Snowflakes

My stepson, Micheal (pronounced ME-Hall), and I are cutting out snowflakes.  It is December 22nd and outside there is no real snow. Four days ago I was pregnant and now I am not.  My baby miscarried and I am trying to carry on. So Macker and I make snowflakes; we decorate the tree; listen to Christmas carols on the radio.
     Portland is soft this afternoon, almost balmy and dry. The persimmons on the tree, in September so vibrant, are now ashen on the limbs.  My garden is a briar-y tangle; the rhubarb stalks yellow, melting into the soft soil; the tomato plants are reduced to greying sticks stiffly moving in the breeze. Micheal and I work quietly using old blueprints his father has put aside for me to use for artwork. We snip quietly, concentrating. Micheal is attempting to make the world's smallest snowflake. He is working so hard he has forgotten to breathe and he lets out a hot breath and looks at me, flushed.
     I am trying to remember how to make paper snowflakes. Micheal looks up at me and suggests I cut the corners to make it look less like a square.  Diligently, I take his advice wishing my scissors were sharper as I cut away thick sections of the folded paper.
      I am snipping away confidently, when all of a sudden, I realize I may have made an irreparable error: Shit,  I think, I've cut the middle out of it! Carefully, I unfold the paper to assess the damage. As I open it, I see that there is no center to my snowflake. I hold it up, and stare at the gap I have created at the snowflake's center.  I push my finger through the empty space and mean to say, "Look the middle is gone," but instead I hear myself saying to Micheal, "Look, the baby's gone."
      For one awful moment, we look at each other, both disbelieving the words that I have spoken, baffled by my mistake.  And then, because there is nothing else to do, we start laughing.
      "You are addicted to that baby," Micheal says to me.