Chapter 4
Chapter Four
One nap, one potty break, and another Minions movie and at the rate James kept popping up his head, I was pretty sure he really was going to find out how babies got here.
If we only had Wi-Fi, then I could get him playing one of his games, which would definitely keep him occupied.
“Dad?”
“Yeah, Bud?”
“Can’t you make it so Miss Zoe doesn’t hurt so much?”
“I wish I could, son, I wish I could.”
“I’m all right, James.”
She really wasn’t. I’d been turning off the truck for twelve-minute intervals to save the battery, conserve gas, and make sure we didn’t die of carbon monoxide poisoning, but Zoe was dripping with sweat despite the sixty-degree temperature in the truck.
Her complexion kept vacillating between beet red and parchment white, and James was right—she was whimpering and biting back screams like nobody’s business.
Marie’s delivery was nothing like this. This was ten times worse.
“Miss Zoe, do you want to watch a movie with me? We could watch about Elsa. She sings.”
James started singing:
Let it go, let it go
Can’t hold it back anymore
Let it go, let it go
My kid had a good voice. I looked at Zoe, she had tears in her eyes.
“Come on, Miss Zoe. Maybe if you sing with me, you’ll feel better.”
Her knees were up, and I hadn’t measured, but the last time I checked, she’d looked pretty dilated to me. I knew another contraction was hitting her, because of the way she was squeezing my hand and trying to break every single bone in it. I looked at her face again.
Fire engine red.
Her lips were clamped shut.
She was breathing through her nose like a bull. Doing everything she could not to scare my boy, even though the pain had to be horrific.
Fuck.
This woman was fucking amazing.
I ducked down under the blanket and took another peek with the flashlight. Still no sign of the head, even though her contractions were coming less than a minute apart.
Zoe’s entire body slumped, her contraction over.
“James, I can’t sing right now. I’m sorry, honey. Maybe some other time.”
“I don’t like it that you’re hurting.”
“My body needs to hurt just a little bit for the baby to come out. It’ll stop soon, I promise.”
James gave her a probing look, searching for a lie. Then he had another question. “Is the baby hurting?”
“No, honey. This doesn’t hurt the baby. The baby is protected by my body. She’s safe.”
He nodded and smiled. “Okey-doke.” He turned to me. “Can I watch How to Train Your Dragon?”
“That’s a great choice. Do you need me to set it up?”
He rolled his eyes at me. “I’m four and a half, Dad. I can do it.”
“Right.”
Zoe snorted out a soft laugh. It was good to hear.
“Use your headphones, Son.”
“I will. You showed me. Tell me when the baby comes.”
“I will.”
James’ head disappeared. I leaned over the seat, and saw him connected to his iPad, with the movie queued, and his headphones on. I turned to Zoe. “You can start making noise again,” I assured her.
“Okey-doke.”
“Smart-ass.”
“So, Dr. Beckett, how was it looking down there? Any sign of Olivia’s head? Please say yes. Please. I’m begging you. I want to be done.”
Tears glistened in her eyes.
“I’m sorry, Zoe. Still no head.”
She pounded her fist against the back of the seat. “Dammit!”
“You’re a lot more dilated. You’re close. Your contractions are less than forty-five seconds apart.”
"Close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades," she gritted out.
"Yes," I agreed. "But close is good."
She let out a long, shuddering breath and dropped her head back. For just a moment, with her eyes closed and her dark hair plastered to her forehead, she looked utterly spent. Then her jaw set again, and she was back.
From what I could tell, that was Zoe in a nutshell. Down for three seconds, then back swinging.
"Talk to me," she said. "Distract me. Tell me something."
"Like what?"
"Anything. Where are you from? What do you do? Do you have a dog? I don't care, just talk."
"I’m an Army brat. Lived a few different places. I was born in North Carolina. Then there was Kentucky and Germany.”
“Do you sprechen de Deutsch?”
“I can if pushed. But I lost a lot of it. I was only there for three years, starting when I was seven.”
“Where after Germany?” Zoe panted out the question.
“Texas and Washington state, then Virginia. I ended up going to school—”
“Ahhh shiiiit,” she wailed somewhat quietly. “It’s bad, Adam.”
