Marie opened her eyes. The soft light of morning peeked into the bedroom. Dawn seemed gray, and that made sense. It rained last night. She turned back the covers, rubbed a hand over her belly and gasped.

The swell of the baby was gone.

She bolted upright, looking around the room, realizing where she was. Back at the hospital, like she had wished. Panic shot through her as she looked at herself. Her arms were a mess of tubes and tape. As she became more aware, she noticed that her head was wrapped in bandages. One of her legs was in a cast. The other leg had a wrapping around it, which squeezed every few seconds. Under the gown, she could feel the bulk of a pad between her legs. A catheter tube was taped to her thigh.

Then the pain hit her. Everything hurt, especially her abdomen. She raised the gown, looking at herself. A scar ran across her pelvis. Now the missing baby made sense. But where was she? Was she okay? Tears leaked from her eyes, as she lowered herself down onto the bed.

Something was beeping, a frantic, grating noise that had her heart racing. She was lucid enough to understand that the beeping was likely because her heart was racing. She tried to glance at the monitor, but could not turn her head far enough to see the screen. Her neck was stiff like the rest of her.

The door of her room opened, and a nurse came in. The scrubs she wore fit snugly around her hips and her breasts. She tried to look as if she was not hurrying to the bedside, but her tight, frizzy curls betrayed her. They bounced with a life and force of their own.

“Hi, Marie, I’m Margaret. I’m your nurse today,” she said. She was cheery, but underneath, Marie could hear the concern. She pushed a button on one of the several machines in the room. Marie watched her, barely registering her movements, as she typed something into the computer. A moment later, she pulled gloves onto her hands. “I’m just going to check you over,” Margaret said. The nurse raised the sheet. “Have to check your pad, honey,” she said.

Marie obediently spread her legs. Margaret worked in silence. She was pressed, wiped, changed, feeling nothing at the invasion of her most personal places. There was only one thing Marie was thinking about. Margaret lowered the blanket. “How’s your pain?” the nurse asked.

“Hurts everywhere,” Marie said.

Margaret went still. “It was a very bad accident, I think,” she said. The way she said bad tightened Marie’s chest.

“Where’s my baby?” Marie asked, the question finally bubbling to the surface.

Margaret put her hand on Marie’s arm, gave her a gentle squeeze. “She’s in the NICU.”

Marie wondered what it meant that Margaret didn’t offer any other details. She swallowed a lump the size of an apple. Her stomach ached, in the same way it did after a night of heavy drinking. She felt ill and dizzy. If her nurse noticed, she didn’t comment. Mouth suddenly dry, she asked, “And…what about my husband?”

“He is in the ICU,” Margaret said. Her words crawled out of her, individually, as if they weren’t forming a whole sentence.

“Is he awake?” Marie asked.

Margaret’s mood darkened visibly. She shook her curls away from her face. “Last I heard, no,” she said. There was a finality in her tone that was hopeless.

Marie leaned back on the bed, the sickness overcoming her now. “I don’t feel right…I’m gonna be sick,” she said.

Margaret produced an emesis bag seemingly out of thing air. As Marie wretched, the nurse held back her hair. When she was finished vomiting, Margaret wiped her face. She checked vitals. She asked if she could bring another pillow, a sip of water, if she wanted the T.V. on, if there was anyone that the hospital could call for her. Marie shook her head at all these things, unable to think.

“Can I see my baby?” she asked. Her timidity nearly broke her own heart.

“We can’t get you out of bed for another twelve hours,” Margaret said. “But, as soon as we can get you up, we can get you in a wheelchair, and we’ll take you to see her.”

Marie wondered what kind of world she had stepped into. These were her daughter’s first hours of life, and she was laying here in this bed, while her husband laid in a bed on another floor of the hospital. It didn’t seem possible. I wished to get it over with. She nearly said it aloud, but the fear of what it meant glued the words to her tongue.

Margaret eventually left. Marie broke into sobs that were barely controlled. Somehow, she still managed to fall asleep for a few hours.

When she woke, there was a man she didn’t recognize sitting at the foot of her bed. She should have been wary, and yet… The man was slender, almost golden in the pale evening light that shone through the window. He wasn’t young, but he wasn’t old either. There was something familiar and soft about him, though he was certainly a stranger. He ensorcelled her the longer she looked at him. A slow smile spread across his features as he watched her studying him.

“I believe,” he finally said, “that now you owe me something for our deal?”

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