Anne Anthony: BEFORE I HELD YOU • Cleaver Magazine

Flash Nonfiction by Anne Anthony
BEFORE I HELD YOU

Before I held you, your father held you cradled in his arms—mine couldn’t, strapped securely to the operating table; before he held you, you flipped, you slippery fish dropping thud-like into the cavity carved surgically for your release; before that knife slice, the on-call obstetrician ruled my labor stalled and ordered a C-section; before the doctor rushed your delivery, he sliced my placenta, unleashing a splash to the floor, your soon-to-be father, nauseated, fled the birthing room; before your father abandoned the room, I shuffled my swollen feet into the Emergency Room where nurses rushed forward with a wheelchair but I pointed to my breathless mother drowning in a full-blown asthma attack; before nurses dosed her with antihistamines, my mother insisted I drive her to the grocery store determined to locate my father—begging for a chance to say goodbye fearing her death though she’d live another twenty-three years; before the search for my father, we played Scrabble in a ground-level apartment, unaware of my mother’s allergies to the two long-haired cats sprawled at our feet; before my parents drove five hours to await your birth, a girl I counseled asked the question—do you not want children because you work with girls like me; before that girl’s question tainted my should-I-be-a-mother mind, your father pretended to be a father holding daily conversations with imagined children—calling upstairs to ‘little Jimmy’ with the promise of a story and asking if ‘little Susie’ wanted a glass of milk; before he played at being a father, his older brother, his sister, and yes, every cousin, asked for five consecutive years when we’d start our family; before they hounded us, family arrived to witness my walk down the aisle to greet my groom, your father; before we exchanged vows, I hid my left hand behind my back on Christmas Eve until his older brother grinned, searching for the ring he knew was there; before the sapphire blue ring slipped on to my finger, your father (still my boyfriend) and I watched television on separate sofas and he proposed during a commercial break; before I looked away, unsure, uncertain, I was blissfully unaware of how the weight of you in my arms when I held you would change everything; so today, before your reckless rushing into marriage, before your life tilts and slides into the unknown, before you say, ‘I do,’ before the judge, before your parents, before this man you barely know, dear daughter do be cautious, those two words change everything.

Anne Anthony credits her steady diet of comic books for her ardent belief in superpowers. Her gritty, tender, and amusing stories feature compelling but flawed characters. She has most recently been published in Ghost Parachute, Third Street Review, Bright Flash Literary Review, Flash Boulevard and elsewhere. In 2019, she released a short story collection, A Blue Moon & Other Murmurs of the Heart. She is a senior editor and art director for the online literary journal, Does It Have Pockets. Find her writing here: https://linktr.ee/anchalastudio. Or check her social media: IG/FB: @anchalastudio. Bluesky: @anchalastudio.bsky.social.