IT’S A GIRL

It’s, also, the darkest one I have written.

This was a prompt from Ariadne Pautina. And I started to think about the image — forget the fangs, the eccentric dressing. Look at the smile, the little bear and the emptiness in the eyes. That was what drove me to this story. I think it’s the darkest one I have written. And for this one, yes, I would ask you to comment.

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He had been at the hospital since six. The text was still on his phone — 13:42, the last she had sent him: Something small. Don’t get carried away. He had taken a coffee at nine. Another at eleven. A sandwich at one that he had not eaten.

At four he came back down. The gift shop had bears in the window.

He picked one. Small, white, the scarf knitted into the body so a child couldn’t pull it loose and choke. Eight ninety. The queue was three people deep. The woman in front of him was buying mints and a sudoku. Behind him an old man was buying a charger.

His phone rang.

A woman’s voice. She said fifteen words.

“Yes,” he said. “I’m coming.”

He did not move out of the queue.

When it was his turn the cashier scanned the bear. The machine beeped. He held the bear in his left hand.

“Congratulations!” she said.

“Thank you.”

She folded a small pink card into the top of the bag. “On the house — sweet little thing.” Cursive. It’s a Girl.He smiled. He nodded. He walked out.

The corridor was the wrong temperature. He waited for the lift. Someone pressed three. He got out because everyone else got out. Maternity. Family Room. He followed the arrow.

A doctor opened a door. She said the baby. She said hemorrhage. She said nothing could be done. She said the same words the woman had said on the phone, minutes ago, an hour ago, ages ago.

He nodded.

The bear was still in his left hand.

Someone took him by the elbow into a small room with two chairs and a box of tissues. A nurse sat with him. She said his name twice. She asked if there was someone she could call. He gave her his sister’s name. He gave a number. He spelled it.

She left.

He sat with the bear on his lap. The price tag was still hanging from the ear. €8,90. He read it. He read it again. Then he read the receipt, because the receipt was in the bag beside him, and the bag was on the floor.

The receipt said 16:48.

He folded it once and put it in his pocket.

The nurse came back. She had a folder. She said the same words again and asked if he understood. She gave him a paper to sign. The paper had a time on it.

16:46.

He nodded. He signed.

“Thank you,” he said.

He went home that night with the bear in the bag and the bag in his hand and the receipt in his pocket and the small pink card still folded inside the bag, untouched. He set the bag on the kitchen table. He did not open it.

Six months later he moved. The bag went with him. He did not look inside.

The scarf is knitted into the body so a child cannot pull it loose and choke.