Chapter 3 - Collapse Upon the Grain
The heavy oak door felt impossibly cold against the back of the pregnant woman’s shoulders as she slid all the way down to the polished wooden floorboards of the hallway. The pain in her lower abdomen was no longer a dull ache; it had sharpened into a white-hot ring of fire that seemed to wrap around her spine, threatening to snap her in half.
"Please," she whispered to the empty corridor, her hands flying down to press frantically against the fabric of her gray leggings. "Not yet. Please, not yet."
Her fingernails scratched uselessly at the polyurethane-coated oak, leaving faint white smudges where the dust had settled. Every breath she took felt shallow and thin, as if the air in the suburban house was suddenly being sucked away by the very walls that enclosed her.
Footsteps echoed from somewhere deep within the interior of the house, heavy and measured, unlike the frantic scurrying of Mark’s departure. She tried to raise her head, but dizziness washed over her in a nauseating wave, forcing her cheek back down against the cool grain of the wood.
"Who's there?" she choked out, her voice barely audible over the ringing in her ears. "Mark? Did you come back?"
No one answered immediately. Instead, the sound of a latch sliding back somewhere down the dark corridor signaled that she was not as alone in this house as her husband had desperately tried to make her believe.
The shadows stretching across the hallway seemed to lengthen, bending unnaturally beneath the amber glow of the wall sconces. She squeezed her eyes shut, wishing away the nightmare, but the reality of the contractions was an anchor dragging her deeper into the abyss.
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With a final, desperate gasp, she curled into a tight fetal position, her fingers locking into the hem of her shirt as a searing contraction tore a raw, helpless cry from her throat.
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