An Eternity of Change

Chapter 1

September 24, 1794

            Daniel Carver paced around anxiously as he heard his wife, Anora, screaming again. Sitting nearby his five-year-old daughter Jane was sitting in a chair casting worried looks between the door her mother was behind and her father. He didn’t blame his daughter for being worried; he was getting a bit anxious himself. Anora hadn’t been feeling well the past couple of months, and not just because of her pregnancy, she had even fainted a couple of days ago for unexplained reasons.

            “Should I go check on momma?” Jane asked quietly.

            Daniel shook his head at her comment. “No, you don’t want to go in there. You might bother the doctor and he needs to focus on his job at the moment.”

            Jane yawned tiredly and curled up into a ball on the chair as she began to drift off. “I hope I don’t get a brother…”

            Daniel laughed a quietly at her half asleep comment before picking her up and carrying his daughter to her room. “Now I doubt it would be that bad to have a younger brother.”

            He laid her on her bed and pulled the covers up, Jane shifted in her sleep; her brown hair sliding into her face, seeing this Daniel brushed it back into place before leaving the room and closing the door silently behind him. As he walked back out to the living room he could hear comforting, encouraging voices coming from the other room, he could hear her speaking now though it was too faint and disoriented to make out what it was. Then another shout, weaker, almost a normal speaking level, he sighed; she was getting weaker by the minute. This went on for several more minutes before everything went quiet. The door opened and a doctor walked over to him with a look that told Daniel what he was about to say wasn’t good.

            “Your wife wishes to speak with you.” The man told him somberly. “I’m afraid she doesn’t have much time left.” 

            Daniel nodded in acknowledgement and walked into the room where Anora was sitting up weakly, sweat causing her chocolate brown hair to stick to her face. “How do you feel?”

            “Tired.” She replied, forcing a smile to come to her face and glancing down at the wrapped bundle in her arms. “We have another girl...”

            Daniel walked over to see his child and put a hand on his wife’s shoulder. “She’s beautiful.”

            “Like… like an angel.” Anora’s eyes began to flutter closed.

            “Anora, stay with us. You need to keep your eyes open.” Daniel shook her gently to avoid waking up the baby in her arms, unlike Jane; this baby was silent and looked a bit lifeless in his wife’s arms.

            “I’m just… just resting… my eyes.” Her voice continued to grow fainter and Daniel knew he was going to lose her. He glanced towards the door, about to call the doctor in, but the man was already standing in the doorway with his head bowed. Daniel realized the man couldn’t do anything to help now.

            “Anora, you can rest later…” Daniel tried to keep his voice steady. “Don’t leave me, you need to raise our daughters… watch them grow up.”

            “And I will Daniel…” She stared up at him with her emerald green eyes; they were growing duller as she died.

            “What should we name her?” Daniel changed the subject, desperately hoping to distract her enough to stay with him at least a bit longer.

            Anora blinked a few times as she looked down at her daughter. “Jaylyn… Jaylyn Carver.”

            Daniel took his daughter as Anora handed her to him and felt the baby, no, Jaylyn, shift in discontentment at being moved. “I love it.”

            He waited for a response, for his wife to say something, anything, to him, but looking back at Anora… he realized she never would again. Her eyes were now half closed, a weak smile on her pale face… she was gone. Daniel felt the doctor take Jaylyn from him to make sure the child was well as he numbly stared down at his wife’s body, funeral plans were in order, but he couldn’t find it in himself to move to the phone and make them.