Fourteen

 

 

Here’s the problem with minding your own business – it never works, ever!

 

I was just looking over some figures from head office when my phone rang and I saw Dad’s contact photo come up on my screen.

 

I’d just hit answer when he started yelling down the phone at me. “The heifer’s in labor and I need you to help with the births. Everyone is coming, but it’s a difficult one.” Not bothering to sign off, he just hung up. Anyone else might have assumed that it was Ebru that he was talking about, but on this occasion the heifer in question was in fact an actual heifer.

 

Sighing, I looked down at my jeans and t-shirt, picked my cap up and went to help out. Passing Coleman, I let him know where I’d be and to keep an eye on Sabine who was sleeping.

 

One calf later and all hell broke loose..

 

“Holy shit,” Cole screamed. “Ebru’s having a baby. She’s having a baby,” he continued screaming as he ran forward, then ran back, then ran further back and stopped. “Where am I meant to go?”

 

“Back to your house, dickwad,” Ren snapped as he headed towards the buggies that we used to ride around the fields. The only time we used horses nowadays was if we ran out of gas in the buggies. Totally personal preference.

 

Loading up, we drove across the fields toward Cole’s house. Calling Coleman on the way, I filled him in on the situation and told him to bring Sabine over. We could all travel to the hospital together.

 

As we pulled up to the side of his house, we heard Tony panicking inside through the open window, and Maya directing them all. Cole, Ren and Dad ran off, leaving the rest of us to park up properly and walk inside more calmly.

 

“Look away!” Cole bellowed as I walked in, and everyone turned to face me. I just shrugged at the looks on their faces as Jack and Ren rubbed their eyes and groaned. They’d gotten an eyeful as they went into the room, which was their karma for running inside without checking what was going on first.

 

Tony, who was standing behind them and was closer to the massacre, was banging his head off the wall.

 

“Why?” He whined. “I’ve never hurt anyone. I’ve always given to charity. Why does everyone show me their taco?”

 

I had to admit, so far, he was hitting a home run. Each of the women had gone into labor and had popped out a baby with him right there; Isla had even popped one out at him. It was fucking hilarious!

 

Mom pushed past us all after hanging up from whomever she was talking to on the phone. I’d passed us as I came into the house, but I doubted that she’d even noticed. She was too focused on the birth of her grandson and hissing at the responder on the phone to ‘hurry the fuck up before she shot her baby canon everywhere’.

 

“The ambulance is on its way sweetheart, everything will be okay.” She used the voice that she used on all of us when we had broken a bone as a kid. The one that we had quickly learned actually meant – it will all be okay, you won’t lose the limb, but holy shit you’re gonna experience hell when they put it back into place.

 

Obviously, Ebru wasn’t dumb and knew what the tone meant too. Panicking, she grabbed Maya and pulled her down as she snarled, “Did you rip?”

 

Cole walked slowly up to his possessed wife and asked, “Rip? What rip? Who cares about shit ripping? Ebru, you really need to focu…“ he cut off squealing and wheezing. I was as green as him on this one though, who cared about shit ripping? Then I saw where she was holding and squeezing, dear holy shit was she squeezing, his balls and grabbed my own. I want to say that it was in solidarity and sympathy, but honestly it was probably to protect them from the possessed alien birthing my brothers spawn.

 

“Listen, asshole. I might have bat wings after this baby comes out, so you’ll excuse me if I’m a little bit fucking worried that if the bat signal hits the skies, that I’ll be expected to answer the motherfucking call of fucking duty!” She screamed and visibly squeezed his balls tighter.

 

The vomit trying to make its way out of my stomach made me retch audibly. “Aw fuck me, that’s graphic!” There was no coming back from that mental image. I’d never look at Ebru the same way again.

 

“Or you’ll look like the Joker with a smile from side to side on your…” Maya added and quickly snapped her mouth shut at the glare that she got from Ebru as she and slowly raised her hand.

 

Then the next contraction hit the she-Devil at that moment though, saving Maya’s life.

 

“Oh fuckingshitstainingpissfartlickingmotherdickingshitfucker!” She screamed loud enough for her pet hounds in Hades to hear. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Coleman stop at the door to the house and block Sabine’s entrance, looking at me for permission to bring her in. Sighing, I nodded. Seeing this, she was going to live in the hospital for at least a month before she was due and I was getting her every single drug that they had.

 

“What did she say?” Dad asked the rest of us.

 

“I think she wanted a grilled cheese sandwich with some of that German sauce shit from the store that no one can pronounce,” Gramps suggested from the other side of me.

 

Doing a double take at him and Grams, who had just appeared out of thin air, I hissed, “Are you a fucking bat or something?” I mean, where the hell did they come from?

 

The smirk soon dropped off his face as the next scream split the room so loud that it would make your ears bleed.

 

“Ah, how lovely,” Grams crowed as she elbowed through the group. “There’s the baby’s head!”

