Baby Fever

by Landish, Lauren

  Riding the high as long as possible, I open my eyes again to see Rose catching her breath too. She smiles, and it’s like sunshine on my heart. “Eight months, and you still want me like it was the first time.”

  “Damn, Momma.” I pant, wiping the sweat from my forehead. “You’re sexier now than ever. As fast as you make me come, maybe this traveling thing isn’t so bad after all.”

  Rose chuckles. “Mmmhmm, that was just what I needed, but I still wish you were here in person.”

  “Me too, baby. This is it, though. Last trip for a long while, and then it’ll just be you, me, and our little girl.”

  “I like that . . . kinda hard to do Skype sex with a baby around. We’ll just have to be boring.”

  “Oh, I can help you be quiet,” I tease. Rose laughs, nodding. We talk for a bit longer, and while my cock says it still wants a little attention, I know I have to get up before sunrise to head out so I start to wrap things up. “I think I’ve gotta get some sleep. I’ll be off-grid for five days to ride out, do the checks with Sam, and ride back. I won’t have phone service till I’m back in town, out of the forest. Brad promised to take care of you, and if there’s an emergency—”

  Rose interrupts, shaking her head. “There won’t be an emergency. I’ve got this handled, and you’re right. I’ve got great friends if, by chance, there is. So no stress, Nic.”

  “I know you do, but if there’s an emergency, have someone call Wes. I left his number there, and he can get in contact with me if he really has to. If you need me, that’s how to reach me.”

  Rose nods. “Got it. It’s fine. Go get your work done, play in the outdoors, and feed your spirit, then haul ass home as soon as possible.”

  “Will do. I’ll be back before you know it.”

  Rose

  Rolling out of bed, I scowl at the alarm clock, its beep-beep-beep an annoying reminder of all the things I need to do today. I’m opening the boutique, and Devon comes in to cover the afternoon shift so I can hole up in my office to place an order for our next shipment before she closes down.

  The spring lines are in full swing, and I’m already looking for this summer’s lines, knowing that’s another of the big tourist seasons. May through August pays for September through November, when the ski season starts around here. Just not enough fall foliage, I guess. Too many pine trees, even if they smell great.

  Mentally running through the list of clothes I’ve already selected, I try to decide what bonus pieces I want to order as well.

  One of the major ways I can add to my bottom line and provide exceptional customer service is in not only providing the one piece a customer is looking for, but in providing an entire ensemble, from dress to jewelry to shoes to jacket. The difference between ‘oh, that’s nice’ and ‘holy shit, I gotta get me one of those!’ often comes down to these little accessories. Those detail pieces are what I need to determine this afternoon to finalize the order.

  Finishing up my mental prep as I brush my teeth, I slip on a slim-fit cotton dress that hugs my curves and highlights my baby belly. Amelia’s really far too big to call her a ‘bump’ any longer. While the mornings and evenings are still cold around here, days are nice and the shop can get really warm. Devon has insisted on keeping the shop at exactly the temperature that Ana’s told her is perfect for me. Ah, well, better to be over-loved than under, I guess.

  Turning sideways to check myself in the mirror, I really am stunned by how huge I’ve gotten. I always thought the expression ‘she swallowed a basketball’ was funny, but when it’s your own body stretched, it’s shockingly odd to see yourself that way. I’m thankful that most of my pregnancy weight seems to be contained to my belly, breasts, and if I’m honest, my butt, and if the mirror isn’t lying, I look good—glowing, healthy and happy. Especially my ass. I’m gonna have to figure out how to keep that cushion for the pushing after Amelia is born. Eat your heart out, Kardashian family!

  Slipping on low-heel booties that will be comfortable all day, I decide to just grab dry toast and decaf coffee on my way out the door. My stomach is a little upset and I don’t know if it’s from Amelia dancing inside me all night or because I miss Nic so much. Probably both. Amelia seems to get antsy when Nic’s not around. She’s gonna be a total Daddy’s girl for sure.

  Unlocking the boutique, I get to work straightening racks, putting away the few things left in the dressing room area before deciding that the mannequins up front need new outfits. With the change in weather, it’s time for a new series up front.

  This is one of my favorite parts of my job, creating a look that is eye-catching and interesting to get folks to stop in and buy the outfit I’d put together. Every time that happens, it feels like a pat on the back for creating a look that someone wants to actually wear on their body for their daily life.

