Time to Reflect

The plane ride had two stops and lasted a little over two days, giving Jaimee lots of time to think: sit, eat, sleep and think.

Remembering her old relationships she realized the other two men she had been with had never been loving or attentive. They had never shown interest in anything about her really. She was so scared to be alone sometimes she settled for things that belittled her. Once, her children’s father (before they had children), Gerard, asked her to get a hotel room for the night and since she was working and he was not, she got a room at Honey in the Rock Motel.

They walked into the room and he started kissing her and fondling her breasts, then said, “I need a beer. Could I use your card to get a beer and grab your keys? I’ll be straight back. Take a shower, take your clothes off and get under the covers. I’ll be right back to make this a night you’ll remember.”

“Okay,” she said, handed him her debit card and car keys and stepped toward the bathroom. “Get me an orange soda too.”

“Yeah, ok”

Waiting under the covers with no clothes on was at first titillating, but after a half hour and then two hours passed, Jaimee was fuming mad and humiliated. She threw her clothes on and sit up in the bed when she saw car lights through the window.

Frantic, he came in pacing back and forth, no beer or orange soda, she noticed.

“Where the fuck have you been?” She screamed.

“I got jumped. I can’t explain right now. You need to get outta here. I want you to be home safe. I’m sorry. I’ll make it up to you. You see my busted lip?” He pointed at his mouth.

She saw nothing wrong. “What do you mean? I don’t see shit! Is my car ok? So I’m taking you home and going home then?”

“No, I’m safer here than home. I’ll figure it out. But if they find me, I don’t want you in danger. And yeah, your car is fine. Now go home. I’ll explain everything later.”

"No, you’ll explain now!”

“There’s no time! Now go! Get the fuck out!”

Tears rolling down her cheeks, she grabbed her car keys and debit card he had placed on the bed. “Don’t ever call me again!”

“Love you baby! I’ll call you tomorrow.”

She slammed the door and cried in the car. Then pulled herself together and drove home. Then she happened to look at her bank online and found that Gerard had charged another room at the hotel for a whole week, and taken 200 dollars out at the ATM.

The first of many traumatizing events that she tolerated because she thought she didn’t deserve any better.

When she found out she was pregnant after first having sex at 21 years of age, her father, whom she adored, called her a whore and her mother pleaded with her to get an abortion. “What will people think, Jaimee! You aren’t married and we raised you to be better than this!”

Growing up overweight, with severely low self-esteem, this cut her to her core. The only people who showed her love and affection were now turning their backs on her.

She would never have an abortion, but she wouldn’t marry Gerard or even tell him she was pregnant. She was officially alone.

Eventually, the bond she had with her parents proved to be stronger than worrying about the outside world and she was accepted and loved again, but the scars were still lingering on her heart. At 6 months along, she decided to tell Gerard about the pregnancy, though he was already living with another woman an hour away from home.

“Marry me.” He said. “I’ll straighten up. We’ll have a good life: me, you and the baby!”

“No Gerard! You like other women too much. I won’t be treated like that and you already have 3 kids with two other women and don’t pay attention to any of them.”

"That’s they mama’s fault. I try to take care of them. Look I just bought a house in Charleston and we can live there.”

Thank God she was friends with his sister and had learned by this time he was a pathological liar and there was no house. “I can’t marry you, but you can see the baby. If you really want to be a father, I’ll let you.”

At this time she had no idea he was a crack addict. He had given her a small rose once that came from inside a crack pipe - she was so naive about the drug scene at that point.

Eventually, by the time she had been in and out of a relationship with him and pregnant with her second child she had seen him use and known he was stealing money from her for drugs. The hurt he caused was unbearable.

“How can you say you love me and treat me like you do? What does that little white rock hold over you? I don’t get it! Let me try!!!” She exclaimed on a ride one day with her oldest son in the backseat.

Here he said and placed a pebble on the stem. “Inhale it like a cigarette.”

She did but felt nothing. “I still don’t see the appeal. Why are you fucking up our lives over this shit?”

She later learned, with her next man, Ron, that he hadn’t given her a big enough hit. After that she was off and running in the drug world and never looked back.

By the time she got pregnant with Ron, they were smoking synthetic weed. She didn’t find out she was pregnant until 5 months along and had been smoking fake weed daily.

