The Ashes She Gave Me

Stella insisted I wear the silver locket she gave me after her tragic miscarriage. I hated wearing jewelry, but her eyes had been so hollow, so desperate, that I eventually caved and fastened it around my neck. This morning, the ultrasound screen was a black, silent void. My perfectly healthy baby had lost its heartbeat. Meanwhile, sitting in the very same waiting room, Stella texted me a picture of her positive pregnancy test. I walked out of the hospital clinic like a wandering ghost. The sunlight felt cold. Suddenly, a scruffy old man stepped directly into my path, his piercing eyes locked onto my chest. "Girl," his voice rasped, sharp as an ice pick. "You are carrying a child, yet you wear the ashes of the dead. You are trading your own flesh and blood to buy life for someone else's womb." A chill violently violently down my spine. Stella's sudden pregnancy. My baby's vanishing heartbeat. I shoved past the old man and ran.