Now I wanted to cry.
Her whole body tightened. She grabbed my hand so hard I felt my knuckles grind together and this time she didn't hold back.
"That's it," I told her. "You’ve got this, sweetheart. You can ride it out."
She didn't answer. She was somewhere else entirely, somewhere pain had taken her that I couldn't follow. All I could do was hold on and not let go.
When it broke, she was shaking.
"Adam." Her voice had changed. Stripped of everything. No humor, no deflection, just Zoe. "I need to push."
There it was.
"Okay." I was already moving, repositioning, flashlight in hand. "Don't push yet. Let me look."
I checked.
There she was. The very top of a dark-haired head, just visible, just waiting.
Thank you, God.
"Zoe." I looked up at her face. "She's right there."
Zoe’s expression was a mixture of fear and relief.
"Okay," she whispered. "Okay. Tell me what to do."
I forgot. I was the expert. I’d done this with Marie. I sucked in a deep breath so that I could give Zoe all the reassurance and support she needed.
"On the next contraction, you’re going to push. Hard as you can. Bear down and don't stop until I tell you to."
She nodded. Her chin was trembling but her eyes were locked on mine, steady and fierce and absolutely determined.
The next contraction came fast.
"Push," I said.
She pushed.
The sound she made this time was raw and animal and reverberated through the cab. There was no way that James wouldn’t hear it. But fuck it, it was what it was.
“Dad?”
“It’s okay, Buddy. I gotta help Zoe now.” My eyes never left hers.
"You’re doing so good," I crooned. "Now, again. Keep going."
She bore down harder and groaned loudly.
"I can see her head. She's coming. Don't stop."
"I'm not…stopping…" Her words came out in gasps.
"One more. Give me one more."
Zoe's whole body arched. Her hand found the headrest above her and gripped it white-knuckled, and she pushed, her face turning purple.
Then everything happened at once.
“Daddy.”
I caught Olivia Post with both hands.
She was small and furious and absolutely perfect, and she announced her arrival to the world at the top of her lungs.
"She's here," I said. My voice came out wrecked. I hadn't been expecting that. "Zoe. She's here. She's perfect." I carefully cut the umbilical cord with the knife that I had sterilized earlier with alcohol wipes that I’d had in my first aid kit.
“Daddy, the baby’s hurting.”
I turned to my son, holding Olivia. “No, Buddy, she’s just mad that she had to leave Miss Zoe’s tummy. It was warm in there. The baby is perfect. She’s safe. She’s loved.”
I got Olivia wrapped in the cleanest thing I had—one of James's spare t-shirts from the bag, soft cotton, covered in little dinosaurs—and I placed her on Zoe's chest.
Zoe's arms came around her instantly. Like they already knew exactly how to do this. Like they'd been waiting.
"Hey," Zoe whispered. Her voice was wrecked too. "Hey, you. You are in so much trouble for that."
Olivia squinted up at her with the ancient, indignant expression of the freshly born.
"I know," Zoe told her. "I know. But you're here now. You made it." She pressed her lips to the top of Olivia's head, eyes squeezed shut. "Your mom is going to absolutely lose her mind."
I knelt up on the floor of the truck and looked at my son. His eyes were enormous as he stared at Olivia on Zoe’s chest. At some point, Zoe had unzipped her parka and unbuttoned her flannel shirt. Now Olivia was resting skin to skin with her aunt.
“Are you sure they’re okay?” James whispered his question to me.
“Yes. But I need you to finish your movie, okay? Zoe and I have a little more work to do.”
James’ eyes got even wider. “There’s more?”
I thought of the afterbirth.
“Just a little. So can you finish your movie?”
James nodded and slid back down the seat. I looked over and watched him plug in. When I was satisfied that we weren’t going to have an audience, I went to handle the next task. When I was done, I looked up to find Zoe nursing Olivia.
“Thank you, Adam. From the bottom of my heart. Thank you.”
“I know this is going to sound crazy but thank you, Zoe. Except for being there when James was born, this was the most meaningful moment of my life.”
Outside, the snow had finally stopped.