Out of the Darkness: Ebook serial story free online: episode 92

 That dark gloomy cloud hung overhead, it's gloom descending the light of day, it sank lower and lower towards her head and strange grey wisps of it filtered down over her face, she blew them away, but nothing changed, more came, descending down from the horizon, she struggled with their stultifying possession of her body and soul, her mind could not escape, they brought with them a chill wind, and slowly that wind began to howl.  She shuddered, someone had turned the heating on but her skin was cold and clammy, she moved lower down in the bed, pulling the covers up over her head but the black cloud hovered around her still, taunting her with its presence.

She twisted and turned, but strands held her tightly, clutching at her eyes, and almost pushing into them, she felt as if something or somebody was going to gouge out her eyes and grasp her eyeballs from their sockets, she felt the pain of the pulling and suddenly there came this shrieking cry.

It pulled her out of her stupor, and the cloud and the nasties disappeared, still the shrill cries came hurting her ears and then another set of cries, joined in unison with the others.  The babies, she thought and tumbled out of the bed onto the floor.  she staggered out to get them, returning to the bed to feed, not one baby but two, sucking at her, greedily pulling at her overworked nipples and slowly Mary began to embrace the day, the dark cloud was gone completely, a soft grey light suffused the day, she could see that it was cold outside but it was shut out and inside she was safe.

Mary shuddered again at the troubled thoughts that haunted her.  For the moment she was valued, a breast feeding mother, but after that, what?, more nappies, more chores, not having the right clothes to wear, her hair badly needing a cut, barely time to look after herself before the next feeding of these two little parasites, she'd only wanted one baby not two, with one baby she would not have such large breasts now and she could have got out of the house but with two babies it was near impossible, if you wanted to feed one baby when you were out that was fine, but two? no, no, no, she'd have breasts hanging everywhere and curious and perverted eyes would look at her nakedness.

Soon these two tiny mites could be put back to bed where they'd sleep until bath time, they liked their baths and would sleep well after their next feed.  These babies were thriving but she'd nearly killed them, neglected them for hours, left them screaming and hungry and freezing cold until Jim had come home and been shocked by what he'd encountered.  How could it all have gone so sadly wrong.  She longed for her dad, he would have had some comforting words to say, Ruth had been her surrogate mum, her surrogate sister or auntie or both, but she'd gone, gone like a puff of air, disappeared off the face of the earth leaving Mary all alone, abandoning her after all her kindness, and they'd had so much fun and Jim had been home and they'd all coped well together.

Now her home had been invaded.  Jim's mother was her like a prison warden, keeping her eye on Mary, making sure she'd commit no crime again.  But soon the babies were fed and Mary could have her own breakfast and for the time being at least she would have a little peace and some time to herself, other that her mother-in-laws beady eyes looking critically at her, getting ready to report her every misdemeanour to her son, her son, Mary's husband, it had all been so very new and exciting until she'd fallen pregnant and then everything had gone wrong.  So much for married bliss, so much for harmony and contentment and fun and two little jobs gone forever, two little jobs Mary had felt so proud to have, no what was she? a cow waiting patiently to be milked all day.

She staggered off to the kitchen, pulling her dressing gown around her, she'd eat first, shower later, but what was there to put on, her overly large blouses and then something around her legs and bottom that was never the right size now.  She had slimmed down, but there were curves and bends and fatty tissues in all sorts of places where they'd never been before.

She'd make herself a good breakfast, she had plenty of time, and she bundled Jim's dirty dishes into the sink,  Emily would be in later but not until the afternoon so she had nothing to worry about until then.  Emily had been her friend, until she found out what Mary  had done, now she was cool and aloof and couldn't get away fast enough, she came out of duty and because of her nursing training.

Cereal with hot milk and then fried eggs and bacon, she wished she had some lamb's fry even though it was a bit of trouble to cook.

