** STRONG LANGUAGE AND VIOLENCE AHEAD **

Collin came home a few weeks later. We were cool for a while. He stopped trippin' with the baby, he stopped trippin' with me. He really did love us. He was just...crazy. Random things would set him off, and you never knew what they would be, so I just gave him his space. Of course, that only worked for a little while. Jasmine was right. Things didn't get any better. They actually got worse. I started researching ways out of situations like mine, but then saw something that said be sure to cover your tracks and delete those type of websites from your search history...in case. I didn't need any "in case" type shit to jump off, so I just pulled back on that, too. The crazy thing is that after that day with Jasmine, I did memorize their numbers. All of their numbers. It just never even occurred to me to use them. I mean, they were all just regular people, like me, and Collin was... something else. At that point, I figured nobody could help me. I would just have to help myself.

I just didn't know how...other than to kill him.

And that plan had gone the exact wrong way last time.

He started hitting me every day. Every single day. Something was always wrong. I hated him. And I loved him. It only took a few weeks for me to want to jump off of that roller coaster, too. I didn't know what to do. I bought one of those burner phones and hid it under the carpet in the back corner of the baby's closet. It took me a really long time to get on board with technology, obviously. Collin was totally against using anything that could get him caught up. I'm surprised we had a computer, but I guess he did have to work. I would have hid the phone in my closet, like I used to do when I was...getting high on the supply...but Collin was so random, there was no promise that he wouldn't all of a sudden decide that he needed to do a surprise search. He almost never went in the baby's room, though, much less her closet.

We fought so much by then that I would instinctively move the baby out of the way and brace myself every time he came into the room. He never went at the baby, thankfully, he would only come straight at me. Every day. Several times a day. Like he had rabies. It was like we had a wild dog living in the house, and we never knew which way he was going to jump.

I never slept. I would listen for the baby all night long. If she woke up crying, I would spring out of bed before she woke Collin up. He hated the sound of anybody crying. If Collin woke up in the middle of the night and paced around the room or watched TV, went to the bathroom, went to the phone, whatever, I would watch him in the dark until he got back in the bed and went back to sleep. This was no way to live, and I had to get us out of there.

Or I had to kill him.

It would have to be one or the other, and the time quickly came to decide.

I was in the kitchen cooking dinner and the baby just kept crying. I mean, she wouldn't stop. I had her in the kitchen with me, in the high chair, and Collin was all the way on the other side of the house, but all of a sudden he came storming in and snatched the baby up out of her high chair. It was the first time that he had ever been rough with her in any way. I mean he had snatched her toys, sure, but it was the first time that he had ever touched her roughly, and my snap decision was that he had to go. I didn't see any other way out that wouldn't just end up right back there again. Just that quick I decided that the boy that I had loved almost my whole life would have to die. And I was ok with that.

This is what we had come to.

There wasn't even any type of deciding about it. I just grabbed the knife that I had been slicing the steaks with and went for broke. I ran at him, before he could start shaking her - which is what I thought he was about to do - and swung the knife, slicing right through his arm. I probably should have just stabbed him, but I wasn't thinking. I also didn't really want to kill him. I just wanted to get him off of her. He looked over at me like he couldn't believe what I had just done, and then he put the baby back in the high chair.

I thought he was about to rush me, so I wiped his blood off of my hands and onto my pants, and then held onto the knife tightly with both hands. I held it out and away from my body, and...I don't know. I guess I thought maybe he would run into it and stab himself like on TV. But he didn't rush me. He reached under his shirt and pulled out the gun that he always had on him, and took a step to the left. Then, without breaking eye contact with me, he stretched his arm out and held the gun to my child's head. To his child's head. I dropped the knife and dropped to my knees.

There were no words between us. Time just stood still, and it refused to move. I put my hands together, silently begging him not to do anything stupid, but his arm didn't sway and his face didn't change.

"Crawl bitch."

Oddly, the fact that he could speak let me know that he hadn't blacked out, and the fact that he had given an order meant that if I just did exactly what he said, my baby would live.

And I would have done anything that he told me to do right then.

Anything.

"Where?" It was the only word that I could choke out.

He pointed to the front of the house with the gun.

"Up the stairs. Now."

