Heads Or Tails

• Apollonia Perry , Grade 10
• Short Story
• 2013

Two roads stood before me,
Two choices I could make.
In this small section of hell,
Which decision would I make?

Empty, broken and torn from the inside out, I could hear them in the background. Their whispers echoing off the white walls of my cell in this horrific nightmare. My so-called ‘loved ones’ discussing the murder of the gorgeous, fragile girl inside of me; my perfect, innocent little angel. Like vultures they are trying to pick off the weak. Hurting those not strong enough to defend themselves. Wave after wave of agony hit me, one after the other. I was drowning in my own misery, surfacing only to hear from the man who had condemned one of my unborn children to death; the man who had turned what should be the best day of this life, to my own version of hell.

As numbness spread like poison through my veins, the words, so well intended, began circulating and transforming my warped mind, morphing it into a dark, sinister reflection of what it once was.

“My name is Dr. Arowanza and I specialise in Paediatrics. We have done everything we can to save your twins but there have been complications. They have a severe case of twin-to-twin transfusion, a rare problem that affects identical twins in the womb. The blood travels from one twin, referred to as the donor twin, to the other. I’m sorry but this has to be dealt with immediately, the girl is the donor twin and has the least chance of survival but the boy has been affected too. It is your decision whether we save the boy or if we try and save both. I must warn you however, that would be a high-risk operation and could end in the death of both babies. I am truly sorry Miss.”
A blood curdling scream wrenched it self from my throat; the clammy hands of relatives met with mine. My baby boy or my baby girl? What society forces a mother to choose between her children? What kind of sick, twisted reality is this? Every fibre of my being wanted to save them both but I knew that was impossible. Save the boy and forever feel guilty? Or try and save the pair and by doing so, possibly sentence them both to death?

Their beaks shrieked the words that sliced through my shattered soul. “Save the boy.”… The unwelcome pity in their eyes blinded me, their unmoving certainty in their murderous decision unforgivable. How dare these people ask me to abandon one of them? It was not just the emotions they threw at me; but their intent as well. Those malicious, barbaric ideas that raged through my mind like an oil-lit flame. Demanding the slaughter of my unborn child.

My pale, shaking fingers gripped round the frame of the hospital bed; it was time. It was time to refuse them all. It was time to stand up to those who had imprisoned and entrapped me with their ideals and opinions my entire life. It was time to fight these vultures that wished to butcher my daughter; it was time to say no. No longer would I allow them to rule me, no longer would I allow myself to be trampled on. They are my children, my last sparks of hope in this crumbling world of brutality, I would not allow them to be taken away from me; not now, not ever.

Like the flip of a coin life is just a game of chance, your destiny hanging on the odds and I was hoping for two heads.