Contaminated Water

I always have hot green tea in the morning. I get excited about consuming something beneficial to my health. I think it helps offset anything negative I put in my body.

It started recently. My live-in girlfriend started racing out of bed early in the morning, staying gone for a couple of hours, then getting back in bed. She said she had diarrhea a lot, something about irritable bowel syndrome. I dunno. I know she wasn't eating right. I also know that our relationship was in the shitter and she's just hanging around my place because she can't find a place to stay.

I'm pretty sure she hates me now after years of companionship. I probably shouldn't have cheated on her. To me, a fuck is a fuck but I love her. She can't understand the difference or what it's like to be a young man like me. I guess I love her because I feel the need to help her. She always seems helpless and unstable, as if she couldn't take care of herself on her own. I know, that's bad of me to say but it's true with her.

I work a lot. She doesn't have a job because she has failed to keep one. She keeps the house clean and washes my clothes so I don't mind it so much. Well, back to the stuff that has happened, my morning tea had been tasting a little bit off. I can't explain the taste. It just tasted wrong. But I didn't feel sick from it or anything. Nothing seemed unsuual except that my girl was really sick. She was in bed for days and I was really worries about her. She refused to see a doctor, said it was just something that had to pass. In hindsight, a lot of toilet paper did go missing so I suppose she was telling the truth.

She never got better. Three nights ago, she told me why she was sick. It's true, she was pregnant for 3 months. She miscarried the child. She said she passed the child in the shower while I was at work. You could imagine my surprise. She went on to explain that when it happened, she lost control of her thoughts and actions' only thinking about how she could make this event hurt me. She unscrewed the line to the water heater and stuffed the dead fetus up into the tank where it has rested in its water grave for over a week. "Just to make you feel this like I do", she said.

After a long, painfully emotional argument, she finally agreed to go to the hospital. I called an ambulance and she's been gone for three nights now. She's doing better physically but the doctors are sending her to a psychiatric hospital when she is deemed physically capable. The authorities are searching the trash and landfill site to find the remains of the baby.

It's morning of the fourth day and I'm sitting here with my hot green tea. I've grown accustomed to the flavor of my only child, ever-spoiling in the water. I've always thought my morning ritual was meaningful yet now it means more than anything. This tea is a part of me and her. I miss her. I would have taken care of this baby and her all the same. Now that I know, every shower I take and every dish that I wash is a ritual of being close to my child. I haven't washed my clothes at home since I found out. It's a waste.

The faucet seemed a little clogged when I filled my cup this morning, so I unscrewed the tip of the faucet and was surprised to see my little baby's hand in the piece. So tiny, stark white; I held it. I'll have to collect the rest very carefully. I'm making a little box so I can have a place to collect my child. I'll store it in the freezer. Until them, I'll just sip my tea with a watchful eye.