“Hormones,” Darko says, escorting the doctor out, apologizing and thanking him at the same time. I thoroughly expect a lecture and a punishment when he gets back, but I don’t care. I stare at that blurry picture the doctor printed out and I feel my eyes begin to water.
That poor little life inside me. It’s entirely innocent. It has no concept of what it is going to be born into. And there is nothing I can do ultimately to keep it safe, just as in the end, my father could not keep me safe.
* * *
Darko
My suspicions have been confirmed. I think I knew she was pregnant the moment I came inside her, but I could not come to terms with it. I gave her a pill to end it and still that soul persisted. I feel a strange sense of pride at that fact. The life inside my wife has been battling from the beginning. I know, male or female, it will be strong. The news fills me with happiness, but I know Chloe does not feel the same way.
As I return to her, she looks at me with hatred, her gaze bitter. “Congratulations,” she hisses. “You’re going to be a father.”
“And you, a mother.”
“Fuck you.” She crosses her arms over her stomach and looks away from me. I see her lashes batting quickly as she fights tears.
This is not how most pregnancy revelations go. The joy is absent, just as it was from our wedding. I see bitterness on her face, a misery that goes to her core and suddenly I am struck by the fact that this is my fault. One hundred percent, completely my fault. The news of new life jolts me out of the bubble of my self-righteous certainty and makes me see things anew.
Chloe is small, vulnerable, and weak in the way nature makes all women. Her ability to bring forth new life makes her so exposed to dangers, so much more aware of their impact. I have blamed her for so much. I accused her of putting the blame on me for things that were not mine to take responsibility for. But I am the one who took her and tore what remained of her world apart. I am the one who has forced her every step of the way and now she is carrying my child.
At that moment, I make a vow to myself. I will not engage in any more fights with Chloe. I will not allow this baby to be born in bitterness, hatred, and grief.
Sitting on the bed next to her, I take her by the hand, and I begin to talk.
“I was a teenager when the Yugoslav war was being fought. My father was a rebel. I worshipped him. My people have been rebels for centuries. Generations. We have been fighting since the twelfth century, fathers and sons taking up arms against the oppressors which swept in and out of our lands. I was twelve the first time I took a man’s life.”
She is stiff next to me, but I hear a soft sound from her as I share that piece of information.
“The scar. The one you see on my chest. The one you first asked about. That is where a bullet was taken out next to my heart. A fraction of an inch either way and I would have been dead, but I survived. I was sent away from the war after that. My people committed atrocities, and had atrocities committed against them. In the end, I was left with a great deal of blood money and no family. They were all gone. When I returned to my village after the war, it was rubble. I know what it is to lose those one loves, Chloe. I became a man when I took my first life, and perhaps you became a woman when you did the same.”
“No,” she whispers softly. “I became a monster.”
“A human is a monster. A proper human, anyway. The people you see on the streets, most of them are not fully human. Most of them are parts of the hive, little pieces in the system. They do their jobs, they fulfill their purpose, but they never have the full expression of their instincts. They never act on their sexual desires, or fully express their hatred and loathing. They subjugate themselves to the will of the collective so they can live in peace. You and I have foregone that peace, and those rules. But we have more freedom, more power, and a greater world to live in because of it.”
* * *
Chloe
As Darko speaks, I feel him unfold next to me. The cold silence that has characterized the first weeks of our marriage is shattered by the words that resonate with truth. This is the first time he has ever shared anything of any real substance with me before.