"Erica"

     "I don't know what to do."  Erica whispered as tears streamed down her face.  Dr. Swanzy took a tissue from the pocket of her white hospital coat and offered it to Erica.  Erica took the tissue from Dr. Swanzy and blew her nose, her eyes swimming around the room, avoiding Dr. Swanzy's silent gaze.  "I don't know what to do!"  "What do you want to do, Erica?" Dr. Swanzy softly asked, her face still and emotionless, waiting.   Her eyes held Erica's face, waiting, until Erica's eyes met hers.  Her eyes asked the question again.  They held Erica's, as if the answer to her question would speak from Erica's tears.
     Erica's eyes looked away from Dr. Swanzy, unable to answer, but her voice met the challenge in a barely audible whisper.  "This baby is number nine.  I was pregnant when I married Pedro.  Fifteen years old!  Fifteen!  I had to get married.  My parents were so disappointed in me.  They had big dreams for me...big dreams.  I was Daddy's smart little girl, who was supposed to be the first in my family to go to college.  I broke his heart when I got pregnant.  I broke his dreams."  Erica tried to swallow her father's disappointment, and then she cleared her throat.  "I have been pregnant most of my life.  The babies kept coming and coming.  Pedro....he...I never felt like I owned my body.  It was his, and not mine."  Erica closed her eyes, tears seeping through red rimmed lids.  "I didn't mean for it to happen!  This baby.  I...I....misplaced my pills.  I couldn't find them."  Erica eyes opened, pain filled, but now there was a silent awareness in them.  A dark epiphany.  "Maybe he hid them?  He hid them!"  Erica's voice became edged with anger and she threw the tear soaked crumpled tissue towards the end of the hospital bed.  "He...he, uh ...he forced me...I mean I didn't want to.... and I tried to get him to stop!"  Erica hands clenched the sheet covering her bruises.  "I told him I had missed some pills, but he wouldn't stop!  He wouldn't stop!"  The words pushed themselves out of Erica's mouth, bruising her lips as they fought their way into the air. 
     Erica stared into Dr. Swanzy's darkening eyes and her voice began to rise.  "I was going to get rid of it.  I was going to get a...an...I was going to kill it!!!  Kill him inside of me, for forcing me!  But then, I heard a baby crying.  This child in me was crying...and I looked everywhere, but I couldn't find it!  And then I saw...I saw an Angel!!!"  Erica sat up in the bed, her face pleading for belief.  "I know you're going to think I'm crazy, but I did hear a baby, this baby, crying...like it was begging for it's life.  I was walking home from this Book Woman Club meeting, and I heard it crying!  No one else could hear it!  ... And then God sent the Angel!  It was a sign, don't you see?  A sign from God for me not to kill my baby!"  Erica wrapped her arms protectively around her belly, her face sweaty and pale.  Tears continued to pour from her eyes. 
     Dr. Swanzy waited; waited while the flood of tears and words ebbed.  Waited while she tried to make sense of what Erica had just told her.  "I'm not sure what to say about this...this angel."  Dr. Swanzy's voice was slow and calm.  "We will need to talk about...it...about, "The Angel"." Dr. Swanzy paused, her face neutral.  Then, again, she asked her question.  "What do you want to do, Erica?  Shall I call the police, or will you call them?"  "The police?  No!  No!  I don't want to call the police!  He's my husband, the father of my....my children!  Where would I go?  Where would we live?  I have no money of my own!  Please..."  Erica swung her pale legs over the side of the bed, her tears suddenly dry.  She desperately grabbed Dr. Swanzy's arm.  "Please....no police!"  "And so you will stay in this situation?  This marriage where you are beaten?"  Dr.  Swanzy winced as Erica's grip tightened on her arm.  "Does he beat the children?" Erica shook her head vehemently and exclaimed, "No! He has never touched my kids!  I would never allow that!"  "But he has beat you with this child inside of you." Dr. Swanzy quietly said.  She waited several moments while she watched her words sink into Erica's salt-encrusted eyes.  "Is this what you want for this new life inside of you?  Is this what you want your children to continue to witness...the abuse of their mother?"  Dr. Swanzy's hand mirrored Erica's hand, gently holding Erica's arm, as their eyes held each others.  "Is this what you want for the rest of your life?  You know...you know that he will end up killing you, don't you?"  Dr. Swanzy's voice was soft, tripping on the edge of pleading.
     "I know he will.  I know that he will kill me, tonight...for being late!"  Tears again threatened the edges of Erica's eyes and she blinked them back.  She began to chew on the inside of her cheek; vicious bites that basted her saliva with blood.  "He will kill me!", she whispered.  "Then you will not go back there."  Dr. Swanzy's hand moved from Erica's arm, and she released her arm from Erica's grip.  She grasped Erica's soft hands in her strong ones.  "I can't just walk away from my children.  I can't leave them with him.  Even if I could leave, I have nowhere else to go.  I have...I have no-one." Erica's whisper became frantic, as she leaned in close to Dr. Swanzy's ear.  She leaned in as if Pedro could hear her through the walls of the hospital;  as if he could hear her from all the way across town.  "No one will take in me and eight children!  No one!  And Pedro...Pedro won't let me just walk in and take the children!  I won't leave without my children!  I won't."  Erica leaned in, her lips were almost on Dr. Swanzy's ear, her hot breath tickling Dr. Swanzy's ear as  Erica continued to whisper.  "My husband is a very dangerous man.  He has killed before."  Dr. Swanzy stared at their hands as Erica's grip on her hands became painful.  "If I run...if I try to leave with my children, Pedro will hunt me down no matter where I go.  He will kill me and anyone who helps me!"
     The sudden knock at the door brought a scream of raw terror to Erica's lips!  Dr. Swanzy's cry of pain joined Erica's scream, a call and response to Erica's overwhelming fear, as she disengaged her hands from Erica's unbearably painful grip and lifted her hand to defend her throbbing ear drum.  "Ah-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h!!!"  Their cries resounded in eerie discord, as the knocking became urgent pounding.  "Ah-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h!!!"