Chapter Four
Josie noticed that Sherri had dispensed with formalities, not even bothering to cover Laura’s lower half with a sheet as she palpated her belly. A nurse’s assistant tried to cover Laura to give her some privacy, but Josie just shook her head slightly and then Laura shouted in the middle of the exam.
“Don’t bother,” she said, her voice labored, and then she arched her back to the extent that a pregnant woman in labor can arch anything and tipped her neck back in a strange, unnatural curve.
She watched as the midwife seemed to do mental measurements—and that’s exactly what she was doing, Josie realized—to determine how far along everything was, and then a big grin spread across her face and she said the words that everyone in the room had been waiting for. “You are probably complete. The baby definitely dropped.”
“Probably?” Dylan asked, eyes bulging. “Can’t you do an exam?”
“I’d prefer not to now that the waters are broken. I can if we need to, but—”
A primal sound emerged from Laura. No amount of mellow meditation and breathing techniques under Mike’s tutelage could stop the baby that was barreling out of her birth canal now. A sound like an opera singer being stabbed to death in the middle of an aria poured out of Laura’s mouth as she stood, legs wide like a sumo wrestler’s. Her face turned a pinkish-purple Josie thought wasn’t quite found in nature anywhere but childbirth.
“You are likely complete. Laura,” she said, quietly, “and you can start pushing now.”
“She beat you to it,” Dylan muttered, holding Laura’s upper arm to give her support.
“I want an epidural!” Laura said, panting after the contraction had subsided. Sherri casually crawled on the floor, under Laura, placing Chux pads beneath her to mop up the fluids, mixed with a tinge of blood, that were coming out in waves as the contraction bore down, then subsided.
Josie would have thought the midwife was watering a plant, not monitoring a patient, given her neutral, calm countenance.
“It’s a little late for that, honey,” Mike explained, standing behind Laura now, arms ready to slide under hers and catch her.
“But I don’t—oh, not more!” She moaned, her head dipping down, breathing slowing as the contraction made her belly tighten, and Josie swore she could see the baby descend, Laura’s naked belly on display for everyone now, her navel roiling as the womb tightened so fast and so hard it made Josie wince. The strangled soprano sound came forth again, Mike now holding Laura up, arms under her armpits as she let him support her.
“That’s it. That’s it,” he soothed.
“I can’t do this!”
“You are doing it,” Josie interjected. “You are doing it, Laura.” Laura shot her a look of exhausted resignation, a contradictory look. Nothing could save her from what was coming in these next few minutes, and she knew it, Josie knew it—everyone in the room knew it. Paralyzed and horrified, Josie realized her entire role right now distilled down to one, simple job: to usher Laura through the most barbaric pain ever, a pre-condition for meeting her baby daughter. That was it. She couldn’t soothe her, or take any of the pain away, or crack jokes to help Laura relax. This was real life, stretching back to the dawn of man, this baby entering the world the same way countless humans had before them, and no amount of intervention could give Josie any power to alleviate Laura’s suffering.
The room began to spin and Josie reached out, grabbing onto the arm of a chair. She had never been queasy in her life in a medical situation, but right now was different. This wasn’t just some random medical situation, some kid who’d cut his head open, or some Alzheimer’s patient who needed ambulatory care or a diaper change. This wasn’t an emergency appendectomy or a gunshot wound; it was her best friend having a baby. As Laura bore down, her body folding in half, Dylan and Mike supporting her, a nurse and Sherri pulling on her knees, so that the baby’s head could emerge, Josie began a slow descent into a faint.
Strong hands wrapped around her ribcage and guided her to a chair.
“It’s okay,” Alex murmured in her ear, his voice comforting and solid. “You’re fine.”
He settled her in place and gently pushed her head down between her knees. “I’ll be right back,” he said.
Footsteps—she heard them walking away and then quickly come back. A tiny little cup of water shoved in front of her eyes. “Here, drink this. Sip it.”
“She okay?” Sherri shouted from across the room, though Josie realized it wasn’t a shout, it was a whisper, all of her senses distorted right now.
She couldn’t be doing this, falling apart in the one moment Laura needed her most. It was like some sort of cosmic joke, especially a nurse losing it in the most stereotypically obvious way possible. A delivery room faint? Come on. This wasn’t A Baby Story or some stupid trope in a television show.
