Amelia’s Baby

“Hi, Darren?”

“Hey Bree, what’s up?”

“Oh, nothing much, I just wondered if maybe you had heard any news about Amelia recently.”

“You mean about how she’s pregnant?”

“Yah, that’s it. I mean, yeah, I know about that, but I was wondering if you knew of anything else, since you’ve known her since high school?”

“Not really, she’s always kept a lot to herself, in fact I was chatting to the guys about her last night, and we’re all kind of confused, we didn’t even know she was dating anyone, then she announces online that she’s pregnant out of the blue. I kind of thought one of the other guys might have been secretly dating her, but we soon found that’s what everyone else was thinking! Some of the guys even thought I might be the father. But we had established by the end of the night that no one here knows who the father is.”

“Yeah, that’s right, the other girls don’t know either, Amelia is being really tight lipped about it. It seems to be a pretty well guarded secret because I haven’t found anyone else who knows.”

“Yet she seems really happy about it all.”

“Yeah, she is. Too happy if you ask me.”

“Hey, do you reckon it’s like her boss’ or something? That’s why she’s keeping it secret?”

“Dr. Marris? No way, he’s almost sixty. It is definitely not him anyway.”

“It’s really odd though, it’s got to be someone she has regular contact with I reckon. I am not a believer in immaculate conception.”

“If you heard her talking to the girls about it yesterday at brunch you would swear she was trying to convince them some Olympian god had come down from heaven to impregnate her.”

“That’s nuts, but I suppose that’s baby brain talking then?”

“Yeah, that’s probably true.”

“Unless she got knocked up by some random guy in a one night stand?”

“Honestly, that’s what I thought she would go with, but she hasn’t done that. She insists that the father is someone special and she doesn’t want to tell them who.”

“Well maybe she’s just lying to save face? She wants to cover up her embarrassment of being knocked up by some hobo while drunk in an alley way.”

“Hahaha, this is Amelia we’re talking about. She was always saying that she wanted someone strong to be her husband, I remember her saying someone strong like her dad.”

“Her dad? She hasn’t seen him in twenty years. At least not that I know of, she was only six when he left, does she remember him at all? That’s a strange thing for her to say. But yeah, but just between you and me Bree, us guys are seriously getting annoyed with women these days.”

“What, for real? Why?”

“Well, we’re all for women’s rights and all, and we don’t want to tell women what to do, but when we see some of the men the womenfolk are sleeping with and having babies with, well it’s really getting under our fingernails. I have seen women dating unemployed guys, guys who literally yell abuse at them in public; and I have even seen women who will date cheaters and gropers. Basically, just trashy creepy guys with no morals and none of them treat women nor their children with any respect. The guys are frankly getting confused why we ought to be treating women with respect when for a lot of men treating women with no respect seems to get a lot more out of them.”

“Interesting, but I just got to point something out, ‘we’re all for women’s rights and all… but’ sounds pretty contradictory.”

“No, well yeah, hmmm, yeah I suppose it is.”

“Because it sounds to me like you actually resent women having the right to decide for themselves who they want to sleep with and have children with.”

“Gosh… *swallow*…”

“It’s ok, Darren, I know you didn’t mean that, I can understand because I get frustrated too when I see one of my girlfriends with a loser, but we’ve just got to respect that’s their choice though, that’s the law after all.”

“Well, actually, Bree, to be honest I think you’ve caught me out, I am honestly struggling to think of reasons to respect women in general these days.”

“Wow! Oh my goodness! What do you mean? Do you think all women are whores or something?”

“No! No! That’s not what I meant; I mean I do know some women, smart, moral women with great men and great morals. Those women I respect a lot, my boss is one of those women: I respect her a great deal. But while I can respect a few key women in my life, I have to say the majority of women just leave me thinking the average woman is little more than a better dressed prostitute much of the time.”

“Wow… Darren… but you’ve got to respect all women.”

“Nope. No, I don’t think I do, actually. I have thought long and hard about this: I respect, love, and care about the few women who treat me and others well, take responsibility for themselves, and make good decisions, but the rest: I really can’t stand them. I have been told all my life to respect all women, but never once have I been told to respect all men. Which is makes sense because how many men are rapists, thugs, liars, and killers? I only respect the men who are decent, responsible, and sorted, while the violent, creepy, dishonest, and arrogant men I have no time for. I think it’s only proper to treat women the same way I treat men: on a case by case basis.”

