Something We Were

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   "Life is a journey, Aisha darling," Aisha's mother had once told her. "Choose well those with whom you travel."

   As always, Aisha still followed her mother's advice.

   It had been six months years since she had stepped in this part of the world — the Americas. Pennsylvania to be exact. When she had stepped into the flight, she was four months pregnant, and infinitely scared having been cut off by her dad. Her mother's trust fund had kept her going through the college and pregnancy expense, but emotionally ... she was crippled.

   Throughout the pregnancy, she was trying to push herself to do better. Her acceptance letter for post graduation was her only hope, and she had decided to not take too much load in the university so that she could take care of herself and the baby. Along with pursuing her Masters in Computer Science, she also did some research work for the university to manage with the extra bills. Her petite figure did manage to conceal her condition for the first two trimesters from the rest of the world.

    All hell broke loose when her university mates and professors found out about her increasing condition after her first two trimesters. Of course, the university didn't have any rules against pregnant students, but the attitude towards her — the straight A student, the girl who was doing so well in her fellowship, the girl who was so genius that it put the professors to shame — changed drastically. She became a mere spectator in the world around her, and it did not sit fully well with her. During her graduation degree, she was never treated with so much condescension and ignorance, the brilliant student she was ... but she had never been pregnant woman without a father before either, had she? How do you change the way people perceived you after something like that?

    She decided to ignore the stares, and eventually people stopped talking about it. That was the one thing common in every human civilization — they continued to bother you if you still reacted. She decided to take the rest of the semester remotely, from her home.

    After the next three months, her life changed forever. One day, she was listening to Twenty One Guns by Green Day and trying to reminisce the good times when life wasn't so complicated. It was tough to feel the kind of loneliness when you're all but surrounded by people. When hands touched, but not the hearts. There were times when she still couldn't sleep, felt extremely suicidal, depressed, awful but she always made it through when she thought of the bloom of life growing inside her womb.

    She lightly touched her baby bump. It was all because of the child she would soon give birth to. She had kept herself strong for the child, because otherwise, she would have been long dead. She didn't want to think about what might happen when the child was here. She didn't want to think about it at all. She was all alone, and she had no fucking idea about how to raise a child. Suddenly, she wanted to cry.

    "Keep your shit together, you stupid woman." Aisha chastised herself. "The strongest people are the most alone. You'll get through this. You don't need anybody now. You'll get through this, and raise the most amazing child." She pictured a pair of tiny infant hands, and she tried to hold them in her grasp. They were trying to get away from her, and she took a step to grasp them. Instead of grabbing the imaginary hands, Aisha tripped on her feet and fell on her bottom.

   When she gathered herself to get up, Aisha felt a wet sensation in her vagina, and she knew what was it. She had learnt all about it in her prenatal classes. Her water had fucking broken. She tried to get up and grabbed the intercom, and dialed to her best friend and neighbor, Elis Brandon. "My water just broke, Elis." She yelled through the speakers.

   "Oh my God. I'm coming there right away, Aisha!" Aisha nodded her head, then felt stupid because Elis couldn't see her through the phone. She kept it aside, and caressed her baby bump through the sheath dress she wore.

"Just a little while, darling. Elis will come, and we shall get through this, okay? We shall get through this together, my love."

   The door barged open, and Aisha smiled. With Elis' help, she got up and made her way through the door. 

   The next few hours were the most excruciatingly painful hours of her life. Childbirth process was traumatic, no matter how much it was romanticised in those stupid, unrealistic sitcoms and romantic comedies. All Aisha could taste was salt because she was constantly crying.

   She had read in books that in medieval times, a woman would ascend to Hell if she died in a child birth because she simply wasn't strong enough. And if she didn't face any pain during childbirth, it meant the pro-creation process was simply fornication, and the child — a spawn of the Devil himself.

   Lucky for Aisha, she was never religious.

   Aisha smiled through her tears when she heard the doctor say the head was coming out. She pushed harder, and then sighed heavily when she heard the first cry. Her eyes were beginning to droop because of the exertion, and she didn't realize when she passed out.

   After a couple of hours, she called out the nurse to show her the baby she had given birth to. The nurse smiled at the new mother, and exited her room to fulfill the demand. After five minutes, she showed up with the prettiest human being in the universe which was all red and had all the stars in its eyes ... her eyes. It was a girl.

   Her daughter. She wanted to weep.

   Aisha felt like she literally had her heart in her hands when she held her daughter in her arms. The one person she had decided to love unconditionally. She had decided to name her first offspring Anmol (irrespective of the sex of the child) with the love of her life at some point of time. It was a shame, he wasn't here now but it didn't matter. It was what she deserved anyway. The point was, she didn't feel so lonely now.

      She had someone to love.

    She heard her child's cry, and a lone tear rolled down her cheek, but she smiled anyway. "Hello, Anmol. Today, I promise to love you, and cherish you forever." She softly whispered.