and through shutters, keened so high that Michael didn’t hear his phone ringing until he was through the door and inside. For a second he was confused, but only for that second. He ripped his coat open and dug inside for the phone. It rang a third time before he got a hand on it. He pulled it out, didn’t recognize the number. “Hello, hello.”
He heard static and background noise. Voices. Metal on metal. “Michael?”
“Elena. Baby.”
Static scratched, and her voice faded. “Oh, God. I’m so sorry…”
“Elena, what? I can barely hear you.”
“The baby’s coming.”
She faded. “Elena!”
“… don’t know what to say. I thought I had time, but the baby’s coming early. I’m sorry, Michael. I’m so sorry. I wanted you to be here. I was going to call. Oh. God…”
She made a loud, terrible noise and Michael heard voices in Catalan. Intercom sounds. “Where are you? Tell me where you are.”
It took long seconds, and Michael recognized hospital noises. She was on a gurney, he thought. Stern voices that had to be doctors.
“What hospital? What town?”
“Ahhh…”
“Baby. What hospital?”
She told him between heavy breaths-a hospital, a town. For an instant, the static faded and he heard her perfectly. “It’s coming. It’s coming.”
Then someone took the phone and hung it up.
Michael tried to call back, but the phone was dead. He stared at the wall for long seconds, utterly frozen for the first time in his life. She’d called; the baby was coming. His mind was locked tight. But then the paralysis broke. He tore through the apartment until he found a map and his keys. “What else do I need? Think! Think!”
But, he needed nothing else. Wallet. Keys. Map.
He squeezed into the tiny car in the tiny garage; his hands shook as he opened the map and found the road that would take him to Elena. He started the car, pulled out onto crowded, icy streets and fought his way to the open roads that ran fast and true to the north. He pushed it until the little car shook.
But that was not entirely true. Elena labored for three and a half hours.
He made it with eight minutes to spare.
John Hart
