FREYA
The bed under me is the same bed Papa used to sit me on when I was small and had a fever. The blanket on my lap is the same blanket. Miriam’s hands moving across my belly in slow unhurried circles are the same hands.
Only my body is different.
She has not spoken since I lay down. She never speaks while she is listening. She listens with her palms, the way Papa once explained she would, as though whatever is inside a body will tell her if she stays quiet long enough for it to speak.
I keep my eyes on the ceiling. The same ceiling. A brown stain in the corner where a leak came through the winter I turned ten.
When Miriam finally lifts her hand, she lifts it slowly, the way you set down a thing that has weight.
“The baby is alive,” she says. “It’s holding. The pregnancy is viable.
