The Heartbreak Factor - Part Four

Chapter Eighty-Two.

“It’s no trouble,” mum paused. “You know we’re here for you.” 

I nodded. “Thanks.” 

“Things will be okay in the end,” mum reassured me. “I know things feel really bad right now and they are. I don’t know anybody braver than you, Sammy. You’ll get through this. I’m heartbroken so I can’t imagine what you’re going through.” 

I nodded again. 

“You can get through this, Sammy. We’re all here for you.”

I nodded for a third time.

“Mummy!” Katy screeched at the top of her voice. 

Mum gave me a supportive smile before I began to stumble across the hallway to Katy’s room. “I’m coming.” As I walked into her room, Michael left us alone and shut the door, leaving me and my daughter in the room in silence. “What story do you want me to read?” I asked, looking at Katy, who was all snuggled up in her duvet. 

“Teddy Bear!” she grinned. 

“Again?” I asked. “I only read that to you Monday night.”

Katy, adamant that she wanted me to read ‘Teddy Bear’ again, nodded with a huge grin that was hard to say ‘no’ to. 

“Okay.”

Sitting down in the chair beside Katy’s bed, I tried to ignore the pain that was throttling through my stomach but it was hard to not yelp at it. The doctor told me it’d be normal to experience a bit of pain and only go back to the hospital if I started to bleed. Never going to the hospital ever again would have been too soon. 

“Once upon a time, there was a little girl named Betty,” I began to read, picking up the story from the bookshelf and showing Katy the pretty illustrations on each page. “Betty had a teddy bear who she loved dearly. She took it everywhere with her. When Betty went to school, Teddy went to school. When Betty went to the park, Teddy went to the park.”

Katy grinned up at me as I read the story to her. 

“One day, when Betty went to the shops, she forgot Teddy and left him at home on her bed by accident.” 

Katy gasped, just like she did every time I read the story to her. 

“While Betty was at the shops, Teddy decided to go on an adventure to find Betty. He packed his bag, threw it over his shoulders and left the house to find Betty,” I smiled, reading the story just like I usually did with enthusiasm - I loved it almost as much as Katy. Almost. “Teddy climbed hills and marched through the streets to find Betty.” 

“Teddy!” Katy beamed, pulling out the free Teddy teddy that accompanied the book that was shoved down the side of her bed. 

I smiled at her before reading the next page. “Eventually, Teddy found Betty at the cake shop on the other side of town.” 

“‘Hello, Teddy!’” I exclaimed in the high pitched voice I had allocated to Betty. 

“‘Hello, Betty!’” I replied in the low pitched voice I had allocated to Teddy. 

“After eating a cake and having a cup of tea, Betty and Teddy ran all the way home, giggling and singing as they ran.”

“Night, mummy,” Katy grinned, rolling over in bed - just like she did every time I finished reading her the story. 

“Night, baby.”

After turning the light off and closing the door ajar, I turned around to see both my mum and Michael looking at me from across the hallway with the same look of sympathy that everyone seemed to be giving me. “What?” I asked.

“Are you going to be okay, Sammy?” mum replied, looking more worried than I had ever seen her before. “We can stay if you need us around. Or you can always come back and stop at ours for a few days. You know you’re always welcome.”

“I’m fine.” 

“Are you sure? I know how things got on top of you last time,” mum paused as she realised what she had said. 

“Last time?” Michael asked in confusion. 

“Well done, mum,” I groaned, walking past them and into my bedroom, leaving them in the hallway with a cloud of awkwardness surrounding them. 

“What do you mean ‘last time’?” Michael repeated. “Jenny? Sammy?”

I ignored his request for information as I carefully sat on the edge of the bed and slowly shuffled back, further into the duvet. Mum, on the other hand, stood looking at the floor, trying to work out an excuse but there was no point in thinking of an excuse - Michael had guessed it. 

“You mean, this has happened before?” Michael asked. 

We ignored him further. 

“Can somebody please give me an answer,” he demanded. 

“Yeah,” George replied, walking up the stairs to see what all the commotion was about. “Before we had Katy. Sammy was pregnant but she had a miscarriage. That’s why she collapsed at that concert a few years ago. She wasn’t taken to hospital with expected appendicitis. She lost the baby.” 

Michael’s jaw dropped as he looked at me. Soon his anger and frustration over nobody telling him turned into sadness and sympathy - yet again. 

“Sammy. Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked, rushing into the room and sitting beside me. 

I shrugged my shoulders. “I don’t know. I guess I just wanted to forget about it,” I paused. “I guess I just wanted to move on past it without letting it get to me. It wasn’t like I was ready for a baby then.” 

“You can’t forget something like this though, Sammy. It’ll stay with you forever,” mum sighed. 

“I can,” I replied. “And I will. We’ll tell Katy in the morning and then that’ll be that.”

“Until the funeral,” mum paused. 

“How can you have a funeral for something that wasn’t even born?” I asked. 

“Your mum is right,” George said, sitting on the edge of the bed and looking over his shoulder at me. “A funeral will give us closure and help us say goodbye. The baby might not have been born but they were still loved by us both - by all of us. We still need to grieve.”

I shrugged my shoulders. I was too numb and confused to make any decisions. All I wanted to do was roll up in the duvet and cry myself to sleep. The last thing I wanted to be doing right now, or ever for that matter, was planning a funeral for my baby. 

“I can arrange things if you want me to?” mum suggested. 

I nodded. It wasn’t like I had much choice in the matter but part of me knew George was right. We needed to grieve for our loss - both of us.