  By the time noon rolls around, I’ve helped several customers and selected the mannequin outfits, trying to discreetly wrestle the clothes onto the unhelpful forms while there’s no one in the shop but me. If anyone can ever make a mannequin that doesn’t make you half rip a seam getting a blouse on, I’ll kiss them.

  “Come on, you son of a bitch—” I grunt as I wrestle with a light pink blouse that’s going to be part of a set inspired by Amelia, who seems intent on pink becoming my favorite color even before she gets here. The bells jingle merrily as the front door opens, and I call out, “Welcome to the Mountain Rose . . .” as I look up, but it’s not a customer.

  Devon comes in with takeout boxes from the diner, and as her eyes find me, her face screws up in exasperation. “Rose, what the hell are you doing? Why are you kneeling on the floor? You’re about to pop, for gosh sakes!”

  She sets the boxes down on the desk and offers me a hand, helping me up. I accept the helping hand, grunting as I get up. “I’m fine. Just decided the mannequins needed to have some fun so I picked them out new outfits. And I’m kneeling because if I sit all the way down, I’d never get back up. I’m pregnant, not broken.”

  Laughing, Devon brushes off my butt, which I guess has gotten a little bit of carpet fuzz on it. “All right, pick them out some goodies and then leave the clothes for me to do it. That’s what you pay me for, Boss.”

  I smile, glad that she is such a good worker but more importantly, that she’s become a good friend in the months that she’s worked here. I don’t know what I’d do without her and I’m glad to have her so that I can go on maternity leave in a few weeks, secure that she’s got the boutique well in hand. The Mountain Rose isn’t going to miss out on the kick-off to the summer sale season, and I’m not going to have to rush back either.

  “Thanks, truly. You’re a lifesaver.”

  Devon shakes her head and heads back behind the register to drop off her things. “That’s what I’m here for. So, besides doing too much,” she says, giving me a knowing, reproachful glare, “what’s up?”

  I smile, quietly loving her mama bear instinct because I already have quite a serious streak of protectiveness over Miss Amelia. “Nothing much. Saw some customers, sold several items, including one of the long layered maxi-skirts and one of those chunky turquoise necklaces to the same lady.”

  Devon does a little fist pull as she makes a cha-ching sound. “Money, money, money, baby.”

  “Yep,” I agree, not mentioning that I’m going to be giving Devon a bump in her paycheck this month because that necklace was her idea. “Good sale and a nice lady. She had me cut the tag off the necklace and wore it out—said it was her new favorite.” I smile at the memory of how excited the woman was with her new treasure.

  “I’m glad,” Devon says. “All right, let me finish this up and you can get to whatever else needs done. Don’t forget your lunch. I got us soup and sandwich specials today.”

  I grab the takeout box, inhaling the delicious aroma and realizing that the dry toast didn’t exactly last me long enough and I’m suddenly starving. “Thanks again. Holler if you need anything, otherwise I’m hibernating until I’m done.”
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  I get to the office and sit—well, more of a controlled fall—down on the couch, resting my food box on my belly and laughing that it’s become a convenient place to perch things. I sip at the soup. It’s good, light but filling, and helps me feel reenergized. For a diner that has a reputation for being a bit of a great side-of-the-highway comfort food place, they really know how to make a damn good high-quality soup . . . and today’s ginger and chicken with vegetables really kicks ass.

  Deciding to save the sandwich as a pick-me-up treat for later, I set the box on the little table and stand to switch over to my desk. As I stand, my belly tightens, a strong squeezing sensation moving from under my ribs to down deep in my pelvis. It takes my breath away for a moment before I remember to breathe slowly, in and out.

  “Whoa, baby,” I mutter, grabbing the edge of my desk. “What the—” My mind whirls, and I realize I just had a contraction.

  As it passes and I feel fine again, I’ll admit that I’m a little excited. Dr. Stevens and the nurses who’d done my birthing classes had talked about how most women have practice contractions for weeks before they actually go into labor—Braxton-Hicks contractions, they call them—to help their bodies prepare.

  “It’s like a marathon runner doing training runs beforehand,” Dr. Stevens told me when he explained them. “You’ve got to get your muscles ready and learn how to stay calm and breathe through the contraction. There’s another benefit too . . . for Amelia. The practice contractions will help her get in position and be ready for her birthday.”

