I waited very impatiently in this white hospital room. It really was too white. White walls, white bedding, white machinery, white chairs. Did the decorators have no sense of color?
I was waiting in this room because a few minutes after my precious son was born, the doctors took him away from me murmuring some rubbish about "tests" and "premature". I didn't want to hear a word of it. I just wanted my baby boy in my arms. My gorgeous son. My reason for living. I hadn't told the nurses, but I was pretty sure that I was close to death there at the end. But I wouldn't give in to the death that would have been a welcomed freedom from the pain. I couldn't. Because my son needed me.
It was here in this white room that I contemplated names. I tossed around a bunch, but only one stood out. It wasn't common, but I didn't want my son to have a common name. I decided to go with my gut feeling. So now my son has a name.
Haven.
Haven literally means "safe". And that was what all my struggles in the past 9 months were for. Just to keep Haven safe. I knew Haven would carry his name well.
It was the second day I had been trapped in this room. I had seen my baby one time since his birth and was fed up. I would have stormed out of the room and demanded to see my son, except all I had to wear was this silly hospital gown.
I was amazed at how much I loved my son already. I thought it would be a while before I would feel the mother son bond. But as soon as I held him in my arms, I knew that this boy was my life. I loved him so much it was crazy. I knew I would take a bullet to save him.
Just as I was about to page a nurse and ask to see my son again, but, just then, one walked in. She sat down on the foot of my bed.
"Esme, Haven had a severe lung infection."
"Had?"
"Well, honey, he didn't make it."
I couldn't process the information. I just sat there, staring blankly ahead of me.
And then the pain hit.
It was an overwhelming wave of emotion, beating down upon me. Swirling me around underwater. I couldn't breathe. I was being torn apart on the inside. I could feel the physical pain. I couldn't bear it. I screamed. So loud, it must have sounded like someone was trying to kill me. Then, I threw on my clothes, and left. Just walked out of the hospital. I'm not sure what I was thinking. I don't think I could think.
Dead, dead, dead, dead. No! Take me, take me! Please!
I then I feel to the ground, just outside the hospital. I feel to me knees and screamed again. Only this time, I articulated a word. "WHY?"
I knew I couldn't live with this pain. I knew I could not live while knowing that my precious Haven did not. But I didn't know what to do.
I got walked as far away as I could. As I walked, I contemplated suicide. It was the happiest thing I could think of. I wondered how I would do it. Part of me wanted to do something dramatic. But I decided I would want to end my life reliving a better time. But how to do it. But then I remembered something.
I fell down towards the ground. Even though I was insanely scared, there was something liberating about the fall. Or rather, there was, until I hit the ground.
And then I knew how I would do it. I would fall. Or rather I would jump. But on a much larger scale than the tree. And this time, there would be no doctor to help me. No doctor to give me a hint of happiness in my life that I would lose just like everything else. I would fall, and then it would be all over. The pain would be done. Gone. Just like me.
And with these thoughts, I walked to the cliff.