. Mila was looking through this book with interest in the library yesterday. This led me to conclude that despite the threat of abortion, I still have a chance to extricate myself from this situation healthy and unharmed.
However, despite the auspicious signal, I have to be cautious. Mila’s actions are contradictory. My future is vague and depends entirely on Mama. I am a helpless, passive observer. Tangled in the umbilical cord, I am in a dark and closed space, and I cannot influence her decision in any way. The only way I can entertain myself is to hold onto the umbilical cord, float in the intrauterine pool and perceive the world the same way Mama sees it.
I don’t know what my Mama looks like, or what her male and female friends look like. But for the past nine weeks I have been able to hear clearly, or rather feel, or rather consciously perceive all her words and actions. I can even read thoughts, a skill which is considered a miracle in the real world. When she smokes a cigarette, I choke from the oxygen deficiency; when she drinks a shot of vodka, it gives me hot flashes. It is especially oppressive if a man puts his weight on her stomach and presses with all his strength. His thrusts cause me pain. Resisting with all my might, I strike madly against the walls of my cell: „Stop! That’s enough!“
She feels my anger and pushes away my tormentor. The next day she lies in bed for a long time, holding her stomach and asking forgiveness saying: „Lord, why am I in such misery?“
I feel sorry for her. I try to calm and comfort her: „Mommy, forget about him. We do so well, just the two of us.“ She agrees with me and curses the tormentor: „He can go to hell!“
Unfortunately, our heavenly pleasure is short-lived. A person cannot go without food for long – I know this about myself – and that person is always occupied in searching for nourishment. But what does a woman need a man for if she is already pregnant?! Everything that was required of him has been done. Many women, Zina being one of them, can do quite well without physical intimacy. Their health does not suffer in any way because of this. But not my Mama! She has some strange, drug-addiction-like dependency! I am willing to resign myself to the presence of a strange man in my room. But let her suitor make a conciliatory step: he should keep his emotions under control and stop beating me up. What have I done to him?! Even if by chance he happened to be my father, that doesn’t give him the right to subject me to torment. I will not endure seven more months of torture!