The sound of a happy baby is one of the best sounds in the whole wide world. I oughta know, I've had quite a few of them. Seven that will be with me for the rest of my life. All the others would would leave as soon as they appeared. Jennifer was the latest heartache I had expierienced. I had just given her to her adoptive parents. Oh, sweet Jennifer, if you can feel me, you would know that giving you up tonight was one of the hardest things I ever had to do.
I am sick over this. I should have known better than to take her in and get attached to her like I had done. Like I said, she wasn't the first baby to break my heart. The first one was Jim-Bob's twin, Joseph. Joseph was the most handsome baby boy that I had ever seen in my life. When that baby came out and didn't cry, I knew that he didn't make it. I wanted to hold him anyway. I looked at my dead son and I looked at my still living one and cried. I did not cry for myself, but for Jim-Bob. They shared my body together for nine months and must have been incredibly close. Everytime the anniversary of their birth came around, Jim-Bob would cry. Everyone thought that was most peculiar but I knew better. He missed his brother and he knew, even in his infant mind, that was the time his brother left him. It carried on until he was one-and-a-half. I guess by then he learned how to heal himself.
Then I had suffered a miscarriage a few years back. That was particularly devastating because when I lost that one, I lost everything about that pregnancy. I learned early on to be grateful that even though Joseph was a devastating blow, I still had Jim-Bob to love. At that time, I had nothing to show for it. Not a Joyce that Elizabeth hoped for, not a Seymour that Jim-Bob had wished for, nothing.
So now, back to Jennifer, I can learn to be grateful about that miscarriage. I didn't get close to that baby. I didn't have a chance to know him or her. Jennifer was healthy as a horse, funny as a clown, and she wasn't mine. It didn't/doesn't matter to me; I love her and I wish I still had her in my arms. I can't sleep and I can barely breathe, my heart hurts that bad. I break out into sobs and I cannot control them. I think all the years of turmoil at the loss of my babies had finally caught up to me.
"Liv," John says, not moving from his spot. "You're okay, honey. Go to sleep."
"I just can't, John."
"Yes, you can," he finally rolls over to me and begins to wipe away the tears from my eyes.
"How?" I ask as he begins rocking me back and forth. That's all he kept doing for a couple of minutes and he's not saying anything. I don't know how he knew that would calm me but it did the trick. I dozed off into his arms and didn't flutter my eyes open until I saw him get ready to go to the mill the next morning.
"Good morning, honey," that's all he says to me.
"How did you know?"
"Know what?"
"That all I needed was a cuddle last night?"
He begins to climb back into bed with me. He puts his arms around me as he kisses my cheek. I kiss his cheek back as I squeeze him to me a little harder.
"You know, Liv," he says not letting me go. "You have been cradling and loving on babies since I can remember. I think you have forgotten that you need to be cradled and loved sometimes, too."
"I wasn't completely crying for me last night. I was crying for Joseph and Jennifer and..."
"It doesn't matter, honey. Listen, you did no wrong by those babies. You're one of the greatest mothers I know. God gave you those babies because He knew you were strong enough to take care of them for the time being. You can be strong enough to let them go."
"I'm not that strong, John. I don't think I can do this."
"You're doing it, Liv. You've been doing it. Hey," he says, taking my hands and looking me in the eyes. "You've got seven kids down there who still need their mother. Go love and laugh with them instead of cry over the ones you've lost."
"You're right. You're absolutely right," I give him a kiss. He always manages to get through to me. "I will do this for my kid's father. I love their father."
"Well, I love their mother."