Guilt

A TCP by Raven (raven@subreality.com)

Author's Note: Prince Of Darkness time again! Despite my
own personal good mood lasting into its Xth week, this one
just wouldn't go away...  Rated R for really unpleasant.  All
usual TCP rules and regs apply, and all feedback and flames
to the usual address.

***

Another sunrise.

Great.

Another day coping with what I did.

Great.

What did I do?

Heh.

Nothing really.

Or at least, that's what everyone said to me at the time.

~"Don't worry about it, what matters is you're still here, right?"~

~"You'll get over it in time."~

~"We're here for you, honey."~

Bull-*shit*.

They have no idea how I feel.

They have no idea what it felt like doing what I did.

Oh wait, I never told you what I did, did I?

Sorry.

I guess I can't hide it forever, right?

I had an abortion.

There.

I've said it.

I guess you think I'm some kind of monster now, don't you?

Because *I* do.

I destroyed something.

Some*one*.

Because of me, someone never got the chance to breathe,
to feel the sun on their face, to see the full moon...

Someone never got a chance, period.

I hate myself.

Why did I do it?

Heh.

That's the saddest part of all.

I didn't even have a good excuse.

I wasn't getting rid of an accident.

I wasn't raped.

The kid was mine and my husband's.

Would have been a little brother or sister to the one we already
have.

Hell, we'd planned to have another ever since Jessie was born.

So why did I do it?

I'll tell you.

I went for the scans like they asked me to.

And as I lay there, looking at the fuzzy image on the screen,
my world went to hell.

The baby was perfect.

Except for one thing.

Growing out of his shoulders were the stumps that would
eventually grow into huge, feathery wings.

I burst into tears right there and then.

I couldn't have the baby.

I just couldn't.

I couldn't bring new life into the world if it was a mutant, right?

I went home, and I told Peter what had happened.

He said it was up to me, that it was my body, my choice.

That's what he *said*.

But his eyes said something else.

They've said something else ever since.

I went ahead with the abortion.

Peter and I made up some story about me miscarrying.

The guilt I felt when all my friends at the library sent me those
sympathy cards...

Many's the time I've thought of killing myself.

Just taking a bottle of JD and some antidepressants down
to the cliffs and throwing myself over them.

But I can't.

I couldn't do that to Peter.

Couldn't do that to Jessie.

Another day.

Another sunrise.

Great.

I get out of bed, trying not to wake Peter up.

I wince at the agony in my shoulderblades.

I go to the bathroom and look at myself in the mirror.

I look at the horrible scars that mar my back.

The scars from where my wings were removed so that no-one
would know I was a mutant.

I try to stop myself from crying, but I can't.

I've done this every morning for eighteen years.

I'll do it every morning.

I cry for my unborn son.

I cry for myself.

I cry for things that might have been.

FIN