machine shop. They had to get it out of the way so that the infirmary couldn't be supplied with weapons anymore to defend its self. She had heard stories about the amount of zit berry trees that were set on fire by the infirmary scientists. How they almost lit up the entire forest in the process. She also heard the scientists panicking as they tried to figure out how they would make the public understand their reasoning behind destroying all the berry bushes. Everybody was so caught up in the excitement to get the remaining berries out of the infirmary that they ignored the scientists' pleas. As they tried to explain how the berries only made the disease worst but calmed the symptoms, people angrily destroyed the infirmary.

She held on to the baby tightly, because he was all she had left in this world. His big brown eyes were exactly like his father's eyes. He had her fair skin and big mouth. He had relatively big hands and feet for a baby, just like his father. She stared at his eyes for a long time. Those were the same eyes that had said "I love you." The same eyes that walked down the isle and said an oath to be by her side through sickness and health. She held the baby's hands. Those were the same hands that she held when she had first found out of her pregnancy. The same hands that were supposed to be their for her to hold while she delivered the baby. Before she left the infirmary she took a needle dipped in ink and slowly pierced the baby's shoulder. When the needle broke through his skin, he let a cry that was louder than the screams coming from downstairs. "Shh, be quiet, they can't hear us!" she told him. But the crying continued as she used the needle to tattoo the "L." The screams continued as she used the needle to tattoo the letter "e" twice. Then she finally put the needle down and breast feed him so he would stop crying. When he had finally fallen asleep, she wrapped him in the white blanket and used the bed sheets to strap him to her body. She then took the food that she had safely hiden in a bag under the bed and ate for the first time in a whole day.

She stood there, with a baby strapped to her stomach and a bag on her back. She quietly observed the room that she had been in for the past ten month. But she didn't let a single tear drop as she looked at the torn down bed, the broken glass on the floor, and the dying flowers that were on the night stand. The flowers that her husband had brought her the second time he came to visit her. The flowers that her husband had brought the last time she had seen him. Nine month ago. Then she looked out the window and took a deep breath. Slowly she started to climb down the window. Carefully placing her feet in the cracks on the wall and holding on to the frame of the window. Her right hand moved down with her left foot, and her left hand moved down with her right foot. Trying not to forget to breathe, she continued to climb down until her right foot could no longer find a place to rest on. As she tried to look down in order to find a spot, forgetting to hold on tightly with right hand. Before she knew it, she was dangling eight feet off the ground, desperately resisting the forces of gravity.

After a certain amount of pain, the human body no longer feels any. The pain becomes a part of you, as you drift away from life. She experienced this as she neared the steps of her old house. As she started to drift away there, by those rusting steps, his voice brought her back to life. That same voice that whispered "I love you" in her ears nine month ago on that hospital bed. She stood, frozen, by those steps until a baby's cry reminded her of what she struggled all the way to her husband's house to do. At the door, her broken arms bleed as she forced them to open the mansion's heavy doors. As soon as the doors opened, he was the first thing she saw. Standing, seemingly taller than before, with a younger woman on his arms talking in a hushed voice in his ear.

All this time, in that hospital bed, it never crossed her mind that he would be with somebody else. Never. Her love for him never faded, and she had thought that the love was mutual. Somehow, maybe it was because of all the pain she had been in, she had convinced herself that he thought she died. She could understand why he would not return to bury her properly, for the fate of anybody who dies in the infirmary was well known. She had never anticipated the sight of him with another woman.

However, she did not let the shock show on her face for her body simply would not accept anymore pain. So she dragged her useless right leg by her side as she approached her husband and the woman in his arms. The shock showed on his face clear as day. It was as if he was in more pain than her, with her broken arms, leg, and multiple cracked rips. She did have the upper hand though, for her body no longer felt any of it. His facial expression had not changed until she was only a few inches away from him. She could see that he was forcing himself to continue breathing. Paying no attention as the new woman silently slipped out of his arms, she reached for Lee and handed the child to her husband. Her arms could not hold on to the child long enough and she ended up thrusting Lee in his arms.

"Lee," she said and then closed her eyes for a moment while she regained enough strength to continue talking. "You're son's name is Lee... I named him after you."

Not giving him enough time to respond in any way, she turned around and struggled towards the door. Her husband watched the trail of blood that followed her grow thicker as she exited the door. Suddenly he screamed for her, begging her to wait as he chased after his wife, only to find her body lying dead on the rusting steps.

// Chapter 2 //

The letter in his hand was the funniest thing he'd read in ages. She was leaving him because he had not "moved on from his old wife." Apparently, she had expected him to always be the "brave and strong admiral" he was before Lee entered his life. All her excuses were quite hilarious, in all honesty. But he was thankful that she was the one to end the relationship, because he could not bring himself to possibly hurt another woman the way he had his wife. Although he knew that breaking up with her could not ever hurt her as much as completely ditching his pregnant wife, breaking up reminded him too much of what he did to his wife.

He was looking at the empty half of the dresser, where her make up used to be, when Lee knocked on the door. Lee stood silently, dressed in all white with a black tie, watching him until he stood up and said he was ready to go. Lee never talked very much for a two year old, he just watched silently and did what he was told. Guess that was a good thing, for the most part, but he aways felt like his silence stopped them from getting any closer.

Today was Sunday, which meant that they had to go to church. Neither of them enjoyed going to church, it was one of the few things they could agree on, but they always went. Religion was a big deal to his wife, and he wanted to try and make it a part of Lee's life as well. He never understood his late wife's dedication to religion, but she would simply just smile and tell him that it gave her strength when she felt weak. And if religion was part of the reason she could remain strong during the last months of her life, then he wanted his son to have that type of strength.

Church dragged on as usual, and Lee had not asked any questions about where his girlfriend was. He wouldn't be surprised if Lee would never even mentioned her at all because the two were not fond of each other. All she would do was complain about all the things Lee was doing wrong, and Lee would silently listen to her yell and continue on living how he wanted to. He admired that about his son, and it bothered the hell out of his girlfriend that he never took her side about what Lee should be doing.

Later that afternoon, he went up to his son's room to see if Lee wanted to do something together. Without his girlfriend around to entertain him, all she was good for really, he figured it was time him and Lee started bonding. He found Lee on the floor messing around with a small doll, and he watched his son silently. When Lee realized he was being watched, he shoved the small doll under his bed and turned around quickly.

"What you got there, Lee," he said. "A doll," Lee replied simply. "Can I get a look at that doll?" he asked. "Why?" This reply made him laugh a little, because Lee was never one to get defensive. "Just want to do something with you, I guess," he said. When Lee didn't reply, he got on the floor and reached under the bed to grab the doll. To his suprise, he felt more than one toy underneath the bed. When he pulled out the dolls, all of them had their eyes pulled out, their noses broken, and their mouths sewed shut. "Why'd you do this, Lee?" he asked. "Because that's the way God wanted them to be," answered Lee. Lee's answer made him laugh. //Just like his mother//, he thought. His late wife's excuse for everything related to God. Lee's remark made him feel better... maybe he was doing this parenting thing right after all.