The adrenaline had worn off with me. Instead I just felt tired. Tired of having to juggle everything, tired of making choices. I wanted nothing more than to just curl up into bed and sleep the month away, but I owed Robert the bare minimum of an explanation.My heart was pounding in my throat when I approached his door. Though we were definitely closer now than we had been a few months ago, I still knew that he would rightfully so chose the baby over me. The very same baby I had been impacting with my dumbass choices.“Come in,” I heard his low voice say when I knocked on the half open door. He was sitting on the edge of the bed, his hands hidden away in his pockets. The sheets on the bed had been discarded to one side, the pillows were messy too. I had definitely disturbed his sleep.“I am so sorry.” I said. I really was, I hated needing other people to depend on. I hated being this much of a liability. “What happened?

I definitely did not raise Clara to know this.We were seated at the large dinner table. The private chef still could not look me in the eye but did give Clara a friendly wave. My head was playing an endless loop of Clara knocking her glass over or spilling her food all down her shirt. We weren’t even in a restaurant, but it still felt like this place was way too fancy for her to do that. Robert was at one end of the table, while I was on the other. Clara sat to my right, looking either silently at me or at the silverware in front of us. Things certainly did not look this shiny at our place, though I saw that she had a special kids’ set where the knife wasn’t that sharp. This time, the silence was awkward. I had at least informed Robert that Clara thought he was just a friend of mine, so we couldn’t discuss any pregnancy stuff. I was the one link between the two people, but I was coming up empty on conversation starters.

I laid in the comfy bed, staring up at the perfectly white ceiling. Clara was softly mumbling in her sleep beside me, her body all curled together in a fetal position. I placed my hand on my bump.We had spent the last three days here, but tomorrow we would leave. I found a nice apartment in a better neighbourhood than before. Robert would be paying rent while I was pregnant, but even after I would still be able to afford it. It was in a great and colourful neighbourhood, with loads of (legal) street art and even a little flower shop right outside our building. It was perfect.I patted the bump. It really was perfect, but it would still take some time for it to become our home like our last house was. It still hurt me that I would never get to see it again. There was already some furniture in the house, but buying a new mattress was high on the priority list. I quietly got out of the bed. I was never going to fall asleep. I could postpone it every other ni

I massaged the side of my bump. The weird pains popped up every now and then, mainly when something stressful was happening. Today they almost didn’t stop.I could see Clara playing through the glass. She had a blonde barbie in her hand and pointed to it when she spoke to the woman. The entire room was decorated like a playroom, with colourful walls and a soft floor. The only thing that wasn’t decorated as though a rainbow threw up over it was the woman. She wore a black pants suit. She was from social services. I was told to bring Clara so they could talk to her on ‘neutral’ ground, rather than at her school or the new apartment. I watched as Clara handed the woman the barbie she had been talking about while she went to grab a new one herself.I smiled to myself. That was Clara. The woman was incredibly patient, but even I could see that Clara was way too easily distracted by all the shiny toys to answer any long questions. Clara w

Kiara definitely helped with making my apartment look like it was straight out of a magazine. I texted her photos of newly arriving packages every day, and she told me where to put it and how to dress it up. Of course, anything made out of glass didn’t last longer than a day in a household with Clara, but the sentiment was nice.I stretched out my sore muscles. Clara needed some time to adjust to the new apartment, so getting her to sleep was a part time job at this point. I read her books and told her stories, I even dared to sing her a lullaby. Nothing I did helped with calming her down