“Hmmm, honestly, I wasn’t sure where you were going with that at first; but I think everything you just said makes sense. It just feels threatening to me. As though if a lot of men started thinking like that then I, or some of my friends, might be in trouble.”

“Why would you be in trouble Bree? I’ve never seen you be cruel, dishonest, or mean to anyone. You’re definitely one of the women I respect.”

“Awww, thanks Darren I appreciate hearing that, at the risk of disappointing you though, the thought crossed my mind that maybe I liked the idea of women automatically getting treated with respect just because what if one day I wanted to do something wrong? Then it would be nice to know people would still think highly of me even though I did the wrong thing: Kind of like having character insurance.”

“Haha, yeah wouldn’t we all want something like that, eh? But I can’t see you doing anything wrong soon.”

“Yeah, but honestly, sometimes I’ve felt tempted to do something crazy like Amelia has just done.”

“Wait, what do you mean?”

“Ahhh, I mean get pregnant while single. Because I can’t seem to find a decent man.”

“Really? But there are plenty of decent men out there. I know a few. Would you like me to set up a date for you?”

“No. No. No. That’s not what I meant Darren, never mind!”

“Still that’s a strange thing to say… Honestly, I find it incredibly irresponsible what Amelia has done. Choosing to have a child like that: she’s not even thinking about what the child might want or what would be the best environment for that child to grow up in.”

“Yeah, it’s like you said, some women are selfish and have children just to make themselves happy, not because they want to make a happy child.”

“Yes! That’s exactly what I meant Bree, I mean, men can do that too. A lot of sad people choose to have children in a bid to make themselves happy, but hardly anyone chooses to have children purely because they’re happy already and want to share that happiness with them.”

“Yeah.”

“Yeah… ?”

“Oh, just that I agree with you.”

“You don’t sound happy, Bree, what gives?”

“Well, the world is full of messed up people isn’t it?”

“Bree, is Amelia one of those messed up people?”

Heavy breathing and sniffling sounds came from the phone speaker.

“Bree? What’s wrong?”

“I know… I know who the father of Amelia’s baby is.”

“Woah! Bree! Really? Who is he? He’s not some unemployed bum is he?”

“It’s bad Darren… real bad. I am scared to talk about it; I was hoping someone else would know already so I’ve been phoning round to check. But I think I’m the only one who knows from our circle.”

“Well explain it to me, from the beginning.”

“Well, ages ago, I was hanging out with Amelia at her place when I found a letter, a hand written letter, on her desk. Well, I asked her who sends hand written letters these days. It’s 2017 after all! Well she said that her boyfriend does, because he’s so romantic, he wants her to see his passion for her in his writing. Then I noticed the return address: Pilton Prison.”

“No way! Her boyfriend is in prison? How did that happen to him? I don’t remember her dating a guy who went to prison.”

“No. They hadn’t met before he went to prison. She started writing to him when he was already in prison.”

“But Piltin is a maximum security jail. Those are some pretty nasty sorts in there.”

“Yes. That’s how she found out about him, from the news.”

“Who is he?”

“Lee Johnson.”

“The killer?”

“Yeah, that’s the one.”

“The same Lee Johnson who killed three men?”

“Yes.”

“Wow. And he’s her boyfriend?”

“Yes, she became obsessed about him apparently just reading about him in the news. She collected all the news articles and printed them out for a scrap book she keeps in her bedside table. She has been writing to him for years apparently.”

“Woah, that’s crazy, what kind of woman does that sort of thing?”

“Apparently a lot of women do. She’s part of a kind of online support group for women who love violent men and don’t see it as a problem. Kind of like proana groups which claim anorexia isn’t a disorder: it’s everyone else who has the problem because they can’t recognise the beauty of extreme thinness. Frankly, they seem to be a group of women who fawn over violent thugs, particularly serial killers. They write to them in prison and have virtual relationships like some kind of messed up fan club of hate.”

“But why? That’s so messed up!”

“Apparently it turns them on. It’s the only way they can get excited: thinking about a man killing another man. It’s like how some women have rape fantasies about men; well some women go a step further and have murder fantasies. Amelia says she’s only ever been turned on by violent men.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me! That’s nuts, no man would do something that messed up!”

