It'll Pass

by Sarah Bakewell

chamomile tea

It’ll pass.

Everything seems so unbearable. So difficult. So overwhelming.

It’ll pass.

It’s too much. There’s just too much crashing down all at once.

It’ll pass.

I’m struggling. Again. I can never remember how to get out of it.

It’ll pass.

I know it’ll pass but when? It’s been days. I want to do something to make it go away sooner.

‘It’ go away, or ‘you’ go away?

Whichever.

It’ll pass. Be patient. You have to ride it out.

Why? Says who? Who for? Who’s making it happen, testing how I deal with it?

Breathe.

What if I don’t want to anymore?

You do. Keep breathing. All will be well.

… It’ll pass.

That’s right. It’ll pass.

100 Worder Resignation

100 Worder

Sarah Bakewell

Resignation

Caramel Hot Chocolate

The truth of my words spiked the air around us. He stopped in his tracks, piercing me with his wicked blue eyes.

‘And that’s what you want?’ he muttered.

‘I…’ I stammered, taking a step back but only finding the cool wall. Looking up, he’d edged closer, towering over me, blocking the setting sun from the window opposite. I’d been honest once, another time wouldn’t hurt.

Or it might. But the time for considering consequences had passed long ago.

‘Yes.’

‘Fine.’ Another step closer, his dark words swirling in front of me. ‘I quit.’

And just like that, it happened.

About the author:

Find out more here: www.sarahbakewellwrites.com / @_SarahBakewell

Published August 3 2015 

The Black Butterfly

Sarah Bakewell

Latte

I was about five years old. I’d shuffled across the waiting room to a plastic blue chair in the corner, away from the eyes of others, and clambered onto the seat. The chair was next to a small wooden table with a box of tissues sat upon it. I was sobbing silently in the corner on my chair, my little legs dangling above the floor, with three mushed-up tear-sodden tissues in my small fist. One of the nurses had offered me a cup of juice, but I’d shaken my head without taking my eyes off the floor, my scraggly brown hair hiding my tear soaked face; I’d felt sick.

After an hour or so, a plump, redheaded nurse had squatted down beside me and asked my name.

'Hannah,' I’d muttered.

'I’m Nancy; it’s nice to meet you, Hannah.' I said nothing. 'Do you know what, petal, I think I have just the thing for you.' She’d pushed herself up and I’d dragged my eyes off the floor to watch her through strands of limp hair as she went behind her reception desk, rummaged through some papers, and came back towards me, holding something behind her back. She crouched beside me once more, smiled, and held out a brand new colouring book and some crayons. I looked up properly as my small green eyes filled with tears at her undeserved kindness; I’d never been given a colouring book before. She smiled at me again and left them with me. I took another tissue to dry my eyes before carefully turning the crisp pages until I came across an outline of a butterfly. I carefully coloured it all in, making sure not to go over the lines, using only the black crayon; it didn’t feel like a time for colour. Not when my mother was in a nearby room having her stomach pumped.

When we’d got to the hospital they rushed her off, entwined in tubes and wires that I didn’t understand. Then I waited. I spent the night curled up across two of the plastic chairs in the waiting room because my mother didn’t want me by her bed; she refused. Nancy had found some blankets for me but I didn’t sleep very much. When my mother was discharged, she stormed towards the waiting room, grabbed my arm and marched me straight out of the hospital without a word of thanks to any of the doctors or nurses. The colouring book lay open underneath my chair at the page of the black butterfly.

That colouring book was mine. Nancy kept it especially for me, and throughout my childhood I’d coloured in almost every picture in the book. It didn’t make me look forward to my mother collapsing by any means; I dreaded having to come back and sit on that chair, it always brought back an unwelcome sickly feeling in the pit of my stomach. But I had someone to look out for me when it was clear that my mother didn’t. They’d had to replace their black crayon several times during my infant years. I never touched the others.

That was years ago. I imagine other children have used every colour in the carton since they were mine. I hope they did. I wonder if Nancy would recognise me now, or if she remembers me. I’ve spent a lot of time in the hospital recently but I haven’t seen her. Then again I haven’t exactly been in the waiting room. Funny, I’d spent hours and hours in that waiting room because I was an accident and I drove my mother to drink, but now it’s different. I’ve caused my own accident this time.

A doctor comes into my room and checks the machines surrounding my lifeless body. After making some brief notes, he leaves again. It’s too quiet in here for my liking; at least the waiting room had a bit of noise, the buzz of the reception desk, the other waiting families. I never realised when I was younger how much I needed other people to be waiting for someone too – I’d always sat in my corner, away from them, but now I really am alone and I don’t think I like it. I never appreciated the noise. Now it’s silent. I can’t go anywhere in here; I’ve only been able to drift around the room, never leaving my body for too long. Maybe if I went too far I might not be able to get back at all, and I haven’t made my mind up about that yet.

I’d been walking. Not walking anywhere in particular, just anywhere to get out of the house. I was always easily distracted, by a stray cat or a cloud shaped like something other than a cloud. My mind had to wander; it would have been a dark place otherwise. That day, I remember seeing shadows on the pavement at my feet. I’d chased them. I chased them all the way into the road, but they escaped over the car while I crumpled at the front of it. I’d been chasing the shadows of butterflies.

I circle the room some more, and hover in the chair next to my unrecognisable self. I’m curious as to how far I can actually go, so I allow my ghost to wander just outside my room and take a nosey peek down the corridor; I see my waiting room. I float closer until I can see my chair. The tissues have been replaced my magazines on my table. Underneath them, I see a child’s colouring book.

