Late Night Shopping

              The fluorescent lights inside the cavernous store make the snow swirling outside seem far away. The wind howls only faintly against the cinder blocks that compose the building. I am tired. I could lie down on the cold, yellowing linoleum floor beneath me and sleep for hours – days even. 

              I have no recollection of how I got to this place. I am in the produce section of this store, and I feel alone. I glance to my sides and then slowly turn around.  No other shoppers are in sight. The items nearest to me are an assortment of grapes. I reach towards a bag of red ones and let my fingers squeeze one gently. It is firm and ripe, so I pluck it off the vine and raise it to my mouth. I burst it with my front teeth and let the juices flow gently inside my mouth. The skin is tough. It is sweet, but there is a tartness that comes after I have swallowed. 

              I walk forward to wall of vegetables. They have recently been watered by the looks of the droplets collecting neatly on the small shelves that the leaves of the kale create. I am consumed by the small details of each item and my mind feels foggy. 

              There is a box of apples off to my right that sits on the floor – they haven’t yet been added to the empty shelf that has been designated for them. I walk over to it and kneel down to examine them. They are bright red and shine beneath the lights, their skin is smooth and clean. I pick one up and take a bite. It is juicy and sweet, but there is something familiar and sour about the taste in my mouth after I swallow it. 

              They don’t put clocks in grocery stores. They don’t put clocks in any retail establishments really. It’s easier to wander when you don’t know what time it is – when you forget about the responsibilities you have outside this warehouse of food and paper products. 

              The apple hangs by my side in my left hand. I don’t have a desire to take another bite, so I set it on the shelf where it belongs. I want to stock the rest of the fruits around it so that this one with a bite taken out of it is hidden. The damaged one would blend in well with the rest if no one knew what had already happened. Damages aren’t even visible unless someone knows the backstory most of the time. I hug my arms around myself and take a deep breath. I want to cry but my eyes stay heavy and dry. 

              A noise from the other side of the store catches my attention. The silence is deafening except for this sudden sound. It seems to be a cry. I furrow my brow and stand still. Something inside of myself tells me to go towards it. 

              I walk down the spice aisle to get to the other side of the store. The exotic array of smells makes my stomach clench and I feel a familiar lump of nausea in my throat. Everything has been so strong in my nose lately. I wish for my reaction to it to stop, but this is the new normal. 

              After the spice aisle comes the frozen section. Shelves of pizzas and ice cream and vegetables locked away behind thick glass doors close in on me. I feel a shiver run down the length of my spine and walk quicker. The cry comes again, this time louder as I get closer. It is coming from the baking aisle so I take a left and turn towards it. 

              There is something in the middle of the floor on the aisle. It is yellow and it is moving. I walk with hesitation but continue on and as I approach I see the yellow shape is a blanket. 

              I am standing over the lump beneath the blanket now, and two eyes are staring back at me.  They are gray and terrified. The infant wears a hat like the one babies are given in the hospital immediately after they are born. It’s white with tiny blue stripes. The child can’t be much more than a few weeks old. The baby before me lets out another cry, but this is one is quieter, curious. I freeze, becoming aware of my labored breathing. The baby’s face softens and turns from distressed to comforted. It forms a small, gummy smile and looks up at me expectantly. I begin to feel my heart beating faster. My hands are moist with sweat and I can feel a chill come over myself even though I am far away from the freezer section I passed earlier. The store is beginning to spin. 

              “You’re not supposed to be here,” I whisper. I can feel my throat tighten as I say these words. I reach down and lift the baby into my arms. The yellow blanket feels gentle on my skin. The weight of the baby in my arms is calming – it feels right in my chest even though every other fiber of my being is quivering. The baby’s eyes meet mine and the smile disappears to reveal a look of complete content. A single tear escapes my left eye and plops onto the baby’s forehead. I sniff and wipe it away quickly with my thumb. I look up suddenly and scan the empty store around me. I want to scream out and ask where its mother is, but I already know the answer to that. It is a feeling coming from the pit of my stomach. 

              I gaze into its eyes again. I don’t know if it’s a boy or a girl and I don’t have any intention of finding out. I put my cheek against the top of its head and nuzzle it – not by choice but by instinct. “I’m sorry,” I whisper, careful to blink back more tears. “I know who you are. I don’t know who you would’ve been, but I know who you are.” I feel a wave wash over me. It is sorrow and disgust and fear and loathing. I set the child back on the floor gently and slide my back down against the shelves holding flour and sugar and allow myself to sit on the floor. My body racks with sobs. I want to apologize again and again. I want to tell it that it’s not my fault. It’s not my fault. It’s my choice and it’s the hardest one I’ve ever had to make. I will never be the same person. 

              I can’t bring myself to look at the baby again. If I look for too long I’ll see traces of him in its face and I can’t let myself see that or I’ll have to run far, far away. I can’t bear to look at anything that might resemble him. 

              I am struck with a feeling of warmth. It begins inside of me, low in my abdomen, right between my pelvic bones. The warmth grows until I am acutely aware of a liquid running onto the floor from inside myself. I don’t have to look between my legs to know that it is blood. I let out a broken yell. It is not a word, not even a human sound, and as I do so the baby begins to cry again. I sit there, blood flowing out of myself and onto the baking aisle floor. There is so much of it. 

My eyes blink open. The same fluorescent lights are over my head, but the ceiling is lower.

              “Amy,” a voice says, and it sounds far away. “Are you doing okay?” it says, closer this time. It is female – warm and concerned. There is a note of pity within its tone. 

              I clear my throat, “I’m okay,” I say, and I don’t really recognize my own voice.  It sounds small and quiet. It has sounded that way since that night with him. 

              “Okay, I’m going to take your vitals, and make sure everything looks good, but the procedure itself went completely according to plan.”

              “Is it out of me?” I ask, still looking at the ceiling above me. My choice of words shocks me slightly. There is a pause before she replies. I feel a warm hand come to rest on top of mine on the side of the bed where I am laying. 

              “Yes. Yes, everything went like it was supposed to.” I feel my eyes begin well up.

              “Thank you.”

              “You’re a strong woman, Amy. We are here to help you, but you’re on the road to recovery now.”

              Her voice is reassuring but I know that the road she is talking about is long. It is full of more nightmares like the one I had awoken from. It is full of more paranoia, more flashbacks, more difficult conversations, more therapy, and more self-doubt. Relationships will always be strained for me. I will never be able to think about my life in the same way. I hope he suffers with the knowledge of what he did to me for the rest of his life. But I know that won’t happen. The police report I didn’t file tells me that all too well.