Her hot toast had lashings of butter and thick strawberry jam, and at last Mary's appetite was appeased and she felt better, the comfort of good food.  She took some hot chocolate with marshmallows off into the lounge room and sipped at it's warming comfort, the house was like a furnace so she turned the heating down and opened the window to let in some fresh air and the hot air out.

The cats came and jumped into her lap kneading her legs and tummy, she sid ouch and pushed them away, they looked at her sadly as if she'd been unkind.

Slowly she began to talk to them and they miaowed in response, jumped up beside her, curled up together, this time leaving her lap alone but after giving themselves and each other a good wash they lay purring beside her.  They made her feel good, what did they care whether she starved the babies as long as they were fed.  They'd looked strangely at these odd little creatures but had quickly learned they must keep their distance or they'd be shooed outside.

Mary felt better now, and after her chocolate drink she'd think about showereing and dressing as best she could, her hair was getting so long perhaps she could tie it back, that would make her feel a little better.

She went out to the laundry and put on another load of washing and then she was free to look after herself.

Freshly showere and with a clean nursing bra she felt a lot better, she pulled things willy nilly from the wardrobe just letting them fall to the floor.  She found a pretty blouse, which was large and loose and sloppy and felt good over her seemingly huge breasts.

More things got dragged out and at last she found a pair of track pants which not only fitted but went quite nicely with the blouse and more things were dragged out as she looked for a soft woollen cardigan. After all that with her fluffy slippers still on her feet she went out and brought in the milk.  She scurried back inside, it was cold out there.

Now feeling much better she cleaned up the kitchen, stacking the dishwasher and then letting it run.

She started to hum one of her favourite songs and decided she'd forget all about Jim's mother being there.  Fortunately she kept to her room a lot but would no doubt go out and do some shopping while Emily was there in the afternoon retuning before Emily departed.  She was being constantly guarded.  She knew she'd done something terribly wrong and she knew she'd never do anything like that again.  She'd made her husband hate her and he really was the love of her life.

Pulling an anorak on she went to wander around the garden, she'd had so little time to do anything she wanted to do.  To-day she was going to enjoy herself.

Jeff had kept the garden well in order, she supposed Jim had made some arrangements to pay him.  There were not many flowers there, winter was like that and even the chickens didn't lay so well in this weather but she gathered up what eggs she could find and turned them out for a run, and left them scratching in the dirt and pecking away happily.  Much easier to be a chook than a person.

Coming inside she opened the drawer where Jim always left the money, there was plenty there and she must make sure she paid his mother for the food she bought, the rest of the drawer wa a muddle of bills, Mary didn't know whether they had been paid or not so she quickly closed it.

The day went happily enough and after their baths the twins didn't clamour to be fed so Mary lay them on a soft rug with pillows on the floor and plaid with them a little.  They were much more alert now and approaching 6 weeks old, but still neither of them had smiled, she sometimes wondered if they were blind.  But they gripped her fingers and responded to the little rattles and fingered their soft toys, their little eyes move about in their heads and Mary felt very mean about all the nasty thoughts she'd had about them.

But soon it was feed time again, but not so often anymore, which was a relief.  When they were close enough together they often held hands and  Mary wondered if they had done that in utero.

Her fuzzy head was now clear, the black demons had gone away and Mary planned a nice dinner for the evening, one which she could half cook and have ready quite quickly after Jim arrived home, because at that time of day the babies always seemed to need feeding.

Emily came and went, and Jim's mother went and came and Mary re-imbursed her for her purchases, she tried to be nice as she knew that she would much rather be in her own home but this really had been an emergency and Mary still felt ashamed.

Jim arrived home full of himself, as usual, and now he had his mother there too as his audience but a good meal and seeing two well cared for babies snug in their beds, sleeping soundly, made him thaw out a little,  But Mary knew it would be a long time before she would be forgiven.  And when they got into bed Jim took up his position as far away from her as possible but he had noticed how much better Mary looked and how she'd made more effort with her appearance.  He chose to ignore the all too many bundles of clothing strewn around the floor.