In My Desperate Time

Steven seems to have come all the way just to accompany me to the pregnancy check-up. After I am through, he leaves without
even having lunch.
When he leaves, he stubbornly says, “Jane, no matter how you refuse, I will not miss every pregnancy check-up. From now on, I
will not miss your birthday and the child’s birthday. You don’t need to do anything, and I’ll take care of everything.”
He doesn’t ask me for anything, but his words put a great deal of pressure on me.
After experiencing so much, I feel that I am not worthy of anyone in the world. Perhaps my best ending would be to bring up the
baby and die alone.
After I get home, Mom starts to lecture me when she finds that Steven has left.
“What’s the matter with you, my girl? Steven is such a good man, and he likes you so much. Why do you refuse him stubbornly?
I don’t know what you’ve been through before, and I don’t want to ask about your past. I can see that you are a good girl after we
get along well these days. Why are you making things difficult for yourself? Why don’t you want happiness?”
I feel like crying.
She cares about me, more than my biological mother. She knows that I lack love and long for love, but she doesn’t know that I
don’t dare to love anymore.
“Mom, you don’t know what I’ve been through.”
I finally couldn’t restrain myself and tell her everything from the beginning.
After hearing that, she looks at me with pity in her eyes.
“My poor daughter, you’ve suffered a lot.” Mom strokes my hair with distress, tears in her eyes. “I think that you need a man to
love you, but I understand your pain, so I won’t force you anymore. You need to sort out your own thoughts.”
Ever since that day, Mom never asks me to accept Steven.
Life goes on uneventfully. Nothing has changed except that the baby is growing and I’m missing Frances more.
When I approach thirty-two weeks, Steven doesn’t come the night before I take the pregnancy check-up. I think he has finally
come round, so I don’t call him.

The next morning, I get up and wash, ready to go out and ask someone to accompany me to the pregnancy check-up. There’s a
young man living next door. I have chatted with him several times, and I feel he is a nice man. Maybe he will help me.
I stand at his door nervously, knocking on the door.
Suddenly, I feel a shadow over my head.
Just as I am going to turn around and see what is going on, a hand quickly covers my mouth.
I feel that something is wrong. The next second, I am being dragged away.
It should be a man. He is tall, and I don’t even reach his shoulder. Who could it be?
When I reach the corner, I hear the young man’s door open. I don’t know what is going on right now, but I know that the man
behind me is definitely not a good person. I bite his hand and shout at the young man’s door, “Help!”
My mouth is quickly covered again, and the man behind me curses fiercely, “Damn it!”
He speaks perfect English, not like local people here. My intuition tells me that this man is from the United States.
Moreover, he comes with evil intent.
Who on earth is this man? Why does he kidnap me? Where is he taking me?
The man takes me into a car. After we get in the car, he blindfolds and gags me, binding me up with a rope.
As the car moves, I’m getting scared.