“You did a great job helping Mike and Dylan take care of themselves,” Alex whispered, his hands on her shoulders, her head still dipped down, “but what about you? Have you eaten or had anything to drink other than coffee this entire time?”
I tasted you, she almost said. She stopped and thought for a moment, then shook her head slowly.
“Hang on,” he said.
The footsteps faded and she heard Laura scream through gritted teeth, a low thrumming sound, guttural and visceral. She’d been to plenty of births, but that noise was like a song that came from the base of her spine.
Alex shoved a protein bar in her face.
She batted it away. “I can’t eat that.”
“Take a bite. Trust me. Your friend is right on the verge and you want to be over there with her, right?”
She looked up and warm, concerned eyes met hers. She closed her lids, embarrassed. “I can’t believe I’m freaking out like this and I’m a nurse.”
“I’m a doctor and I’ve done it. It’s okay—it’s different when it’s your friend.”
“Really? You’ve freaked out when one of your friends gave birth?”
“No, I freaked out when my mom was in a car accident.”
“Oh.” Another shot of adrenaline poured through her, triggering deep memories of her own of parents in car accidents. Alarmed, she asked, “Did she make it?”
“Through the accident? Oh, yeah. She was injured but I panicked. No one wants to lose a parent that way, you know?”
No shit, she thought. I don’t recommend it. But now was not the time to talk about her past.
“We can chit-chat or you can eat the protein bar and get your ass over there. Which is it going to be?” he said.
The tone in his voice gave her no choice, and she was grateful. Right now options were her enemies.
The protein bar purported to be peanut butter flavored, but it tasted like a combination of wax, sugar, and something else she couldn’t put her finger on. But she swallowed it, felt better, chugged the water, and stood. The room stayed in place, and as she scooted over to hold Laura’s hand she turned back and mouthed, Thank you.
He just smiled without showing his teeth, crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against the door frame to watch.
She was just in time as Laura bent in half again, her face turning an impossible shade of purple, and Mike stooped down to look at the opening where his child’s head began to emerge.
“Laura, you’re so close,” he said.
Dylan craned over Laura’s shoulder—he was propping her up from behind and unable to see.
Josie saw a mirror, a rather large one on a stand in the corner, and caught Sherri’s eye. “Can I get the mirror?” she said.
“Ask Laura,” Sherri answered.
“Laura, do you want to see the baby?”
Laura pulled out of the pain and looked at her with emerald eyes that were glassy and exhausted and exhilarated all at once and said, “Yes, please,” and then bent down, pushing with all of her might as Josie wheeled the mirror over and positioned it so that Dylan and Laura could watch.
The next twenty seconds went by in such a blur that Josie, years later, would try to remember the exact sequence of events but never quite construct it. A growling scream from Laura, the sound of something popping, and then a slick, slithery sound as Sherri held the baby’s head and one shoulder and then told Laura to push. The sound of relieved laughter, silence, and a baby’s cry all mingled together into a joyful noise that would pull Josie through times of difficulty in the future.
The baby was, indeed, a girl. She caught that from a quick glance and as Sherri handled the wet, slimy, squalling little creature and placed it directly on Laura’s naked breasts, Josie looked over to see Alex wipe away a single tear from the corner of his eye and then step silently out of the room.
“Oh my God, she’s perfect,” Mike said, bending over. The baby wrapped four little fingers around his extended index finger and his tears crested over, one dropping on Laura’s chest, the other on his shirt.
Dylan stared at the baby slack-jawed, eyes wide but not wet, and then reached over tentatively to stroke her head. The baby opened her mouth and what had been a little, mewling cry turned into quite a lusty sound, Sherri smiling and gently laying a warming blanket over the baby.
Laura stared at the creature on her in complete, shocked silence. Josie was with her—right with her, in fact, because she couldn’t think of a single thing that she wanted to say right now, or could say, that would match the majesty of the moment. And then Laura said the one thing that made the tears come for every single person in the room.
“I did it,” she said quietly. With one finger she stroked the baby’s cheek and the baby looked up, eyes wide and calm, mouth closing, puckering, the cries gone, her face alert, following her mother’s voice. “Welcome to the world,” Laura laughed, all her pain seemingly gone, her face lit up with such rapturous joy that Josie thought it was a manifestation of the divine, right here in these seconds.
Mike and Dylan leaned in, both kissing the top of Laura’s head simultaneously, and then Laura whispered, “Welcome to the world…baby Jillian.”