If and when I raise children, I'll never...

If and when I raise children, I'll never...

Cassandra wrung out the soaked towel. Thin red liquid dribbled out of it, quickly at first, then slower with each additional squeeze. She was almost done cleaning up the mess. Her whole body felt numb. She knew she was alive, but there were moments when she had to stop and just look at her tinted red, blood-stained hands in order to confirm that she was still the same person; she was still existing.

Samantha had been eight months old. So little, so cute, so vulnerable, and just so perfect. And she had been hers. Cassandra had never imagined that she could love someone in that way. From the pain-filled moment she pushed her out of herself, to when she was placed in her arms, she knew that her love for Samantha was eternal; she felt it evolve, having blurry, drowsy visions of Samantha’s first word, first step, first day of school, first date, and then first day at university. All of that was gone now.

Cassandra left the towel in the sink, turned on the faucet, and picked up the bucket from the ground. She filled it with soap, then put it under the running faucet. She watched the water fall in the bucket, and felt herself fall. Her feet were planted on the ground of the dim basement, and as she crouched down, she felt her heart being pulled out of her, saw it leaving her body, dragging along with it the veins and arteries that allowed her to live. “My baby, my Samantha, my Samantha…” she cried, getting louder and louder until she was shouting. She was shouting so loud she felt herself running out of breath, her lungs unable to fill up quick enough to give her the air she needed to release her agony.

She stayed crouched on the basement floor, her face drenched with tears, as she suffocated on her sobs. Her Samantha, she would never hold her small, fragile body again, feel her warm breath. Squatting on the ground, balancing herself on her toes, she again reached her hands out, looking at their redness through the blur of her tears.

Cassandra had not known she could experience such rage, never knew the savagery of her hands. But she had done it. Samantha, her little angel, had been crawling about as usual. Nothing out of the ordinary. She was crawling, picking things up, exploring, as infants do. Cassandra was in the kitchen, cutting vegetables for a stew she was preparing for dinner. She saw Samantha crawl into the kitchen, giggling and babbling along. Cassandra saw Samantha, saw the knife in her hand – she would never comprehend what happened next. Cassandra had never believed in neither God nor Satan, or any foolishness of that nature. But what else could have come over her other than the devil?

Cassandra came back to the reality of the basement and her cleaning task. She lifted herself into standing position, her knees feeling weak from holding her body weight. She stood up, and taking in a deep breath. She climbed up the basement stairs, leaving the bloody towel in the sink, ignorant of the faucet still running. She walked up to the kitchen, the floor still stained with blood, the cleaning not yet complete.

She walked over to the phone. She slowly dialed 9, then 1. Then she hung up. She walked over to the counter, and picked up the knife with which she had destroyed all that mattered to her just an hour ago. She pointed it toward her chest, holding it tight, feeling the strength building inside her. Then she lunged it into her it, feeling nothing but darkness as her she fell to the ground.