“You are. You are. You are,” he says, low and slow, the words turning into a vibration that takes my fear to a place where it can flitter and fret but doesn't get in the way of the rescue I need.
And then the pain recedes, slowly replaced with a brisk tingling that saps all my energy.
“Seven minutes away,” José announces as Andrew lets go of my hips, unclicks his seat belt, and positions himself better in front of me.
“That's not safe if we get in an accident.”
“José's good and I need to be able to get to your hips better.”
“I'm fine, Andrew. The contractions aren't that close.”
“That was four minutes, and it lasted almost a minute.”
Pregnancy math happens fast in my head. “Uh....”
“Drink,” he orders. As I tip the bottle up and take my first swallow, the twinge at my back grows again.
“Oh,” I gasp.
He takes the heels of his hands, finds the spots on my hips where Hope taught the partners to push in case of back labor, and works with precision to do whatever it takes to make the contraction easier for me. This one fades faster.
This one feels like a giant red alert.
“That was four minutes,” he says calmly. “Hydrate. Breathe. We're doing fine.”
Bzzzzzz
My phone.
I'm here at the hospital, Shannon texts. What entrance are you coming in? I'll meet you there.
Bzzzzzz
Hi Amanda. This is Alex Derjian. I'm the doctor on call this weekend. I'll meet you at the hospital.
“Oh, no!” I groan.
“What's wrong?”
“I can’t believe this!”
“You're giving birth?”
“No. Not that. The doctor is the one doctor in the practice who I haven't met. Alex Derjian.”
“Why is that name so familiar?”
“Isn’t he the guy who coached Declan on how to catch the baby when Shannon went into labor in the elevator?”
“Dec is going to rib me for copying him.”
“It wasn't like we planned this! Dr. Rohrlian was supposed to do the c-section on Thursday!”
José pulls the car up to the ER entrance. I see Shannon there, hair in a ponytail, a backpack slung over one shoulder.
She lights up when she sees us.
My heart hugs her from a distance.
Having a bestie is the best in a crisis.
Especially a BFF who's already been through childbirth, even if it was in a broken elevator and involved turning her vajayjay into a possible Pulitzer Prize opportunity for the right photographer.
Rushing the SUV, she opens my door and offers a hand. I'm mid-step when my lower belly tightens and it feels like someone's stabbing my cervix from the inside out.
I freeze.
I can't move.
Behind me, I feel Andrew's arms lock in place, his body rigid to support mine. Shannon puts her hand on my hip. I groan.
“Contraction?” she asks.
“Uh,” is all that comes out of me.
Suspended in midair, I can't even move the few inches to set my foot on the ground, the sensation of being a thousand pieces of glass held together by a spiderweb too much. One millimeter and I'm in bone-grinding pain.
So I wait between two realities, car and ground, until enough time passes and I can let gravity continue to do its job.
“Wow,” Shannon finally says, fishing around in her backpack. “Let's get you inside. That was a full minute long. How far apart are they?”
“Two to four minutes.”
Time changes, as if someone snaps their fingers and I experience everything in extended time. The pain itself doesn't intensify, but it elongates, stretched out and settling in.
The check in. The nurse pointing. Andrew's hand on my back. Shannon's worried face. It's all there, but as backdrop for my own heart beat. The brush of the ball of my foot against linoleum. My refusal to ride in a wheelchair. The pressure of my cervix expanding.
The march of inevitability.
We're in an exam room when a long, low contraction hits, hard and grinding. Shannon sees it before Andrew does and moves my hands to the wall, palms flat, pressure suddenly on my sacrum. Andrew's hands go to my hips, but the sweet relief from his strength isn't enough to combat nature.
These babies are coming.
But everything I see and hear, aside from pain, is so slow. So full. Gravity works on my body but my mind floats. Mouths move, words come out of people with eyes on mine, machines are deployed, measurements are charted.
None of it makes sense.
Andrew speaks for me, with me, translating.
“Transverse,” I hear.
Still transverse.
“C-section,” he says, bending down, looking up at me with love and a kind of deep, aching empathy that makes my lungs fill with as much of his air as I can.
“Okay,” I reply.
Because it is.
And it will be.
A water bottle with a straw is thrust before me and I sip, grateful. Nurses come and go, then a man bigger than Andrew comes in.
No small feat, that.
He's in scrubs, with the matching green cap on his head, and carries himself with an affable competence that makes me want to be held by him. Tall and broad, he has the body of an athlete, the groundedness of a guy you want to spend time with. Friendly eyes take me in as he thrusts his hand to me, then jerks when he sees Shannon.
“Shannon?”
“Dr. Derjian?”
I'm shaking his strong hand as he turns to her, but he corrects himself, eyes on mine. “Amanda. I'm Alex Derjian. And very shortly, you get to meet your sons.”
“I–”
The contraction steals my breath.
The doctor leaves, Andrew in slo-mo as he moves the water bottle and turns his arms into a vise again, Shannon's body heat to my right. The only awareness I have of anything is concentrated entirely between my hipbones.
It's the center of the universe. Right there.
In me.
“You'll be fine,” Shannon whispers in my ear, rubbing the lacrosse ball as hard as she can, digging it deep into the small of my back as the contraction fades. “The anesthesiologist is on his way before they prep you for surgery.”
“I can't believe this is happening.”
“I know.”
“Amanda?
