A river of emotion dragged her along. A current pulled her savagely toward a deadly waterfall, with nothing to be done but wait until she reached the edge. Then she felt herself falling and tumbling, the wind and the crashing of the water loud in her ears, so deafening she couldn’t hear her own scream. When she hit the white, churning foam below, the blackness sucked her down to the bottom where she knew she’d drown. They’d never find her body and she wanted that, she wanted cold anonymity.

Greg’s voice called to her in the deep, with indistinguishable words that came to her jumbled and confused. Though she fought against returning, she surfaced, gasping for air and trying to speak. She opened her eyes, ready to tell her husband, the man she loved, that she’d never be whole again.

But Greg was gone.

She didn’t recognize the woman standing over her who stared at her watch as she held Nem’s wrist. The nurse wasn’t looking at her and hadn’t even noticed she’d awoken. She had a pleasant but no-nonsense face.

But Nem had no time to consider her visitor any further. A pain tore through her breast as though her organs had been crushed. Her soul ached. Her body ached as if a giant hand held her in its grip. This was her pain from now on, forever. Her penance delivered to endure every waking moment.

She tried to close her eyes, close out the world and return to sleep, when the nurse spoke in such a matter-of-fact tone that Nem wondered if the woman was aware she’d lost her baby.

“You’re awake. Good. You gave your husband quite a fright. How’re you feeling? My name’s Belinda and I’ll be here on shift for another four hours.”

After completing taking her pulse, Belinda moved around the bed to check the fluid bag hanging at the side. After seeming to satisfy herself that the drip fed into Nem’s body as it should, the woman stopped and touched her arm. Nem felt a jolt and she suddenly thought, is this a dream? The woman acted as though nothing was wrong. She was in the hospital and her baby had died.

“You nauseous at all? Headache? Hungry?”

Though difficult, Nem managed to shake her head, which made a scratchy loud noise on the pillow. The uncaring way the nurse looked at her made her uncomfortable. She didn’t know why but the woman seemed strange to her and she wished someone else would come into the room.

“Shall I tell your husband to come back in? Your man is worried about you. Hasn’t left your side more than an hour or two since you came in. He’s just gone to the canteen to grab a bite to eat. I can call him if you like.”

Nem wanted to say, yes, I need my husband. I need my mom. I need something to keep me sane, to help take this pain away. But a strange sensation stopped her. She detected a wrongness around her as if thick molecules of heavy moisture filled the air. She relived the weight of Greg’s hands on her shoulders. The pushing. The moment of falling and the ground coming up to meet her. The blackness, the water, and sliding deeper into the abyss of cold, overwhelming emptiness.