High Class.

Yvonne puffed the cigarette, she sighed as she blew the air out. She had to stop smoking, for the sake of her baby, the doctor told her. She touched her belly, her eyes turned towards the lonely lane, it was dark and frightening but her house was down that lane, she knew the drunks would try to steal from her as usual or even molest her but she was ready for them today, she was going to fight them, kick them so high and thrash them really bad. She turned towards Blue Heaven, it was the place she had just came out from, she wasn't a prostitute like many would think,she just needed a favour from an old friend, she had to go home though, tomorrow was another day. She started walking down the pavement but a car was speeding towards her, she was going to run like the expert that she was but then, it swept her off her feets and she found herself on the stony ground. She felt cold and there was a tingling pain below her stomach, she held her stomach as if protecting her baby, it was dark and her head felt heavy,she saw the car stop and a man came rushing to her, several people were all around her, she closed her eyes, a tear dropped and her head was as light as paper. The fan swirled, she blinked her eyes, trying to adjust to the sudden bright light, the smell of the hospital hit her, she grunted. She hated hospitals, they reminded her of poverty, she hated public hospitals even more, Benjamin died in a public hospital, Mom died in a hospital and Luis was not spared either. A doctor came to her, he looked like he had just been assigned to something dreadful but can't escape from. "You are awake?" He looked surprised, she tried to sit up. "Don't sit up" He said. "You are still so weak" A nurse walked to them, she looked the same as the doctor, sick of their damn jobs. "Do you know where you are now?" He asked. "A hospital" She replied, looking from the nurse to the doctor. "What is your name?" "Yvonne, Yvonne Solis" "Where do you live?" She looked at them both, her house wasn't registered yet and she couldn't say Blue Heaven or they would think she was a loosed woman, but... "Sixth street, behind Blue Heaven" The nurse and Doctor exchanged glances. "We don't know where that is" The nurse shook her head. Fine, just fine, not everyone knows about that place. "What happened to my baby?" "Oh" The nurse smiled, for the first time. "Congratulations, you gave birth to a beautiful baby boy" Yvonne leaned back on the bed. "Would you like to see him?" The nurse asked. Yvonne was quiet, wished the baby had died, no one really wanted him anymore. When she woke up, the smell of the hospital hit her first, and hunger was threatening to wrench her stomach open. She turned on her bed to the next person, a middle aged woman was lying, looking very sick, Yvonne felt pity for her and she remembered Mom, and Benjamin too, he died in a hospital just like this, and she couldn't even mourn like a normal wife because she couldn't disturb the other patients. "You don't look like you are from here" A woman said, she was the other patient in the next bed, Yvonne turned to her. She looked happy, sitting on her bed, swinging her legs. "So what brings you here?" She asked, Yvonne wanted to avoid her,but on a second thought, she was a novice here and she needed to know what was going on. "I got into an accident" "I just delivered my fourth child" The woman laughed. "I am a regular here" She smiled proudly. Yvonne looked disgusted, she tried to avoid looking at the woman and caught sight of a poster on the wall, it was written in three languages, English, Mandarin and Tamil. "Look" She pointed. "its only in Mandarin and Chinese" "What else should it be in?" The woman face contorted into a deep frown. Yvonne leaned back on her bed, thinking deeply, the doctor and nurse looked very different,they didn't look like her,like Europeans or Americans and they talked like they were new in English. "What is this place?" She turned to the woman. "A hospital" The woman's eyebrows shifted. "Of course I know that, but I mean which country am I in?" "Are you alright?" "Where am I?" Yvonne roared aggressively. "Singapore" By evening, everyone in that Ward knew that there was a demented woman from a place called Blue Heaven, she was penniless that was for sure,She looked homeless too, she had no family because no one had visited her for the past five hours and she was a street girl. She was of the worst class of the social circle. They were generous enough to bring her dinner, it was a bit of everything, beef soup and rice, an apple, water and some cooked eggs. The nurse came by, she was wearing a pitiful look,she sat beside Yvonne on the bed. "Do you want to meet him now?" She asked, Yvonne paused in her eating. "I thought I couldn't see him since he is in the incubator" "Incubator " The nurse was very confused. "Your baby is so strong and healthy, you were almost in your tenth month when you came here" "No" Yvonne shook her head strongly. "I was in my fifth month,the baby couldn't have survived" "No, you were almost in your tenth, I think you are so stressed out and that was why you have been confusing the times, the baby is fed and he really needs to bond with his mother" "What is today's date?" Yvonne asked, the nurse's face was contorted to deep distress. "Ah...., 13 August 2021" "What?" She exclaimed, turning her face to the wall, she counted the months, she had lost one year of her memory, one year and two months we're gone. The baby was brought to her and she held it, it was wrapped in old baby clothes, because there was no new ones, because she was so poor to afford even a gown for herself. She was told too that she had to leave, there was need for her bed for a new patient, so she asked them to give her two more hours to find a place for her baby. The nurse and the Doctor agreed, it was a flimsy excuse because most mother's had did just that but never returned for the child, well it was also going to end up like all the choiceless babies in the orphanage home. Yvonne couldn't leave the hospital with the hospital gown so she stole a gown kept to dry outside the ward by a nursing mother, believing the mother was even more better off than her she didn't care, no one pitied her, no one ever did. She walked long, very long away from the hospital,till she got towards a fish market, it was a little distance from the river, it was the biggest fish market she had ever been to. She settled down beside a stall, it was a big fish stall with so many customers that the owner didn't notice her, her legs were so red and sore because she had walked barefooted from the hospital, she had no sandals, no shoes only a long maternity gown, which was so worn out, that it looked like a rag. Time was not on her side, she thought, she had to act quick and find a home for her boy even though she knew it was so impossible. "What are you doing here, you poor beggar!!!" The owner of the stall shouted at her, She scampered to her feets and started walking again down the road, she smiled, she had gotten food for herself. Three fishes tugged in her gown, she didn't have to walk for too long, because she soon spotted a small house down the road, it was abandoned and dirty and there were signs that showed that it was haunted, she sighed, looking up to the sky, she prayed, grateful that her son now had a roof over his head.