“Jack,” I shrieked. “Jack.”

He ran into the bathroom.

“What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know.”

His eyes were fixed between my legs. The blood was now collecting below me on the bathroom tiling, a glistening circle of syrupy red.

He just stood there, frozen, staring.

“Call a fucking ambulance!” I screamed.

I stood outside my father’s locked office door, braiding the stiff, auburn hair on the mask that hung in the centre of the frame. The mask had always frightened me when I passed by it in the nighttime on my way to the bathroom. Its face was red and contorted, like an angry, ancient spirit.

I listened as the keyboard clicked beneath my father’s fingers, and hesitated. I knew I wasn’t supposed to bother him when he was writing, but it was well past noon and Annabelle and I were hungry. My mother had disappeared again.

I knocked gently, three times.

No response.

I knocked again, this time louder.

The clicking stopped. My father answered with irritation, “Yes?”

“Father, will you make us lunch?” I called, pressing my ear to the door.

I heard papers shuffle and the wheels of my father’s chair rolling along the hardwood floor. The door swung open and I stumbled. My father caught me as I fell into him. His face was stern. “Grace, you know the rule: when my office door is locked, do not bother me.”

“Sorry.” I pulled away.

“You are big enough to make lunch for yourself and Anna. Go see what’s in the kitchen.” He shut the door.

I crawled on my hands and knees down the hallway, pretending I was a cat. Annabelle was waiting around the corner, sitting on the floor, surrounded by piles of books. “What’d he say?”

“He got mad. But don’t worry, I’ll take care of you.”

The paramedics lifted me from the bathroom floor onto the gurney, carried me out of the house, and slid me into the back of the ambulance. I tried to stay awake as Jack squeezed my hand, whispering my name. His voice seemed far away. Everything hurt.

The next thing I remember is the lights, yellow-white and blindly harsh. More voices; new voices. Surgical masks and pink scrubs. The wheels of the gurney on the concrete floor. Something was wrong—I knew something was wrong—but no one was telling me anything. The nurses, both male, attempted to comfort me through the wretched screaming. I heard the doctor say to Jack: “If we have to make a choice, we’ll save her.”

I felt a shift inside me, downward—scraping, tearing, flesh, fluid. Something wasn’t right. I couldn’t feel my baby moving anymore.

The operating room. More nurses flittering around. The shine of stirrups. The chipped nail polish on my toes.

The doctor approached. “Okay, Grace, the head is almost out, but we’ve lost the heartbeat.”

“What?” I struggled to stand but the nurses held me in place. “What do you mean you lost the heartbeat?”

“The baby needs to be delivered now.” The doctor pulled blue latex gloves onto his large, hairy hands.