During a pregnancy, the quickening—the first sign of fetal movement—can feel like a light tapping, fluttering, or swishing. It’s a moment isolated in space and time: one opportunity, a whisper of life, and then it’s over.
I would argue that every mother, every day, requires that assurance of life from her children.
The creak of a bedroom door.
Steam on the bathroom mirror.
Thunderous footsteps on the staircase.
Reassurances, promises that our children are alive, safe.
I anticipated the absence of my son when he went to college this fall. The specter of his loping form moving up the driveway, gone. Silence from the third floor, where he no longer installed himself for long sessions of Netflix. The refrigerator, shockingly full.
And yet … I’m hollowed out. I dream I am pregnant, and I can feel it—a little person, pushing at me from within. My dream self puts her hand against the right side of her strangely flat abdomen, and there’s movement, just like when I was pregnant with my son, his tiny eager feet and long legs pushing into my ribs, my diaphragm, my heart.
Awake, I crave him. I crave it. The quickening. The sign of life. That promise that assures me, reassures, he is alive.
I text him. I send funny Instagram reels to his account. I take picture after picture of the dog, hitting send, hoping.
I feel so foolish, so lucky. I think of those other mothers, who also have sons like mine, who look like me, who have no idea where their sweet boys lie. Doors shut tight, hallways silent, cupboards full. How they must feel that emptiness pressing their ribs like a cruel vice.
At last, I see it.
A red heart. Beating.
A sign of life, quickening.