Though he never went to doctors appointments with her, he did spend time with her sons and she felt she finally had a family, as fucked up as it was. She went to a regular checkup for the baby and her doctor could not find a heartbeat. She was sent immediately to have an ultrasound and found that the baby was dead inside her. They scheduled a stillbirth delivery for the next day.

Jaimee went home and looked in his eyes. How could she tell him the news. She could barely drive home, but she made it.

“How was your appointment?” He looked up from his phone.

Tears streaming down her face, she shook her head but no words could come out.

“Oh no,” he said, “what is it?”

She sit on his lap and started weeping. A wail escaped her lips that sounded as if it was coming from another person. It was the cry of a mother losing her child and it still echoed in her soul to this day.

At the hospital, they prepped her for labor. Her mom and aunt Becky were there for support. Ron came later, for an hour, but couldn’t stay because ‘it was all just too much for him.’

They gave her something to start the labor process. With her two living children, she had Caesarean sections and had never had to go through labor pains, so on the day she was losing her third son, she was also experiencing the pain of a lifetime. Still it didn’t come close to what she felt in her heart.

With every contraction, the pain seemed to increase, but she was focused. She had to push. She had to get through this day. With each push her heart felt like it would break. She would be having a son who wouldn’t be in this world with her and it was her fault. How could she ever forgive herself? She deserved worse pain than this. She deserved the fires of Hell.

After the process was over, a kind nurse came in and asked if she and Ron would like to see the baby. That’s when he left, but she said yes. The nurse carried in a small bundle, following behind were her mother and aunt.

He was her dark chocolate baby, he was tiny, brown and beautiful. His hand fit on the tip of her finger. She counted all ten fingers and all ten toes. Tiny and perfect. She wanted to experience this with Ron but she realized she had to let him feel his own emotions in his own way, so she delved deeper into depression.

Just then a bereavement counselor came into the room. She sad she had a few questions but Jaimee only remembered one: “would you like to make arrangements to have your baby buried or would you like us to just put him in the incinerator here at the hospital?”

This lady wanted me to burn my baby like a piece of garbage. What was she talking about? It was all too much! “I’ll have him buried. Now I need you to get the Hell out of my room now!”

“Jaimee!” Her mother taunted, “you don’t speak to people like that!”

“Who says I don’t? She just said my child was garbage. If she doesn’t leave I will make her!”

Though Jaimee was receiving blood from losing to much during the procedure and was quite weak, she meant every word. She was gripping the bed rail with one hand until her knuckles turned white, while caressing her baby with the other hand. The counselor left without another word and Jaimee’s mother and aunt whispered to one another. Jaimee just looked at her baby until they came to take him from her. She never saw him again except in the tiniest casket she had ever seen in her life. Part of her soul was in that casket.

A baby started crying and she opened her eyes and looked around the plane. The pain of her memories hard to shake off. But a beautiful mother with long, wavy hair was trying to soothe her young one across the row from Jaimee. She smiled at the young mother, who looked like she hadn’t slept in days.

“Are you alright?” Jaimee asked over the shrill cries.

"No, honestly,” she said, “I’ve tried everything!”

"Would you like for me to try for awhile and let you relax for a moment? I’m not trying to be presumptuous. I know new mother’s don’t like to hand over their little ones so don’t feel obligated.” Jaimee said, hoping not to overstep her boundaries.

"You wouldn’t mind? My name is Simone and this little man is named James.” She stood up and brought James to her, emotions flooding Jaimee’s heart.

"Really! I’m Jaimee and this little boy is precious! Look at all that hair!” Jaimee started rocking him slowly and saying sh shhh shh in a rhythmic pattern, just as she had done her sons when they were little. Before long the crying stopped and he closed his eyes and drifted off to sleep.

Simone looked heartbroken. “It’s me. I’m a bad mother. He cries with me but stops with you. I don’t know what I’m doing.”

“Nonsense!” Jaimee said, “He simply feels your fatigue and distress. When you are rested he will feel your true emotions again. Get some sleep while you can!”

Simone smiled and lay her seat back. “I can’t thank you enough!”

"No, the pleasure is all mine!” And it was true. James was Jaimee’s lost baby’s middle name. It were as if God himself were sending a blessing. He slept in her arms until the first layover and Jaimee prayed over him and for his mother to get the rest she needed. As they unloaded at their first stop, Simone thanked Jaimee and that was the last time they saw each other, but for Jaimee it was all she needed to heal her soul, just a little.