“Really, Darren? No man would ever sleep with a crazy unstable idiot of a girl just for sex would they?”

“Well yeah, the scummy men would, I have no doubt, but this is crazy, Amelia a gorgeous young woman, why would she do something so gross? I mean, wow, surely these women aren’t actually turned on my men who kill people?”

“Yeah, apparently they see these men as dominate, strong, and ruthless. They are willing to do whatever it takes to survive and pass on their genetics. Killing your rivals is the ultimate act of dominance over them after all and these women make a fetish out of it, bragging over who can get the most infamous criminals to write back to them.”

“So let me get this clear one more time Amelia is pregnant?”

“Yes!”

“Amelia is pregnant to Lee Johnson?”

“Yes.”

“How though? He’s in prison!”

“Apparently if prisoners are well behaved they’re allowed to have conjugal visits once a year, even in a maximum security prison.”

“I feel dizzy, why on Earth would she want to have a child with a killer?”

“You’re not going to like this.”

“I don’t like any of this already, but please, tell me everything now. I think this falls under the category of ‘need to know’.”

“Well, I confronted her about this last night, I asked her if the baby was Lee’s and she confirmed that it was. I asked her why she wanted to have a child with a man sentenced to life in prison for murder. She told me because he’s the only kind of man she could respect. Because he fought and beat his victims to death with his bare hands and proved his dominance and will to survive over them. She told me that she knows he’s a cold blooded serial killer and a total sociopath who actually brags about how he tortured and killed those men and the pleasure he got from doing it. She even thinks he killed more men that the authorities don’t know about. She said she thinks that sociopaths are superior to other people because they don’t have self-doubt, shame, conscience or other weaknesses like other men. Just a passionate vaulting desire to dominate, control, and win. She said she didn’t want to have to give birth to a weak man’s child, she wanted to have a child to a man who could kill and not lose any sleep over it.”

“Wow… that’s seriously messed up. Amelia’s never talked much about the kinds of men she likes, but I never thought a sweet faced girl like her could be harbouring such grotesque ideas to herself.”

“It is, Darren, it’s so messed I could hardly sleep last night. She’s been writing to this creep for years and I think he’s manipulated her into doing this.”

“No.”

“No, what?”

“No. That’s not manipulation, I don’t buy it. She’s kept this secret from everyone, she knows what she’s doing is wrong, otherwise why hide it?”

“But Darren, she’s harmless, she hasn’t hurt anyone. Tell me she’s just a silly misguided girl!”

“No Bree, she’s got to be at least as cold blooded and sociopathic as Lee Johnson is. That’s why she’s so attracted to him. Like attracts like. No decent person feels attracted to a killer. I think we’ve got to keep well away from her, she’s dangerous.”

“But Darren, she’s never hurt anyone before.”

“Yeah? What about this child? What if she’s right and the sociopathic genetics pass to her child like she wants them to? What happens to that child? Does that child grow up to be a serial killer too?”

“Oh no, she wouldn’t do that! Darren! She wouldn’t!”

“Bree, how do you know how she will treat the child? What if it’s a boy? Would she raise him to be gentle and responsible, or would she raise him to be a cold blooded killer?”

“Oh Darren, this is so fucked up, it is so fucked up, but she told me the baby is a boy, and I think that’s exactly what she wants!”

“How do you know?”

“This isn’t the first time she’s been pregnant to him. This is the third time. The first two times the foetuses were female so she got them aborted. This time it’s a male foetus and now she wants to keep it. This is something she’s planned.”

“She’s planned to have a sociopathic boy?”

“She told me she’s studied the history of sociopathy and that she’s going to teach him how not to get caught. She’s watched every episode of that TV series about a serial killer. She expects her son will turn out just like him. Oh God, Darren, she’s my friend but what do we do? She’s lost the plot!”

“We need to contact the police, she’s out of control.”

“But Darren, nothing she has done is illegal. There’s no crime.”

“She’s murdered two children of her own already: I don’t care if you call them foetuses, I say they were girls and now she’s intending to bring a killer’s son into the world to become just like his father only deadlier. She’s got malicious intent!”

“But they were abortions! That’s not illegal!”

“If I aborted my unborn children that would be murder; why isn’t it the same with her?”

“I don’t know, it just isn’t because it’s her body and her choice, I mean what crime has she committed? What could she be charged with?”