I crawled.

Colling grabbed the baby and held the gun to her little tummy. When we got up the stairs, I looked back at him and he pointed to the baby's room.

"In there."

He kicked me in the side, hard enough to make me fall over and sprawl out, but I didn't even feel it. As long as he didn't hurt her, he could do whatever the hell he wanted to do to me.

"In there." He pointed to the baby's tiny closet and kicked me again. Again I went face forward into the carpet, and then quickly got back up to my knees.

"Collin, no..." I reached out for the baby.

"No?" He asked, a few octaves higher than his regular voice. He looked at the baby and then back at me.

"Collin, please..." I kept reaching for our baby and started to cry. "Please. Please don't."

"Now." He pointed the gun right at Samantha's eye, and I guess the barrel scared her because she started screaming and trying to push it away with her little hands.

My head started to swim and I knew there was no way I was getting in that closet without my baby. I guess Collin read my mind, because he kicked me in the exact same spot again and while I was falling over, rammed his foot into my back and shoved me straight into the closet. Again, I didn't feel a thing and jumped up, trying to run at him, but he slammed the door on me and barricaded it with something. It was impossible to open. I really freaked out then. Not only was I locked in that dark tiny space, I was locked in there with my baby out there, in the hands of that crazy fool. I don't know what the hell would make him do this, but he had to have lost it, which meant that he could very well kill her.

I kept banging and kicking on the door. I was running into it and bouncing off of it like Collin had done when I locked him out of the bedroom and called the police on him.

Please God, don't let this be payback for that.

"Collin!" I screamed and screamed. "Open the door you crazy son of a bitch! Give me my baby!"

What the hell was I thinking getting anywhere near the closet? Of course it would end up like this. I started hyperventilating. The closet suddenly closed in on me and there was nothing but darkness. Even what little light was streaming under the door seemed to disappear.

"Collin! Give me my baby!" The baby suddenly got quiet. "What the fuck did you do to her? Are you out there? Give me my baby!"

I started trying to break the door down again. When I didn't hear anything outside the door, I started to panic. I knew he had a silencer, but couldn't remember if it was on that gun.

The panic set all the way in and I started calling for help, like anyone could hear me. It was way too quiet out there. All of a sudden the baby started screaming bloody murder right outside the closet door. I didn't know what Collin had done to her, but he was going to die.

Every possible, unthinkable scenario ran through mind, all at the same time, and I stopped screaming and running into the door just long enough to think.

That's when I remembered the phone.

I ripped the carpet back and dialed the first number that popped into my mind.

Jasmine answered on the third ring.

"Jasmine help! Help me! He has my baby!"

"Are you at home?" Jasmine's even voice didn't reflect the urgency that mine was giving, at all.

"Yes! Help!"

"Ok." I heard her put the phone down and I thought she hung up.

"Hello? Hello?" I started crying. "Please... He's going to kill her..." It was a whisper, and I thought I was talking to myself. "He's going to kill my baby..."

A soft voice answered me. "Tash, it's ok. Calm down for a minute and talk to me."

"Shayna?"

"Yeah, it's me. What happened?"

"What are you doing there?"

"Don't worry about it. What happened?"

"Is someone coming?"

"Yes, they're on the way."

I didn't know who they were, and I honestly didn't care, as long as they got to us while my baby was still alive.

"Shayna, he has my baby and he locked me in the closet."

"Which closet?"

"The baby's closet."

"Ok." She paused. "Do you think he will hurt her?"

"Yes. He was holding a gun to her head. I thought he was just trying to scare me, and he would let her go if I did what he said." I started hyperventilating and tried to kick the door open again. Collin and his damn reinforced doors.

"Natasha," Shayna was too calm. She was talking like that on purpose. "Stop whatever you're doing and sit down. Save your energy in case he opens the door."

"He won't. He won't..." With every word, I freaked out more. "He's going to kill my baby, Shayna! He's going to kill her!" I started screaming again, hoping that the neighbors would hear. "Help! Help me!"

"Natasha, stop it. Can you still hear the baby crying?"

"Yes! Help me, Shayna! She's right outside the door!"

"Ok, ok...help is on the way. Just don't bang on that door anymore, ok? I need you to calm down."

