Chapter 1 #2
For the next half an hour we crept along the main – and only – road leading towards Nottingham.
In clear traffic, the hospital was about another ten minutes away.
At this rate it would be… well, my body was screaming that it would be too late.
The driver had turned up the radio, tuned into some easy-listening station, and while focusing on it helped a tiny bit, I concluded that I’d never be able to hear Ed Sheeran without reliving this nauseating, sweaty and scared journey again.
‘What’s up, Shona?’ It took a second to realise he was speaking into his headset. ‘Yeah. We’re still stuck on the A60. By that new pub, The Jolly Farmer.’
A brief pause. His dark eyes darted to the mirror.
‘Thanks for the heads-up.’
‘What?’ I asked from my current position, sort of crouched along the seat on my hands and knees.
While this might not be the safest way to travel, it helped me feel less as if I were going to split in two, and seeing as the fastest we’d managed in the past forty-five minutes was five miles per hour, I wasn’t too bothered. ‘What’s the heads-up?’
He gave a small sigh.
‘Not telling me is only making me panic.’
I waited another half a minute. ‘Now I’m really worried.’
‘The traffic jam is caused by a major accident up ahead, completely closing the road off. We could try heading back out of the city and in through Hucknall, but a lot of the roads that way are impassable.’
‘What are we going to do?’
What I really meant was, ‘What are you going to do, random stranger who I’m assigning the role of hero?
’ I would have been twice as anxious if it weren’t for the impassive solidity of the man in front of me.
He seemed capable of handling anything. He knew these streets inside out so he could find another way.
Failing that, he was a doctor. What were the chances of my driver being trained in obstetrics?
‘Hang on, I have to take this.’
Unlike the two previous ignored calls that I’d nosily noticed were from somebody called Tanya, this time he answered her.
‘Hey. I’m sorry… I’m stuck in traffic… I have a woman in the car in labour…
Shona tried, they said an ambulance would be hours.
Suggested we call the fire brigade. I know, Tanya.
I know I promised this wouldn’t happen again.
Is everything okay, though?… Yes. The last time.
I know. Can I bring you back anything – wine, chocolate?
… Okay. Thank you. You know how much I appreciate you.
Yep. Action not words. I’ll see you soon. Bye.’
He leant his head back with a weary sigh.
‘I’m sorry. I’ve got you into trouble.’
‘Not your fault.’
‘Will Tanya be really mad?’
‘Not your problem.’ He turned and raised his eyebrows at me. ‘Besides, we’ve got bigger things to worry about right now. Like?—’
He was interrupted by a deep-bellied, primal groan.
Later, I might be embarrassed about swaying on the back seat, head hanging low like a cow about to birth a calf. Right now, as the man said, I had far bigger problems that were only getting bigger.
‘What’s your name?’ I ground out through a clenched jaw.
‘What?’ he asked, as if that was the last thing he expected me to say.
‘This all might feel slightly less undignified if I knew your name,’ I panted, moving back into a sitting position.
‘Oh. It’s Beckett.’
‘Hey, Beckett, very nice to meet you. I’m Mary.’
‘Okay, so – Mary – we aren’t going to make it to the hospital.’
I said nothing, too stricken to form a sentence.
‘You asked what we’re going to do. I’m thinking… this.’
And then he suddenly U-turned into the opposite side of the road, which was empty thanks to the road closure ahead, accelerated about thirty metres back the way we’d come, slowed for a sharp turn into a small side road, then skidded to a stop in front of a large, boxy building.
We sat for a moment. The windscreen wipers on high swished in time with my hammering heart.
Lights in the ground-floor windows shimmered through the twirling flakes, and the small area of tarmac contained about half a dozen cars, already covered in a couple of inches of snow. I glanced at the clock – ten-thirty.
‘What is this place?’
‘Apart from somewhere dry, and hopefully warm, and with a lot more space than my back seat?’ Beckett peered through the windscreen. ‘New Life Community Church.’
‘What?’
‘Everyone welcome.’
‘I can’t give birth in a church,’ I groaned. ‘What am I going to do, spread out along a pew?’
‘It’s literally called New Life.’ He undid his seat belt. ‘Wait here and I’ll check it out.’
‘No!’
Beckett quickly reclosed the car door. ‘They’ll have an office or something. You can get comfortable until an ambulance arrives.’
‘Comfortable?’ I shook my head, grimacing. ‘I meant, no, I’m not waiting here. Help me out.’
‘Mary, it’s a blizzard. You’ll freeze, and there might not even be anyone there.’
‘Then we’ll break in! Besides, look at me.’ I waved vaguely at my sweat-soaked top. ‘I could do with cooling down. Help me out or I’ll climb out myself and probably slip over.’
His eyes met mine for a second, and he must have seen the fear behind my determined stare because he gave a small sigh before getting out of the car and opening the back door.
‘You need your coat on,’ he said, hair already glistening.
Ignoring him, I heaved myself out before the next contraction hit, leaving Beckett to grab the coat and hold it over my head as he used his free arm to grip what used to be my waist, edging us around the worst drifts towards a pair of double doors.
Everyone welcome, I reminded myself after Beckett tried the door, then rang the bell when it wouldn’t open.
It didn’t take long for the blurred outline of a person to appear on the other side of the fogged-up glass. It seemed a bold move to me, opening a locked door in a side-street off what wasn’t the most reputable area of the city, without ascertaining who was on the other side.
Maybe they were serious about the sign.
‘Hang on, hang on…’ The door flew open. ‘Oh. Can I help you? I thought you were Moses with our pizzas.’
A tiny, older woman wearing a rainbow-coloured jumper beamed at me, a millisecond before I fell against Beckett’s damp hoodie, clinging on to his upper arms as I buried my head in his chest and brayed like a donkey.
I wasn’t listening to whatever exchange happened between Beckett and the woman, but as soon as the pain eased they hustled me inside, down a corridor and through a side door into a small room with a kitchenette and living space with a large sofa.
My heart began to race, head swimming as the reality of what was happening briefly penetrated the fog of labour. I scanned the room, desperate for something to get me out of this.
Beckett immediately knelt in front of me. The woman had already disappeared.
‘Take some slow breaths.’ He took my hands, dark brown eyes fixed on mine, voice soft and steady. ‘Here, with me.’
For the next few moments, I did my best to suppress the rabid panic as I tried to copy Beckett’s slow, steady in and out.
Once I’d stopped whimpering, he gave a gentle nod. ‘It’s okay. I’ve got you. You’re going to be all right.’
I nodded back, because right then I’d have crawled after him over the edge of a cliff.
‘Promise you won’t leave me.’
‘I promise. We’re going to do this.’
‘I don’t want to,’ I whispered.
He gave a wry smile, transforming his craggy features. ‘I don’t especially, either. But we will. Pretty soon you’re going to be holding your baby, feeling like a complete warrior.’
‘Warriors die.’
‘Not this one. Not this time. I won’t let you.’
I let out a pathetic, non-warrior-like sob. ‘Am I going to have to take off my knickers? Because I don’t think I can reach them at the moment.’
He burst out laughing then, his whole face lighting up.
And then the next contraction came, and everything changed.
It was brute force, and I was grunting for breath.
Squeezing someone’s hand.
The hair smoothed off my brow, which felt so lovely I sobbed.
Someone helped me onto the floor. The rug rough against my now bare knees.
Beckett’s voice, making no sense but a soothing burble like the brook behind my cottage.
I pressed my cheek into the sofa cushion and surrendered.