Chapter 23 Lincoln
LINCOLN
I was having an amazing dream, but my panther was badgering me.
Wake up.
Don’t want to.
We’d finished the nursery yesterday, and I was tired but pleased it was finally done and ready for our little one.
I don’t understand what’s happening, but Bronson needs you.
My eyes snapped open, and I sat up and turned on the lamp. The other side of the bed was empty. I shot out of bed, blinking at the bright light in the living room. My mate was leaning on the back of the sofa, panting.
“Bronson!” I was at his side and holding him as his ragged breathing calmed, and I helped him straighten. “Is this it? Is the baby coming?”
We’d attended the classes and watched the videos. We’d read books and blogs and been on pregnancy forums. I knew we’d done as much preparation as possible, but I didn’t feel ready. Maybe next week I would, and I hoped whatever my mate was experiencing was false labor.
“Yes.”
Yes! I thought we’d go through a period of “Is this it?” “No, it’s nothing,” or “Let’s wait and see.” But that was a full-throated, “Yes.”
Shit, I should have paid more attention in class. Why didn’t I take more notes? Was it too late to scribble down pointers from a video?
“It’s the third one in the last hour.”
What? I almost shouted, “Why didn’t you wake me?” But I choked off my reply. Bronson needed me, not some asshat version of me.
“I didn’t want to wake you.” He rested his head on my chest.
“Next time wake me.”
He snorted and looked up at me. “You mean with our next baby.”
“We’re in this together.” I kissed the top of his head, but he grimaced and grunted.
“Another one.”
His belly was resting against me, and it tightened. Gods, that must be painful, and it was probably time to go to the hospital, as the contractions were so close together.
When the cramping eased off, I picked up the hospital bag, phone, and keys.
“What are you doing?”
Was that a trick question? I told him we were going to the hospital.
“First of all, I don’t think it’s time, and secondly, you’re in your PJs.”
I suspected the hospital staff had seen stranger things than an expectant father wearing his pajamas.
My panther who’d been a proponent of a home birth told me we had to get to the hospital now.
I have to listen to Bronson, who's listening to his body.
Pfft. There’s too much listening and not enough doing.
My mate paced over the floor, with me following him and my panther repeating the baby was coming. The contractions were closer together than when I’d woken up, and Bronson agreed I should call the hospital.
The nurse I spoke to was calm, unlike me. It was a wonder she understood what I was saying because I ran all my words together.
“As this is your first baby, you can stay home. Come in when the contractions are five minutes apart and lasting for a minute.”
A minute? Had we learned that in class? All the knowledge I’d stored in my head had vanished.
Bronson didn’t seem as fazed by the news as I was, and we went back to pacing, cramping, and grunting. My beast suggested caterwauling, but I shushed him, saying Bronson’s body would tell him what to do. He grumbled about bodies being unreliable communicators.
“It’s okay, babe.” Bronson lay on the sofa, and I covered him with a throw.
“What’s that?” I sat with him, putting his feet on my lap and massaging them.
“Everything is going as planned.”
He was so calm, but perhaps he and the baby were communicating in code.
Over the next few hours, I timed the contractions and wrote the details on my phone.
I created a spreadsheet and obsessed over the numbers.
But as they got closer together, my mate couldn’t get comfortable in the intervals.
He gripped the back of the couch as another took hold and practiced his breathing techniques.
I put one hand on his back and rubbed in small circles as we’d been taught. Trying to ease my mate’s discomfort reduced my anxiety a little.
Bronson sagged against me, moaning that it hurt. “And they’re getting stronger.”
“It’s time, love.” We’d reached the five-minute mark, and I wanted my mate and our baby in capable hands.
He waddled toward the bedroom, and I was at his heels saying he didn’t need to change his clothes, but he headed for the shower and stood under it while still in his paternity shirt.
“I stink, so I need to wash off the sweat.”