"No. Help!"

"Yes. Tash, yes. What if he blocked the door with the crib and the baby's in the crib?" I hadn't thought about that. When I quieted down, she continued. "I'm not getting off the phone with you until they get there. Can you still hear her?"

"Yes."

"Do you hear Collin?"

"No."

"Maybe he left."

"He didn't. And he did something to her. She got really quiet, and then she started screaming like crazy." I was all but screaming into the phone myself.

"Ok..." Shayna let out a heavy breath. "Hang up and call 911."

"No Shayna, you know I can't do that. If he hears the sirens, he'll kill us for sure..."

"Natasha..." Shayna sounded like she was all out of answers. Which left me up shit's creek without a paddle. "Call the baby and see if she answers."

I started getting hysterical again, and Shayna kept talking, trying to reel me back in. Eventually, she told me to put the phone on speaker phone.

"What?"

"Do it." I did it and she started praying. "God, please help us. We come to you in the name of Jesus...and we need help. Please help us. Please help my sister and her baby. Please help Collin. Show him that this is not what he wants to do. Stop him in his tracks right now. Please protect them from all evil forces that may be working against them. Protect them from anything that may be attacking them right now. All of them. Everyone that crosses over that threshold, protect them. Please help them, dear God. Please help them. Please help them. Please help them..."

That's all she kept saying. She must have said it like seventeen times.

Then she said, "Please cover every room in that house with a calming spirit. Please soothe and protect everyone that walks into that space. Please help Natasha to see what she's fighting against, and help her to win this fight. Show her what to do. Give her perfect timing dear Lord, please show her what to do. Please help and protect them. In Jesus name. In Jesus name. In Jesus name..." She kept repeating that.

And suddenly...I was calm.

And the baby got quiet.

And I did what Shayna said.

"Samantha? Can you hear me?" I spoke as calmly as I could. "Sammie baby, can you hear me?"

"Yeah mama."

Her beautiful two year old baby talk was the sweetest thing I'd ever heard.

"Are you ok?" Silence. "Sammie? You ok, baby?"

"Yeah mama."

I put my hand on the door like Kenney had put his hand against my pregnant stomach. I pictured her being safe, and inside of a protective warm bubble.

"Samantha, I love you so much sweet baby girl. I love you so much."

"I love you," she said in her little baby way. She had just started saying that all the time a few months before. What a sweet, sweet baby I had.

"I'll be out in a few minutes, ok?" No answer. "Ok, sweet baby girl? Ok?"

"Ok."

That was her favorite word. Granted, she had just turned two, but there was no such thing as terrible twos with my baby.

"I love you."

"Love you," she called back. It sounded like she was chewing on something, but I tried not to think too hard about what it could be.

"Sing to her."

"What?" I had almost forgotten that Shayna was on the phone.

"Sing to her. Keep her calm. Help is on the way, ok?"

I nodded into the phone. "Ok."

I sang happy birthday, because that was the last time that I could remember both of us having a really good day.

When I finished singing, I clapped and said "Yay!"

I heard her little hands clapping, and she called out "Yay!" Then she clapped some more. "A-din!" Of course, she meant "again".

So we sang it again. And again. And again.

The funny thing was, Shayna started singing with us.

Eventually, I heard the downstairs door open and close, and my throat closed up in mid-verse.

"Shh..." I don't know why I said that. Panic, maybe.

"Who is it?" Shayna whispered, like whoever it was could hear her, too. They probably could, since I didn't think to take her back off speaker phone.

"Collin." Tears poured out of my eyes, but I didn't make a sound. "Shayna..." I felt like I was in a Michael Meyers movie. "I have to get my baby. Help me." More tears fell.

"God, protect them." Shayna was still whispering. "God will protect you, Natasha. He will. I promise. Both of you. Always."

I heard a loud commotion outside of the door, and then the door suddenly opened. Light poured in. And air.

Drama was standing there, with Jasmine right behind him.

I looked past Drama, into Jasmine's arms, and saw my baby's beautiful face, with those huge dark eyes and tiny toddler teeth, smiling at me, with her little arm flung around Jasmine's neck like they were just two old friends hanging out.

My baby looked like she didn't have a care in the world.