Seventeen November 1971
SEVENTEEN
I was sitting alone at the little kitchen table working on trigonometry when there was a loud banging on our front door.
The apple pickers had already left, the trees bare of fruit.
The first frost had brought quiet, the skies darkened earlier, the fires that were lit for weeks sat dark and silent, and the remaining ash blew away with the November wind.
The knocking, the quick staccato thumping, surprised both Kiju and me.
Kiju shrugged and moved toward the door.
When we opened it, standing there, his eyes watering from the cold, was a young boy, eleven, maybe twelve.
“Well, who do we have here?”
“My mom.” He stopped to take a breath. “My mom. She’s having a baby, and she sent me to get you.” He bent at the waist, hands on his knees, winded from running.
No babies had been born under the tree in two years, and the light in Kiju’s eyes could have lit up the darkest hour.
“Aliet,” Kiju said, turning toward me.
“I know. I’ll get everything we need and follow behind.”
Kiju took off her house shoes, cheap white canvas sneakers bought new each fall, put on her rubber boots, grabbed a heavy blanket off the back of the couch and her thick winter jacket, and followed the boy.
As they disappeared into a patchwork of dead grass where tents had stood weeks before, I gathered the teas, a piece of soft leather to wrap the infant, the knife and the kettle.
The moon was shining in the daylight and promised to help guide us when the sun finally set.
The air was cool, the ground cold in anticipation of winter.
When I finally caught up with Kiju and the boy, they were on the far side of the fields, past the abandoned camp.
The woman sat with her back against the base of a tree, gripping her belly and breathing quickly.
“Well, let’s see what we have here.” Kiju bent down and placed her hand on the woman’s head, then bent farther to see under her dress. “What’s your name, honey?”
“Paulina,” she said, more forcefully than she probably intended. “Sorry, it just hurts.”
“That’s perfectly okay. I’m Kiju and this is Aliet, and we are going to help you. Now, do you want to go to the birthing tree or would you rather stay here?”
“The tree. It’s where I was born. It’s where I was trying to get to.”
“Well then, how nice is that. Let’s get you up on your feet, you have a little while yet.”
Kiju took one arm and I took hold of the other, helping her off the ground.
“Where is your man?” Kiju asked.
“I don’t have one. I mean, I don’t know. We were never a couple so much as company.” She looked at her son, who stood off to the side, and smiled apologetically. He just shrugged and smiled back.
We helped her across the field and down the path that led to the tree, instructing her son to stay at our house to keep the fire going and get himself something to eat; we would come get him when the little one was born.
As we reached the top of the path, the local milkman, headed home after his daily deliveries, slowed down as he drove past us.
I made a motion with my hand to shoo him away and he sped up, leaving nothing but the fading sound of a truck in his wake.
The tree was there as it had always been, waiting.
Paulina’s contractions were still spaced out far enough that we had plenty of time, so Kiju got her comfortable and told her stories of other babies born under the tree while I gathered rocks to make the fire.
They’d been scattered and it took me some time to gather them.
“Once, a set of twins, one right after the other. I hardly had time to catch one before the other came shooting out,” she whispered softly, pacing her words to fit in between the woman’s breathing.
“But they were both good and healthy, so don’t you worry.
From what I can tell, there is just one little one in there. ”
Paulina had chosen the same place all women did, between the two large roots, holding her tender but mighty body.
She made herself as comfortable as possible as I heated water over an open fire.
Paulina was explaining to Kiju that it had been twelve years since she’d done this, and she was afraid she wouldn’t remember what to do.
“Oh, it’s as natural as the sun coming up every morning. You’ll do just fine.” Kiju started to hum the birthing song, which I hadn’t heard in so long I nearly cried. I hadn’t realized how much I had missed it.
“I was born under this tree, June twenty-first, just over thirty years ago.”
“Well then, I would wager all the tea in China that I was the one who helped you into the world. Lots of babies were born under the tree then. I bet your story is just there above your head.” Kiju turned to see how I was doing with the tea.
I passed her a cup meant to strengthen Paulina’s body for birth.
The sun was starting to set, and once again the roots shone red.
