Chapter Thirty-Four

~Nicole~

Boy, they weren’t kidding about those contraction cramps in the one birthing class I had been able to attend via video. I felt like someone had a hold on my stomach and was trying to push it down into my abdomen and out of where the sun didn’t shine. No matter how slow I breathed, or how much I focused on calming rivers and soothing forests, panic came with each and every wave.

Ow.

Own.

When we reached the hospital, I was on my third set of contractions and I just wanted to curl in on myself so hard that I stopped existing. Unfortunately, since I hadn’t figured out a way to break the laws of physics, all I could do was rock in the passenger’s seat until he came around to help me out.

“We’re almost there,” he said, opening my door but leaving me stuck inside of the car. I called after him to help me out, before realizing that he was grabbing a wheelchair.

Oh, that actually was a good idea.

He rolled it up to the car and threw on the brakes before helping me into it. I wasn’t sure how I managed considering the state of my insides, but maybe it was just adrenaline borne out of the fear of having my baby right in the parking lot.

James, to his credit, rushed me as quickly as he could inside and right to the front desk.

“Hello, sir, how can I-”

“She’s six months and she’s having her baby. Her contractions are less than ten minutes apart and her water broke.”

“Of course sir, take a deep breath. We’ll admit her as soon as possible. Ma’am, are you alright?”

“I dunno, my water broke about three months early, you tell me.” The receptionist just gave me a look over then nodded. “Alright then, ma’am. Sir, if you want to wheel her over to the door, we’ll have someone from our obstetrics unit by to pick you up and admit you.”

“Thanks.”

I didn’t know how James was able to keep his relative cool, because I felt like I was losing it more and more with every passing minute. I guessed that I was lucky an orderly came to wheel me off before I blew a freaking gasket.

My cramps wore off as we went down the hall and I had a chance to breathe. Thank goodness, because I really didn’t want to be admitted to the hospital when I was cursing and covered in sweat. If the next round could wait until after I saw my doctor, that would be great.

Surprisingly, I got up into a room relatively quickly. I mean, not ten minutes quickly, but certainly not as long as it had taken when I was first admitted that time I passed out in my work parking lot.

I was in the middle of another round of contractions as they plugged and IV into me and those little sticky circles that read out my vitals. The frantic beeping of the machines only made my anxiety worse, and before I could ask what was going on, they were injecting something into the mainline of my IV.

“Hey, what’s that?” I asked, gripping the nurse’s arm with a vice-like grip. “What did you give to me?”

“Just a little something to calm you down. Your heartrate is a little high and we don’t want you stressing out the baby.”

“But I didn’t want pain pills,” I argued, not caring if sweat was pouring down my forehead and down into my eyes. “the doctor said that even if I was premature, that we would only use them as a last resort.”

“Don’t worry honey, that wasn’t pain medication. I promise. The doctor will be here soon to talk about your options and what’s going to happen, so don’t you worry, okay?”

I tried to tell her that I would do my best, but instead a cry of agony ripped out of my throat before I could do anything about it.

“Yes ma’am, I know exactly what you mean.”

She patted my head and then left, leaving me alone with James for the first time since we had been admitted into the room.

“Hey, are you alright?” he asked, rushing to my side and holding my hand.

I tried to answer him, I really did, but another powerful surge rent through me and it was all I could do to hold on through the pain. At least this time I didn’t scream, I was started to get a headache from my own voice.

“You’re doing great, really,” he continued, pulling a damp cloth from goodness knows where and dabbing it on my forehead. It felt magical, to be perfectly honest, and I leaned up into the comfort.

“I… I think this wave is stopping now,” I said, trying to catch my breath. As hard as I tried to keep control of my inhales, it was hard to get enough oxygen when it felt like my abdomen was being squeezed through a vice.

“Good. Is there anything you need? Anything I can do for you?”

“I wouldn’t say no to some water, I think.”

“Okay, let me grab that for you. You sure you’ll be alright?”

“James, I’m in premature labor, not a war zone. I’ll be okay for a few minutes.”

He still didn’t look quite sure, but he nodded anyways and headed out. The few seconds alone gave me a chance to breathe and figure out how I really felt.

I was terrified. I was well aware that this could definitely endanger the life of my child. The thought that I could have put so much time, and hopes, and dreams into this baby only to never meet them was bone-chilling, and just thinking abut it made my heart pound ridiculously hard.

No wonder they had to give me medicine to calm me down. Even with its effects I felt like I was going to burst under the pressure of it all.

“So, I hear we’re having a baby!”

I looked to the door to see the same doctor that had diagnosed me standing there, looking cheerful considering the situation.

“That’s the hope,” I answered, trying to sound just as chipper but mostly sounding insane to myself.

“Great, how far apart are the contractions?”

“I’m not sure,” I answered, pushing myself up higher on the bed. “James had been keeping track. Time goes funny when a watermelon is trying to push itself out of your body.”

“Yeah, I imagine. And where is Mr. Hines? He’s the tall man in the suit, if I recall correctly.”

“You do,” I wheezed, my middle pinching again. “He’s going to get me water but you’re just in time for another round.”

“Another round of wh-”

Before he could finish the question, I was moaning again and sweat was starting to bead on my brow. Man, James had just wiped my face and I could already feel myself becoming grody again. Why did pregnancy have to be so gross? Why couldn’t the baby just slide out of me and we could have a grand ol’ time naming it and taking thousand of pictures to remember the moment in? That would certainly be nice.

“Ah, I see. Well, if you want to put your leg’s up in the stirrups, I’ll check how dilated you are and we can see what the best course of action is.”

“Sure,” I groaned between the short breaths that I had been taught. “But I’m going to need a little help.”

“Of course. The nurses should be here any second. I asked them to grab a couple things in case your baby decided that they’d prefer the accelerated course for being born.”

“You’re hilarious, really.”

“Thank you. My mother always told me so.” The doctor gave me a wink and that actually did make me chuckle, but the mirth was quickly forgotten as my abdomen bore down again.

True to his word, the nurses came in just before James did, helping me scoot down the bed and get my ankles up into the stirrups. It felt alarmingly similar to some sort of medieval torturing device, but I kept my opinions to myself.

Mostly because I was panting too hard to speak.

The nurses put up some sort of modesty panel and I wondered whose modesty they were protecting. The only people present were the doctor, who’s fingers were already heading towards my vagina, the man who had gotten me knocked up in the first place, and two nurses who had probably been through the same thing. It was pretty much guaranteed that everyone present was going to see a whole bunch of my nether regions and what was going to come out of it.

I flinched as the doctor’s finger poked at me and I let out a yelp. It was less than pleasant, but thankfully it was over soon.

James stood there, shocked. I realized that with taking care of me, he probably hadn’t had much time to research what this part was going to be like. Well, at least he was in for as much as a ride as I was. Looking to him, I reached out, and he grabbed my hand almost instantly. No matter what happened, I would get through this. James might have been my soon-to-be-ex-husband, but he was also my best friend.