Free Heart of a Dove by Abbie Williams Page B

told her, tears stinging my eyes. “I know.”
    “God will never give me another child,” she said decisively, punishing herself. “I feel it. This is my only child and I’m destroying it.” She laughed then, though it was a terrible sound. “I may tell myself I have no other choice.”
    Fear bubbled inside my stomach; I imagined her bearing a child in a whorehouse and shortly thereafter being forced out to live on the streets, though even life there would be preferable to Ginny’s; I felt ill at imagining what would be the child’s fate, should Ginny ever get her hands upon it. Better to starve on the streets than that. If I was brave enough, I would have taken that option myself, by now. Perhaps we could run away together…perhaps…
    “I’m sorry, Lorie, I’m being so macabre. I don’t mean anything by it. I know this is the right choice, though I’m frightened a little. It smells so pungent.”
    I lifted the small porcelain lid of the teapot, inhaling the steam that curled out. It did have an unpleasant musky tinge, of moldering plants crushed beneath others in an unkempt garden.
    “Shall I fetch honey?” I asked her.
    “No, I’ll drink it quickly and be done,” Deirdre said. “Has it steeped for a good half hour?”
    I nodded and she moved as though to pour herself a cup, but her hands were shaking.
    “Here, let me,” I told her, and performed the task.
    And then she drank.
    I lay on my mattress that evening, alone in the darkness, watching the moon decline west. It was so thin, nearly new, as though drawn upon the backdrop of the sky with the slash of a white ink. Soon it would disappear behind the rooftops. My door was tightly closed, though the boisterous activity from a night in full swing seeped through anyway. I had learned to tune out most of such noise; I no longer noticed Mary’s headboard thumping, scarce registered the songs Johnny played upon the piano. I had heard them all so many times my ears jangled if I paid attention too closely.
    Tonight I was simply grateful for the momentary peace afforded by bleeding; I lay still and silent, my ankles crossed, hearing the coyotes in the distance. Again something restless pulsed within me, fleeting and yet strong, a sense of something new on the horizon. Something just out of arm’s reach, though drawing nearer each day. I was startled by the feeling and shifted to my side, tucking both hands beneath my cheek. I was nearly asleep when I heard commotion in the hall outside my door.
    “Deirdre!” It was Ramie’s voice, pitched high in fear.
    My feet hit the floor and I ran to open the door, blinking as my mind tried desperately to counteract what I was seeing, to pretend that it wasn’t actually real before my eyes.
    “Oh no, oh God,” I moaned, dropping to my knees at once, my hands fluttering uselessly, too terrified to know where to light upon her. My voice was not my own as I cried, “Deirdre, what’s happening…what’s happening…”
    Ramie was across from me then, also on her knees, her brown eyes wide with fright. She demanded, “Deirdre, who’s hurt you, who’s done this?”
    My heart was so loud it roared within my ears. I put my hands on her face and curled near her, pleading, “What should I do, what should I do?”
    Deirdre’s dark eyes were no more than slits and between my palms her skin felt afire. She had dragged herself into the hallway; there was a trail of blood on the floor behind her, more covering her pale-yellow dressing gown. And then I saw the shape upon her, near her pelvis, where blood had flowed and left upon the material an almost perfect crescent moon, bright red. I began sobbing, unable to prevent myself from falling to broken shards.
    “What’s happening, Lila?” Ramie asked, frantic.
    “Get Ginny, get a doctor!” I screamed. “ Run! ”
    Heads were popping from nearby doors, men tugging britches over their hips and lifting suspenders into place, curious about the racket. We were joined