Paulina took a sniff of the tea and scrunched up her nose before asking, “What’s in it?”
Kiju looked at me, then back at Paulina.
“That is a secret that has been passed down in our family, and the only people that know it now are me and my granddaughter here, Aliet. You don’t mind if we keep it a secret, do you?
I promise, it may not smell great, but it will help you keep your strength. ”
Paulina looked from Kiju to me and nodded, a little apprehensive but willing.
“And this is some cedar mixed with beech leaves in hot water to make sure everything is clean and safe for when the little one gets here,” I explained, as I poured the remaining tea into the ground and replaced it with pond water and beech to warm.
“Okay,” she said, and lay back down.
As the daytime moon took its place above the tree, I took my place behind Paulina.
I pushed my back into the tree, that sturdy, solid mass holding me firm as I pushed Paulina forward to knead her lower back the way I’d seen Kiju do so many times.
She groaned in relief. Kiju checked the position of the baby and declared that everything was fine.
“He or she must be a little reluctant to leave a place you’ve made so comfortable.”
Paulina smiled before another contraction set in. Her labour was longer than Sally’s. The contractions took their time getting closer together and we passed the time in conversation and occasional song.
Darkness was beginning to settle when Paulina’s water broke.
As Kiju lifted her dress to check on her progress, we heard voices coming down the path, men’s voices.
Men were not allowed here. Kiju looked from me to the path and back again.
I was about to get up and meet them when a group of four white men emerged from the path, their flashlights searching the ground, the tree, the birthing woman and me.
I brought my arm up to shadow my eyes, but one of them was shining a flashlight directly at me and I couldn’t see a thing.
“What’s going on here?”
“Lower the lights,” I said in response.
“Not until you tell me what you think you’re doing.”
“This is none of your business. Now leave.”
Kiju got to her feet and Paulina let out a low groan as another contraction rippled through her body. The lights, pointed at me, swung over to illuminate Kiju and Paulina. My eyes couldn’t adjust to the dark fast enough and I was blind.
“Looks like you are doing something that you have no right doing. This lady belongs in a hospital.”
“She belongs just where she is,” Kiju said, a warning piercing her words.
“Leave me alone. I want to be here,” Paulina said through clenched teeth.
“I’m sorry, but we are going to have to take you to a hospital. It’s for your own safety. We got a judge to sign a paper here.”
My eyes were adjusting, and I could make out the figures of three policemen, dressed in uniform, and the milkman, still in his white suit but without the silly hat he always wore. One of the men held up a piece of paper, but it was too dark and he was too far away for me to read it.
One of the officers walked toward me and I stepped back, not sure what was about to happen. He passed me to stand by the fire. He looked back at Kiju before using his foot to tip the kettle. The scented water spilt to the ground and the hungry earth drank it up.
“Stop. We need that.” I bent down to grab the kettle and set it upright again.
The heat of the kettle burned my hands and I dropped it, gasping.
The man grabbed me by the arm and pushed me away before using his foot again to kick dirt onto the last of the flames, extinguishing them completely. Now only the moon could see everything.
“Leave us alone. Please.” Paulina tried to lift herself up onto her elbow to protest but fell back hard against the tree. I moved toward her, but the police officer who’d extinguished the fire grabbed me by the arm and pulled me back.
“Ma’am, we are here to take you to the hospital.
” The one who looked to be in charge, his moustache too big for his face, looked behind him, put his fingers in his mouth and let out a shrill whistle.
Two firemen came running down the path, a narrow canvas stretcher between them.
They pushed Kiju out of the way and she fell backwards.
“No!” Paulina yelled. “No. I want to have my baby here. Leave me alone.”
She was crying, but they had already lifted her off the ground and strapped her to the stretcher.
She tried to push them away, but they strapped her wrists to the edge.
They said nothing to her, not a word of comfort, nothing.
She cried and screamed as they quickly made their way down the path to the road.
I tried to run, to catch up, to offer Paulina a comforting word, but the remaining men stepped in front of us, barring us from following.
“And you two, you need to come with us,” the moustache man said.
“What for?”