Now? Okay. I helped him shower and dried him off. But I got the wrong clothes and he needed the right ones. But I didn’t know which they were, and we bickered until I got all the clothes from the drawer and he chose what he wanted.
“Ready?”
He cocked his head and headed back to the bathroom. “Gotta pee.” I went back with him, but as he finished, his water broke. There was another shower and more contractions that were closer than five minutes apart. I wasn’t near my spreadsheets. Damn.
I managed to get my mate into the back seat, though we stopped halfway as his body was wracked by a cramp. After buckling him in, I took off and skidded around the corner. Shit, I was supposed to be looking after Bronson and the baby, not causing an accident.
I hit a red light and another. At the second, Bronson's body contracted again. All I could do was outstretch my hand and breathe with him as the light turned green and I put my foot on the gas.
“They’re closer,” he yelled as he panted and hee-hee-hooed.
I breathed with him, wishing we could fly over the rooftops and land in front of the hospital.
Sweat dribbled into my eyes, and I blinked.
There might have been tears mingled with the sweat because I was terrified my mate and baby’s health were at risk.
I sped along the road, thankful there wasn’t much traffic in the early hours of the morning. My mate moaned, saying the baby was coming, but he didn’t mean in the car. Or did he?
“Oh my gods, the pressure.”
What? No! Verity had talked about that.
“I want to push.” I glanced into the back seat as Bronson doubled over and spread his legs and somehow wiggled off his pants.
Did I pull over or dash to the hospital? My mind was clogged with questions and possibilities. I was great at the breathing technique, having practiced for months. Delivering babies? Not so much.
“Can you wait?” Maybe he could cross his legs. If he and the baby were secretly communicating, he could tell our little one to cool it for a few minutes.
“No. Babies don’t wait for traffic lights. Our child is coming now!”
We needed a doctor and pain relief and ice chips. Damn, I had a supply in the fridge at home. I zoomed through the last light just as it turned from amber to red. I could see the hospital ahead, but there were cars and ambulances going in and out.
Out of the way, my beast yelled.
Finally, there was a gap in the traffic, and I flicked my headlights on and off.
The cars stopped, and I careened into the hospital entrance.
Without turning off the engine, I raced around to my mate who had undone his seatbelt and was lying down, with his knees raised.
Shit, I didn’t put the car in park. But I couldn’t open the door.
For once, my shifter reflexes deserted me, and I fumbled with the handle.
“Hey, move your car. I need to get through.”
“We’re having a baby right here, right now. Go around.”
I jerked the door so hard, I was thrown off balance when it opened. I leaned into the front and shoved the gear stick into park, but Bronson’s hands were gripping his bent knees and he was groaning.
“I can feel the baby.”
Gods, this couldn’t be happening. It was him, me, and the baby.
My mate’s cheeks were streaked with tears as he gasped that the baby was here. “Right now.”
I looked down, and gods, yes, he was right. The baby’s head was visible. Where were the staff? I poked my head out of the car and yelled, but an ambulance siren sounded and drowned out my voice.
Everything Verity had taught us deserted me, but she hadn’t instructed us on how to deliver our baby. My hands went numb, but there was no one else to help bring our child into the world.
My panther had his paws over his eyes because he didn’t trust me to catch our little one.
I dropped to my knees as my mate grunted and pushed again.
“You’re doing great.” I remembered Verity saying to push with the contraction, and I repeated that to Bronson. We grunted together, and then my mate let out a sound I’d only heard from my beast. I swore he caterwauled, and the baby was there on the back seat and then in my arms.
He was so slippery I was worried I’d drop him, but Bronson picked up the travel blanket, and we wrapped it around our son. We had a son, and my amazing mate had done it by himself with no doctor or midwife guiding him.
“Hey, do you need help?” There were footsteps behind me, and people appeared with a gurney.
With the baby on my mate’s chest and both on the gurney, I held his hand as we trudged to the ER entrance. I refused to let them go. They were my family and my everything, and I kissed Bronson over and over because I was in awe of him.