Chapter 44 #2
“Then we’ll deal with it at that time,” Opal said crisply. “Right now, Michael, your job is to get Gerty and West to the junction at thirty-six and Harrington.”
“Okay,” he said, and Opal ended the call.
Gerty didn’t know what to say, and tension filled the truck as Mike raced through the darkness. Only eleven minutes later, Gerty had had six more contractions, and Mike turned into a dirt lot at the junction of Highway Thirty-Six and Harrington Avenue.
Opal’s SUV already sat there, and she got out before Mike had come to a complete stop. She held her phone to her ear, and to Gerty’s surprise, she approached her door instead of the back driver’s one, where West’s car seat sat.
“I’m going to check her,” Opal said. “Give you the stats. You’re four minutes out?” She tilted her head, her dark eyes in full Doctor Mode. “Eight. My word. Fine. I’m putting the phone down for a minute. Don’t hang up.”
She tossed the phone onto the dashboard and reached into the truck. “Gerty, how far apart are your contractions?”
“Ninety seconds,” Gerty said even as another one started.
“I’m going to lower you and do a quick check.” She glanced over to Mike. “Get West transferred to my car, Mikey, and come stand here next to me.”
She focused on Gerty again and held up a blanket Gerty had not seen. “I’m going to cover you with this, okay?”
“Opal,” Gerty whimpered. “I don’t want to do this here.”
“I’ve called an ambulance. You guys are still a half-hour from Denver General, and you have to pass through two small towns also celebrating the Fourth to get there.” She wore a fierce expression and spread the blanket over Gerty’s chest.
“You only have to lie there, sweetie. I’ll do all the work.” With that, Opal scooted the seat all the way back and started to lay it down too.
Gerty pressed her eyes closed as Opal worked, and she knew the moment her husband had returned.
“Get my phone,” Opal told Mike, and he complied. “She’s dilated to a nine, and I can see the baby’s head. Where the devil are you?”
Tears slithered out of Gerty’s eyes. I don’t want to have this baby at the junction of Highway Thirty-Six and Harrington, she thought.
“Momma and Daddy are on their way too,” Opal said. “They’ll go to the hospital to make sure you have what you need.”
“I don’t have the baby bag,” Gerty said, trying to sit up.
“Tag called your daddy,” Opal said. “He’s on his way to your house to get it. He’ll bring it over to the hospital too.”
Pure gratitude ran through Gerty as the night air disappeared under the covering of the blanket.
“I’m going to sit you up,” Opal said. “The paramedics will be here in ninety seconds, and I think you can hold off on having him until then.”
Gerty had never had ninety seconds pass so slowly, and it seemed to take forever for the ambulance to arrive, even after she first heard the siren.
Two men approached with a gurney, and Opal gave them all the information she had. Gerty let herself get loaded from the passenger seat of her husband’s truck to the gurney to the back of the ambulance.
Mike climbed in with her, immediately taking her hand. “We’re okay,” he told her, leaning over and pressing his lips to her forehead as the IV went into her wrist. “They have all the medical equipment we need.”
She looked up and into her husband’s eyes. “I like the name Thad the best.”
He grinned at her. “And your daddy’s name for the middle name?”
She nodded as another contraction rocked through her, the need to push so, so, so strong. She groaned and tried to sit up, saying, “I need to—”
“Nope,” the paramedic nearest her said. “I don’t want you to push yet.” He put a firm hand on her shoulder. “We’re almost ready, though.”
Mike had to move back, and the paramedics started talking to her, asking her questions, and giving each other instructions—all while the ambulance raced toward the hospital, its siren screaming.
A couple of hours later, Gerty opened her arms for her perfectly wrapped baby boy. Love filled her from head to toe, and her face contained a smile she couldn’t have erased if she tried.
“Here he is,” Mike whispered. “All bathed and ready for you, Momma.”
She couldn’t look away from Thad’s beautiful face, his perfect little nose, his wisp of light blonde hair. “He looks like me,” she whispered. West had been all Mike, all Hammond, all day long.
Thad seemed to have picked up on some of her genes, and Gerty looked up at her husband. “Thank you for going with him.”
She’d delivered the baby in the back of the ambulance as they’d arrived in the emergency bay. Four nurses had met them, and they’d immediately whisked the baby away, into a more temperature-controlled environment.
Gerty had sent Mike with them, while the paramedics had moved her into a room in the emergency department, where she’d delivered the afterbirth, been monitored for an hour, and then moved to the maternity department.
She’d been waiting to meet her son since, and now, she relaxed into Mike’s side as he slid into the narrow hospital bed with her, curling his arm around her and Thad and securing them both against his chest.
“You’re incredible, Gerty,” he said.
“We almost made it,” she said.
“Almost.” He chuckled. “West is in bed at Opal’s, and your daddy dropped off the baby bag. I sent my parents back to the farm too. They’ll all come in the morning to meet him.”
Gerty nodded and closed her eyes as she relaxed into Mike’s safety and warmth. “Next time we have a baby, we’re moving into a suite next door to the hospital and not going anywhere for the last three weeks of the pregnancy.”
“Yes, we are,” Mike whispered. “Yes, we absolutely are.”