“But this is madness, she’s planning to raise a sociopathic killer and teach him how to murder and get away with it. She’s a menace to society. How can there be nothing in the law to stop this sort of thing from happening?”

“Oh God Darren, it’s just like you said before about those women who aren’t responsible: how many of them are raising criminals? No one ever talks about that. There are no laws against it, but I was talking to Amelia last night and she was talking about this like it’s the most exciting thing she’s ever done in her life. How many other women in her Internet circle are doing this?”

“Why would she think this was a good thing to do?”

“She told me that she thinks men have grown weak and soft and that this is her way of addressing that. She said that in the wild strong men would simply murder the weaker men of the tribe so that only the strong could reproduce, that this kept the tribe strong and fertile.”

“Yeah, and did these same men not rape and beat women too? Did not those same men keep them locked up and pregnant year after year and then murder them when they got too old? Are these not the same men who lie cheat and steal off honest men so that they never have to do an honest day’s work in their lives? In the wild people lived a painful, bleak, and wretched existence, and it was because of men like Lee Johnson. Is this the glorious past she wants to return the human race to? The stone age?”

“Darren, I am so scared, I knew she was writing to this guy ages ago, and I knew lots of women wrote to these monsters in prison and had sexual fantasies about them. But with the Internet I think they’ve organised themselves into a cult. A cult of violence: women who love rapists, killers, and paedophiles. They are actively working together to lobby for more conjugal visits for these men in other states and countries. They are trying to breed violent and dangerous men because they get excited by men killing and fighting with each other. They’re nuts, totally nuts.”

“No Bree, they’re not nuts, they’re evil. They’re utterly evil. We can’t just allow them to keep doing this sort of thing: breeding monsters that in twenty years’ time will start murdering and raping civilisation back into a dark age just so they could get off on a their hedonistic sexual fantasies.”

“But how Darren? Nothing about this is illegal; everything they’re doing is perfectly legal. How do we stop it? Take away women’s reproductive rights? If this is what these women want to do, we can’t stop them.”

“But if we don’t do anything then eventually the population of violent and sociopathic men will grow so big they will collapse civilisation and murder good decent hard working men by the millions! There has to be something we can do.”

“But there’s nothing, we have to respect women’s right to choose.”

“You’re right; we can’t just have a knee jerk reaction to this. If we took away women’s right entirely to choose their husbands then we would be no better. It would be institutionalising rape into the legal system. However, there’s got to be something we can do.”

“I can tell you want I think we should do, Darren.”

“What’s that?”

“Just talk about it. Forget the law, that’s not going to be able to solve this situation except to make it worse. But if we all talk about this, expose these women, their bad parenting, and shame them, then they can’t get away with it.”

“That sounds good Bree, but they could just move away to somewhere else and learn to keep their sordid secret better, and with government welfare they will have all the money they need to have as many of these monstrous children as they wish until they just overwhelm us. Also, aren’t you forgetting that shaming people for their bad decisions is discrimination?”

“What can we do then?”

“We need to stop supporting bad women. Just as we don’t support bad men, we need to start saying that any woman who isn’t decent doesn’t get any help, friends, welfare, or anything. Only good people are allowed to have good things and they earn them by doing the right thing.”

“We can’t do that either because that’s also discrimination.”

“It’s discrimination to notice the difference between good and evil people?”

“Apparently so, Darren, we could get into so much trouble if we tell anyone about this.”

“Dammit Bree, the way I see it, we either discriminate against people who mean us harm and treat them accordingly for that or we surrender ourselves to them as their slaves and allow them to exploit us until they wipe all of us out and civilisation along with us.”

“I am really scared Darren.”

“Me too Bree, but I am sure glad we are having this conversation.”

“Yes, I wasn’t so sure at the start, but now I am really glad we did too. I am relieved that we’re still allowed to at least talk about these sorts of things without being charged with discrimination.”

“Yeah, but if the numbers of sociopaths keep increasing, how much longer will conversations like this be safe to have?”

“I don’t know, but let’s meet up again soon to talk about what we can do.”

“Great idea, are you free for dinner on Wednesday?”

“Sure thing, meet you at Doe’s Diner.”

“Thank you Bree, see you then.”

“Bye Darren, take care.”

“Good bye Bree, you take care too.”