The loud panicked beeping of machines starts screeching from down the corridor. I tear my eyes away from the reception I know all too well and float back towards the noise – it’s my room. Doctors and nurses are running in, I can’t get close enough to see what’s happening to me. I don’t think I have a choice anymore. It’s being made for me.

Bio: Sarah Bakewell is a 21 year old English and Creative Writing student at the University of Salford. She has had a passion for writing since childhood and enjoys reading and writing snappy, short pieces of fiction. 'Chubby Little Cheeks' is her first published short story with CafeLit, this is her second.

Chubby Little Cheeks

Sarah Bakewell

Espresso

Here he is. He’s perfect. My little boy, my first child, my son. Here in my arms. I could hold him forever. All the pain I experienced bringing him into this world is now irrelevant, forgotten. I’m engulfed by love. I feel nothing other than love for my baby boy. My surroundings have faded into nothing; they do not matter. Nothing matters other than him now. Just my son.

He has a mop of thick, black hair, like his father. His small eyes are shut, but he has beautifully long eyelashes. I long to see his eyes, no doubt they will be as perfect as the rest of him, but I dare not disturb him simply to see whose eyes he has inherited; grey-green, like mine, or bright, sparkling blue, like his father? He has an adorable button nose with a tiny beauty spot just underneath his left nostril. His ears are quite dainty. He has a small closed mouth and chubby little cheeks. His baby skin is so new and fresh, so smooth. He smells delicious. I hold him close to me.

He has five perfect fingers on each squishy hand, and five tiny toes on each miniature foot. So delicate and fragile. His perfectly formed arms lay crossed on his rounded stomach underneath his blanket. He has inherited the long leg gene of the other males on my side of the family.

My baby is beautiful. He is perfect. His eyes remain shut.

My surroundings slowly begin to drift back into place as muttered conversation disturbs the peaceful world which only my son and I share. I want to look up and shout at whoever has interrupted such a precious moment but I cannot take my eyes away from my son. How can I look away? My anger is washed away in an instant; I continue to stare at him. His eyes do not flicker.

I steal away from thoughts of my son growing up and try to re-piece my scenery, although I do not remove my eyes from my baby. I am still in my hospital bed in a delivery room. It is dark outside - I cannot remember if it was light when I delivered my baby. I could have been sat here silently for hours, just holding my son. I recognise the hushed tones of my husband near the foot of my bed and a female voice I do not. Perhaps the midwife is still here? I can’t think why she would be.

I think of my son’s room waiting for him at home. My husband’s study is now barely identifiable; a shade of canary yellow occupies the previously cream walls, with an additional colourful border of farmyard animals. The small wooden cot situated against a wall adjacent to the window is filled with soft toys and blankets. A baby monitor is attached to one of the bars with its partner on my bedside table. The shelving unit opposite the cot, once home to my husband’s various work related files, folders and papers now stores nappies, dummies, clothes, bottles, bibs… Anything my baby could need. The room needs to have a baby in it.

‘I’d like to take him home now,’ I say quietly but firmly, still not taking my eyes off him. A heavy silence fills the room. I hear the slow, steady footsteps of my husband as he walks up to the head of the bed where I sit in my hospital gown, propped up by two pillows, holding his son. Our son. My son.

‘Darling…’ he struggles to find anymore words, so instead, places a hand on my shoulder and gives it a squeeze. I painfully tear my gaze away from my son to look up at my husband. His usually bright blue eyes have lost their sparkle. They glisten with tears. They look sore, as if he’s been crying for some time. He looks distraught, exhausted, and apologetic.

‘I’d like to take my son home now, please,’ I say to him calmly, looking deep into his magnificent blue eyes before turning my attention back to my baby. He hasn’t moved.

‘I’m so sorry,’ whispers the midwife, ‘but you can’t take him home.’

I look up at her, suddenly furious, cradling my son tightly to my chest. Who is she to deny this simple wish? I study the woman who believes she can prevent me from taking my baby home. She is a plump woman, rather short, with tight mousey brown curls. She too looks as though she has been crying. A tell-tale tear escapes from one of her small puffy red eyes and glides silently down her rosy cheek. I am his mother. And I want to take him home.

‘He is my baby. My son. He’s coming home with me.’

‘Sweetheart…’ begins my husband, but again words fail him. He eventually settles with, ‘I’m so sorry.’

I look from my husband to the midwife and back again, then I look at my baby boy again. He lies in my arms perfectly still, in the same position as before. His eyes are shut.

I cannot let go of my son. How can anybody seriously suggest that I leave him here? I’m his mother. He is not staying here. I need him. I love him. He is mine. My perfect little boy.

They’ve given up. I have not. I can’t let him go. He is mine; he grew from nothing inside me. I felt him moving and wriggling and kicking. They don’t understand.

Since he was born, he has not opened his eyes, nor moved, nor cried. My newborn baby has not cried. He never will. I will never hear his cry. He will never look at his mother. He will never open his eyes. My perfectly formed, beautiful baby boy does not have a heartbeat anymore. His first breath will never come. I cannot let him go, because I’m afraid I will never hold him again.

I cradle my baby tightly and cry.

Bio: Sarah Bakewell is a 21 year old English and Creative Writing student at the University of Salford. She has had a passion for writing since childhood and enjoys reading and writing snappy, short pieces of fiction. 'Chubby Little Cheeks' is her first published short story.