When the Bough Breaks
Esme's POV-
From Dreams to Nightmares
I was in a complete state of bliss. After years of wishing and pretending that I was a mother to my dolls and my kittens when I was a child, I was finally a mommy. The tears of joy that had been welling up in my eyes finally spilled over as my beautiful little baby boy shifted ever so slightly in my arms. He was just absolutely perfect. 5 lbs. 3oz and 19 in. of soft, cuddly, fragile, warm and complete perfection. After 9 hours of painful labor, my little angel was born. Thomas Gabriel Platt. I gave him my maiden name as his last. I'd see to it that he would never have anything in common with his monster of a father, let alone sharing the same last name. I couldn't help but wince at the painful memories of the abuse--both physical and emotional—I had suffered at the hands of my husband Charles. Despite the horrible circumstances in which I became pregnant with the precious, tiny angel in my arms, I was just completely elated to be a mommy at last.
I smiled and slowly brought my head down to gently kiss my little newborn son on his tiny forehead.
The action caused his tiny brow to furrow as his eyelids fluttered and his small bottom lip to quiver.
I chuckled softly. "Oh, Thomas, your mommy has been waiting her whole life to meet you and you are just going to sleep?" I feigned a hurt look, but smiled warmly as I kissed him on the forehead again. I took his tiny left hand and held it in my own, marveling at the thought that my own hand was once that small.
I yawned. Suddenly overwhelmed by just how tired I felt. It quickly dawned on me that I hadn't slept in the last 24 hours since my little Thomas had been born. I motioned for a passing nurse.
"How may I help you, my dear?" the nurse asked in her thick Irish accent.
"Could you please watch my baby? I'm suddenly feeling so tired that I'm afraid I'll drop him if I were to fall asleep with him in my arm"
"Certainly, my dear!" she replied, gently cradling my sweet little baby in her arms. "Oh, would you look at this adorable little face, now? He's a little angel, he is!"
I smiled, knowing that my little boy would be in good hands while I slept. "Thank you". I turned slightly to pull closed the blinds of the window behind my bed, blocking out the noon day light. That would have been bothersome to sleep with that bright light in my face. I smoothed out my pillow before I rested my head on it.
Sleep did not wait long at all to claim me. I was asleep almost as soon as my head sank in to the pillow.
My dreams consisted of me and my little Thomas starting our new life together: Finding a place of our own, hopefully finding a gentle, kind and decent man, one who wouldn't abuse me or my son, to marry—a good father figure for my little boy—and hopefully being able to give little Thomas plenty of brothers and sisters, watching them grow up and get married and hopefully to have children of their own. I couldn't tell if I was smiling in my sleep, but my dreams were very pleasant indeed.
My dream seemed to end quickly as the Irish nurse shook me awake with great alarm.
"Dear", she said, it was obvious that she was trying to keep the panic out of her voice.
I rubbed my eyes as she came into focus.
"Huh. What? How long have I been sleeping?"
"12 hours, dear"
"Oh, I-" I stopped myself just as soon as I looked in her eyes, my heart tightening in my chest.
"What is it? What's wrong?"
"Your baby has become gravely ill"
I sat up in a flash, my blood turning to ice water in my veins as the words of the nurse's news hit my ears.
"What?!? No! Not my baby…where is he?!" my voice breaking along with my heart. "I don't…I don't understand…why didn't you wake me up sooner?"
"We tried, dear" she explained. "You wouldn't wake up. The doctor felt that it was only natural for newborns, your son's age, to become a little ill, but he felt that you needed your rest. He had me wake you just now because your son's situation is rapidly declining"
I shook my head clear. Any lingering feelings of exhaustion dispersed as I threw my legs over the side of the bed and pulled myself to my wobbly feet.
"I want to see him. Now!"
The walk to the ward where my newborn son was in was only on the other side of the hospital, but the walk to it seemed to take an eternity. With each agonizing step, I could not and would not think that my son would die. That was just too cruel. After being married to Charles Evenson, I was used to being treated cruelly. He would say bitterly cruel things to me. He would call me a 'whore' and say things like "It is most fortunate that we do not have children, Esme. If it were at all possible, you would make a much worse mother to our children than you are a wife!" and that would just be when he was sober. When he was drunk, which was much too often, he would beat me savagely and rape me viciously. The slightest thing I would do seemed to be provocation enough for the back of his hand. The bastard. I was already planning an escape from my horrible existence as his wife. When I found out I was pregnant, I knew I'd have to leave even sooner. I'd be damned to hell itself if I would EVER let that monster hurt my baby. There was no kindness or gentleness at all in that man. I figured that God, if he did exist after allowing Charles to do everything he had done to me, could do what whatever he wanted to me from here on out, just as long as my beautiful and innocent little baby survived. It would just be too cruel to take my little Thomas's life away so soon after he had been born.
As soon as we arrived at the ward, I noticed two doctors conferring with each other. One was a short and round almost middle aged man and the other was tall and blond a much younger looking man than the one he was speaking with. Perhaps it was only my mind that was sick with worry that was merely playing tricks with me, but the blond haired tall doctor seemed to look just like the tall, blond and handsome young doctor who had gently set my broken leg when I was 16 years old, but that couldn't have been him. It looked like he hadn't aged a day in 10 years. I closed my eyes, trying to get my mind clear. When I opened my eyes again a second or two later, the blond haired doctor was gone and the short doctor noticed me through the window and walked through the door towards me, his head and shoulders sagging as he spoke low and softly.
"Ms. Platt…I'm so terribly sorry, but I'm afraid there is nothing more we can do for your son"
I felt like I couldn't breathe. Like someone was choking the life right out of me. I couldn't even swallow down the lump that felt like stuck in my throat. I stepped back away from him, sliding out of the Irish nurse's arms, as my own arms wrapped gently around my still sore stomach. I was going to throw up. I sank to my knees as the tears hit me with the sudden force of one of Charles's backhands. I placed a hand on the cold tiled floor to support me. As I kneeled there with my other hand now over my mouth, I couldn't help but wonder if there was something terribly wrong with me. Was God intentionally not listening to my prayers?! When I begged, pleaded and prayed that God would see to it that Charles never struck me or violated me as he had in the past again, he didn't seem to hear me. After every time Charles would do it again and again, I would beg, plead and pray that it would be the last time. Now, when I was praying for my innocent newborn son to have at least a chance to live, I was being ignored again. I raised my head and in a voice I couldn't even recognize as my own, it seemed to be hollow, broken and cold, I asked.
"May I hold him one last time?"
The doctors didn't seem to mind if I spent the last few moments of life my Thomas had left with him. Within minutes after my little angel had received last rites, I was seated in a rocking chair with my baby's tiny body in my arms. He was swaddled in a white blanket, his closed eyes and tiny forehead was all that was visible of my little Thomas. As I sat there rocking him back and forth I told him just how much I loved him and how I had spent almost my entire life dreaming of meeting him, my words as tight as my throat, choked with my overwhelming grief. The tears had started just as soon as I started speaking.
"Ever since I found out that I was pregnant with you, you have been my little angel…now you're being called away from me to be a real one." I couldn't see him anymore. My flowing tears clouded my vision.
I brought my lips to his forehead and kissed him softly.
"I love you, Thomas Gabriel Platt. I will always love you"
Minutes later, as I leaned over my little Thomas, cradling him gently and securely in my arms, he passed away from this world. I felt something comfortably warm run through my chest and out my back. That was when the sobs finally hit and I wailed an anguished and agonized cry. My son died in my arms and I felt his precious soul go right through me; taking my own along with it.