I’ve recently become a dad for the first time. My girlfriend Jenna and I had been trying for a couple of years and to be honest, I’d pretty much given up hope. Then we found out we were having a baby and we couldn’t have been happier.
I didn’t realise how stressful the pregnancy period is. I’d always heard that new parents struggle but the actual nine months beforehand are difficult too. It’s basically your responsibility to ensure that nothing happens to your partner and unborn child. We made sure we ate the right foods, we attended the best classes, and I did all the heavy lifting. I even got a second job as a security guard on a night shift at a local storage facility.
Then we had Claire. Claire is beautiful. She has deep brown eyes and when she smiles, it lights up my world. For the first four months, things were great. Sure, I was living on about three hours sleep a day but I knew everything would work it’s way out.
But then things started getting weird. I came home from my security job at about 5.30am and Claire was awake. Jenna handed the baby straight over to me and got back into bed. I understood. It was a tiring job. But I was tired too, and I was due to start work in my IT job in an hour. I could tell Claire needed changing, so I took off her nappy and wiped. As I picked up a fresh nappy from its packet, the cartoon lion on the nappy roared at me. I dropped the nappy and swore, which made Claire cry. When I looked back at the nappy, the lion stared happily out at me. Mocking me.
Soon, more weird stuff happend. I started getting calls at work from a crazy guy who said that he was from the future.
“You don’t get it, sir. I lived until I was 89, then woke up the next day and I was 30. There I was, in bed with my wife who’s been dead for the last 10 years. But she was alive again. Young again. And my dick worked again!”
Another time he called me and said “There’s a group of us. Survivors, I suppose. We meet up and discuss the future and try to work out ways of changing things for the better. We think that you’re one of us. We believe you’re going to live up until a certain age, then go back into your younger body again. Don’t ask me how we know. But it’s definitely someone from your family. And the other two people in your family… They can’t”.
I didn’t understand the man. He was talking nonsense. Besides, I was too busy with the other weird things at home. I got back the other night and I heard Jenna and Claire talking to each other. I don’t mean I heard Jenna cooing to our baby and Claire was babbling back. They were discussing me. My girlfriend and my 5 month old baby were chatting about how hard I was working and how I was looking tired.
My therapist said I needed to take a break. She said I was going through a kind of post-natal breakdown that was exacerbated by stress and fatigue. But then she winked and wiggled her tongue at me, so I don’t know what to think.
Claire has begun to cry a lot when she’s with me. She looks into my soul and she can see something terrible. I’ve started to think that the man on the phone is wrong about who is the time traveller. I think Claire has returned to her body and has the memories of her 30 year old self. So she knows something. I think she knows I’m going to die soon, so when she looks at me she feels desperately upset.
I don’t want to die. I can’t die yet. I won’t. I’ve been thinking of ways to stop it from happening and I’m not quite sure yet. But I think I have to do something big so I can break the wheel.
But for now, I’m going to sleep.