 

Taking his life in his own hands, and thankfully now his balls (literally because he was cupping them with one hand to protect them), Cole crouched down beside Ebru and started talking her through it. “Okay, I know how you’re feeling. The electric current is going to go from and eight to a nine in a minute. You’ll feel like you’re shitting, but you’ll only do it if you’re a pussy like…”

 

“Don’t you fucking dare!” Ren yelled, fuming as he dragged Tony toward them for some reason.

 

Never one to quit while he was ahead, Cole continued, “Once you hit a ten, we’ll take the pads off and you can go to the toilet. The pain stops almost immediately so don’t worry…”

 

Unable to grab his nuts, which were still being protected by his hand, she grabbed his nose and yanked him toward her. “I’m having a fucking baby, you anal licking butt monkey,” she screamed. “There are no pads, only a Jesus screaming sumo wrestler trying to get out of a straw!”

 

I started gagging as Sabine patted my back and retched a little herself. The sound of two thuds followed by a squeal and a third thud caught my attention and I looked hesitantly over to see what had happened. Cole and Ren were out cold on the floor for some reason, with Tony’s head covered in Ren’s crotch. If it wasn’t for the way that Ebru was lying at that moment, I would have taken a photo.

 

A laugh burst out of the she-bitch that would make even Satan shit his pants, followed by a horrified gasp. “Oh, shit on me. I’ve just peed everywhere.”

 

My dick of a brother woke up in time to hear that her water had broken on his favorite chair, which of course led to him whining. Making myself more comfortable as the show continued to play out, I silently rooted for Ebru to crush his balls again. Sibling love and all of that! After some more snarling and insults from Ebru though, he let it go and then it became clear, even to me, that it was time for her to push.

 

Her screaming was testing the limits of the glass in the windows when Maya yelled over it, “Oh look, there’s his eyes and the tips of his ears.”

 

My dad, my grandad, Ren and Cole all made the same monumental mistake at the same time and turned around to see what she was talking about.

 

“Don’t do it,” I hissed.

 

Did they listen to me? Nope! The sound of their bodies hitting the ground at the same time filled the room.

 

“Once I’ve shit Shrek out, I’m gonna kill all of them,” Ebru promised the rest of us. Both Coleman and I took a step back so that we weren’t in her direct line of sight in case we became an outlet for her violence while they were incapacitated. I’m not gonna lie, if that happened, I’d throw one of their bodies so that it was closer to her and run.

 

Two more screams followed by the sound of two more pushes and the baby lint licker came out into the world, screaming his head off almost as much as his mama had been. Ironically, at that same moment, Coleman moved aside to let two paramedics into the house who ran over to the massacre in the corner of the room.

 

“Add them to the list,” Ebru snapped pointing at them as they started asking questions and checking her and the baby over.

 

“Louis Lyall Townsend,” Cole murmured drowsily as he stared down at his Satan and their spawn. “We spell it Louis, and pronounce it Lewis.”

 

We all understood the sentiment behind it. Ebru’s sister had died suddenly a couple of years ago from Sudden Adult Death Syndrome and her name had been Louise. Removing the e from the name gave it the same spelling as her name, but the pronunciation would be Lewis.

 

“You’re crying,” Sabine whispered through her own tears.

 

“Shut up,” I growled. “I’m not crying, you’re crying!” It was the weakest come back in the history of mankind, but I wasn’t crying. It was my contact lens in my eyes that had perfect twenty-twenty vision causing the watering.

 

"Wait, double check that it has balls and a dick," Cole shouted, saving me from the mocking that I was about to receive from Sabine. “One, two and there it is,” he crowed, fist pumping the air. “Mine got his junk you punk!” He yelled in Ren’s face. Dad just managed to grab onto the neck of Ren’s shirt to stop him beating our brother into the ground.

 

Helping dad, I got Ren outside and distracted him with a comparison of Maya’s screaming and insults versus Ebru’s. Ebru was definitely the winner.

 

“How do you think Sabine will do?” Coleman asked us.

 

Looking at each other and back at Coleman, I answered with pride. “They won’t even register. My wife is freaking awesome!”

 

I looked back over at where Ren had been standing, but couldn’t see him. Weird! There was suddenly a lot of movement and orders being shouted as Ebru and Louis were loaded into the back of the ambulance. Just as they were putting the ramp away, Cole came running past us with a bruise on his cheek followed by a limping Ren.

 

“I’ll follow in the car,” Cole panted out, before turning around and seeing our brother leaning against the driver’s door of it with an evil smirk on his face. Changing his mind, he got into the ambulance beside Ebru and threw his keys to Coleman. Never one to use his brain for anything, including his life, he leaned back out and yelled, “Don’t be a wacko just ‘cause yours got a taco!”

 

I took Ren down to the ground just as he reached the door of the ambulance as it pulled away.

 

“Did you hear that?” He yelled, trying to crawl after them with my body on his legs.

 

Wisely, I said not one word. Mine didn’t have a taco either!

 

The storm after the calm…

 

As with every moment in life when things were going great, a few short weeks later it all went to shit and my world exploded. This time, it wasn’t my family who was responsible. This time, if it hadn’t been for my family, I don’t know what I would have done.