"I did it!" She smiled up at me. She sat cross-legged on the floor, blood streaming out of her chest, pooling into her lap, and down the sides of her legs. Eyes wild and hands dripping red, she held up her own heart. Each beat like the tick of a too-fast clock. She looked me dead in the eye, "It was destroying me. So I took it out." Hot blood bubbled down her shirt as she sighed, "And now I can breathe."

On the days when

I look in the mirror

and the mirror tells me I'm

wrong

A small voice

has started to

whisper back

"you look just like your

mother"

and for the life of me

I swear

it is impossible

to look into those eyes

(her eyes)

and be anything but

grateful.

Obviously I knew you were coming. Maybe not down to the hour (or even the day) but it's pretty easy to take a calendar and count out nine months. But I still didn't know, not really.

How was I supposed to know that every time you yawn my eyes would go all wet and blurry? No one warns you about that. Will this still happen when you're ten years old and sleepy over your morning Cheerios? Will you still be as oblivious to it then as you are right now? Or will you tell me to cut it out because I'm embarrassing you?

I can't stop starring. Did you know they say your eye color won't fully set for weeks or even months? That doesn't stop me from trying to look deep deep deep into them in the hopes of reading what color they'll be neatly labeled on a piece of your perfect DNA.

Obviously I do not know what happens after today, or who you will become. But boy do I know how I'll love you, really really.