Chapter 30: Jo Beth

As Mitch and Magda drove Jo Beth to the hospital, her contractions were fast and hard, like a train slamming into a brick wall. She was conscious only of pain, of long, agonizing stretches that took her breath away. Once they arrived at the clinic doors, she was immediately wheeled into delivery, totally skipping the waiting game of walking up and down corridors and trying to spur labor. There was no time for an epidural. Even with Jo Beth’s limited Spanish, she understood when the doctor said that her only option was to push. She imagined herself back on the ski slope where she won the silver, only this time she would tune out the bells. This time she would win. She channeled every last bit of energy, every last bit of strength, and with all the hope and faith she never knew she had, she pushed. Jo Beth pushed until she was here.

Bijou. Her precious, beautiful, gold-medal-girl.

“She’s perfect,” said Mitch. After Bijou and Jo Beth were both cleaned up, he sat on the bed next to Jo Beth, admiring how the baby’s five tiny fingers already knew how to coil around his very large index finger.

“I think she has your hair,” Magda said to Mitch. Magda had insisted on coming to the hospital with them and Jo Beth had been too out of it to protest. Now the three of them were together in Jo Beth’s hospital room, like the three points of a dysfunctional triangle.

Then Elizabeth arrived.

“Let me see her!” she exclaimed immediately. In one hand, she carried flowers and in the other a tin of what had to be baked goods. She placed both down on the bedside table and then extended her arms to hold Bijou.

“Isn’t she beautiful, Mom?” Jo Beth handed over her baby, never feeling prouder of anything, ever, in her entire life.

“She certainly is.” Elizabeth’s smile was wide and Jo Beth recognized that loving look in her eyes. She’d given that same look to Skylar and her thousands of times. After a moment of gushing and cooing, Elizabeth glanced away from the baby and focused on Jo Beth. “And, how are you?” she asked. “How are you feeling?”

“I’m starving,” Jo Beth said. She also had the beginnings of a powerful headache, but she figured that was because she was dehydrated. She turned to Mitch. “Can you find the nurse? I thought she said she was bringing me breakfast.”

“I’ll go get you something,” said Magda. She stood and went toward the door, but paused before exiting. “Congratulations, Jo Beth. And I’m sorry about before.”

Magda smiled so Jo Beth smiled back. There seemed no point in holding a grudge.

“What’s she sorry about?” Elizabeth asked, after Magda had left.

“It doesn’t even matter anymore,” Jo Beth said. “Today is a whole new world.”

There was more cooing over the baby, and fierce fascination about how she puckered her lips and how she tried, unsuccessfully, to force her fist into her mouth. Magda brought breakfast, and Jo Beth practically gulped down the eggs and toast. “Is there anything else to eat?” she asked.

“Here, have a lemon bar,” Elizabeth said. “I forgot to bring them out last night.”

“You baked these? Thanks, Mom! You know how much I love lemon bars.” Jo Beth ate three before she started to feel full, but even then, she still had room for a fourth.

She was holding Bijou, trying to nurse her, but the baby wouldn’t latch on, when suddenly Jo Beth’s patience ran out. The pain behind her eyes had quadrupled in an instant. Horrendous, crushing spasms burned inside her brain. “Take her!” Jo Beth yelled to Mitch, worried that if he didn’t, she might inadvertently harm her daughter. Mitch took Bijou. Jo Beth sensed Elizabeth watching her, realizing that her eyes had rolled back so that only the whites showed, that her head fell forward as if her neck had been broken.

“Jo Beth!” Elizabeth cried, rushing to her daughter’s side. “Call the doctor!” she screamed to no one, to anyone.

Magda ran into the hall. “Necesitamos un doctor!” she cried.

People came running, and they wheeled Jo Beth somewhere—to surgery, maybe? She wasn’t sure, because for the second time in several hours, she’d entered a dark tunnel of inescapable agony and she couldn’t turn back. The whole new world she’d only just spoken about became the end of the world, for her at least.

But as she unwillingly released her grasp on her very existence, it occurred to Jo Beth that at least it wasn’t the end of the world for Skylar. And for Bijou, the world had only just begun.