Born 01 - Born

my eyes and slide between the sheets of the empty bed. The one that Anna sneaks into in the mornings. The sheets are cold and crisp compared to the sweaty bed that’s filled with a needy eleven-year-old.
    I stare at the glowing white ceiling and feel a smile cross my lips. I knew it would be too bright to be dulled by the black of the night.
    I can see his wolf eyes if I close mine. He is looking for me. I feel a tug at my heart.
    He's never been away from me like this before. I knew his staying with Meg was a bad idea. I can feel his hopeless panic in my heart. My stomach makes a knot. The past two weeks have been amazing. I can't even try to lie to myself. I've eaten meals I never imagined I would, ever. I've had dessert every day. I can feel my body stretching and gaining and trying to find room for the extra weight. Anna and Sarah are the same. Sarah has started to get a little potbelly that Louise, our first nurse, has started to make fun of. Sarah eats and rubs it. I've learned Sarah was sold to the military. Her mother got liquor and smokes for her. She kissed her on the top of the head and told her not to be a bother.
    I have a small plan of hunting her down when we escape.
    I know Jake and Will have left us. I was worried for a few days and even felt guilty for not even trying to get out, but the food is to get better.
    Anna says it's like the story of Hansel and Gretel. The witch kept making better and better food but in the end, she intended to eat them.
    Anna says we need to worry about anyone who wants to give as much as the doctors and nurses do. Louise has grown oddly quiet in the last couple days. She mutters to herself and gets emotional in our room sometimes and then leaves quickly.
    I try not to think about it all and let my eyes close.
    As my thoughts fade into simple things that make me sleepy, I hear the knob on the door turn. I know it's Anna.
    "You sleep with Sarah this time," I mutter as she closes the door.
    "Emma, honey wake up now."
    I shoot up to see Louise standing in front of my door. Her clothes are dark, not the white coats and pale blue pants and tops. I would know her voice anywhere.
    "You girls gotta go tomorrow."
    I frown and rub my eyes. Did I fall back to sleep?
    "You gotta get out of here, baby girl. The doctors are going to take Anna in the morning for tests and then you have got to go. Do you understand me?"
    I nod. "Why?"
    "This place isn’t what it seems."
    My mind starts functioning. "I can't. I'm waiting for my dad's friend to come for me. He said he would send a signal."
    "I know, Emma. Serge sent me. Tomorrow there will be a huge garbage dump truck. You girls need to be in the back of it."
    My stomach knots tighter as my nerves twist. "Okay. How do I get there?" I remember the garbage thingy being in the middle. Will had been positive it would be there. I hadn’t been prepared for everything to be stark white and look exactly the same.
    I feel her weight on my bed. She sits by my feet. "I have something to tell you."
    I feel twitchy.
    "The garbage isn’t for regular garbage. It's for the girls. You all will lay with the dead girls."
    It doesn’t hit me in the way she's expecting it to. I've lain with the dead before. I've covered myself in their blood. Women used to die from childbirth even before. It doesn’t bother me.
    "Okay."
    "They take the babies three times and then when the third one is born, they get rid of the girls. They think we don’t know but we do. They take their organs and put them to sleep like dogs."
    My stomach lands somewhere very low in my abdomen. "What? What about the condos in the city? The healthy ones go live in the city."
    I can see her dark curls shaking against the white wall behind her. "No, baby. They don’t. That was a lie they made up. They built the city but those women, they never leave here."
    Tears have formed in my eyes. "What?"
    Her hand reaches for mine in the dark and squeezes it. "That’s why you have to go. You have to get little Sarah and Anna out of here. The scientists have done studies. A baby only needs its mother for the first two years of its life. After that it can easily be raised by anyone. It gets the milk and love from its mother for the first two years and then it gets adopted out in the city. That nurse Gloria, she is waiting on you to have a baby. She'll be old enough to raise your baby by the time the first one is old enough to go."
    My hands go to my stomach where my unfertilized eggs sit. My fingers