  All right, first practice contraction . . . handled like a boss, and that means I’m getting one step closer to meeting my little girl. I wish I could call Nic to tell him, but he’s still incommunicado out in the forests of Oregon, and I don’t want to scare the shit out of him by using Wes to get in touch with him. But he’ll be back in three days and I know he’ll be just as excited as I am.

  I picture him holding my hands, telling me to breathe as he puffs his chest out, breathing with me, rubbing my belly lightly to feel the contraction himself and help me get through them as they become stronger.

  We’re gonna do this. We’re gonna be parents. I can’t believe it. Trying to focus my buzzing brain, I sit at the desk, focusing on clicking all the right buttons as I go through item after item for the order. I don’t have any more contractions, just a general sense of tightness as I work, but I’m comfortable enough considering there’s a human being doing somersaults inside me. “Hope you’re having fun down there, babe,” I tell Amelia after clicking the Pay button on the last order. “Just think, soon enough, you’ll be outside and then the real fun starts.”

  By late afternoon, I’m exhausted and hungry so I grab my earlier sandwich, thankful I saved it. After munching it down, I decide a little walking would do my back some good. The hours spent hunching in my office chair have not been doing my back any favors.

  I step out into the boutique to see Devon making final adjustments to the mannequins, which are now placed in the display windows. Devon hears me and calls over, doing a final flourish with her feather duster. “Whatcha think, Rose?”

  “Looks great. Thanks for finishing those.” Her eyes stay locked on her work as she brushes a little lint off the top and tweaks the necklace.

  “No problem, Boss. You did good with the picks. Miss Madison-the-Mannequin looks ready for a night on the town. Heard she’s been talking to that mannequin they’re using for the Nike compression gear at the sporting goods store. Wonder if he’s enhancing any bulges in all that spandex.”

  “Well, if anyone can find out, it’s Maddie,” I say as I laugh a little, the jiggle causing me to inhale sharply as another contraction shoots across my belly. “Oof!”

  Devon is instantly sober and rushes over to me. “Rose, what’s wrong? Are you okay?”

  I breathe, nodding my head, waiting until it passes before I reply. “I’m fine, just having some Braxton-Hicks contractions today.”

  “You sure?” Devon asks, her eyes searching my face, looking for a sign of . . . something. “You do look a little pale.”

  I roll my eyes. Devon’s more freaked out by all of this than I am. “Gee, thanks, honey, but I’m okay. I do think I’ll head out for the day, though, if you have things handled.”

  Devon smiles and gives me a hug back. “Everything is under control. Go home and get some rest. Call me if you need anything.”

  I nod absently, wishing I was already curled up at home on the couch to get some sleep. I bend down to grab my purse from behind the counter, slipping it over my shoulder, when I feel a tiny little cramp deep inside and my panties feel suddenly wet. In my mind, I’m thinking that maybe I just peed myself, when I hear Devon gasp, her eyes locked on my leg. I look down and see a tiny line of blood trickling down the inside of my right leg, curling around to drip over my kneecap.

  “Oh, my God,” I whisper in a voice that doesn’t sound like me. “That’s not supposed to happen.”

  Devon’s voice is panicked, her eyes nearly big enough to fall right out of her head. “Do you want me to call Nic?”

  I shake my head, realizing he’s in the wilderness with no phone. “Not yet. Call Brad and tell him I need him to take me to the hospital. And call Dr. Stevens so he can meet us there.”

  Nicolas

  After our night of Skype sex, I headed out dark and early to meet Sam and Susan. Sam was nice enough to meet me in town, his son coordinating for us to meet during Sam’s supply run. He greeted me next to the biggest of his snowmobiles, a huge cargo job with attached trailer, with a hug that had damned-near taken my breath away, but it was good to see him again. Funny how a few days with just the two of you, working in the woods, could create an instant deep friendship.

  “I gotta tell you, Nic, you were a lifesaver this winter,” Sam says as we go up and down the aisles of the market, checking items off Sam’s list. “Twice, we got huge snowstorms that woulda knocked out our old gear. But the stuff you got us, me and the family were nice and cozy. Haven’t had a single snowmobile go down all winter, no matter how hard we’ve run them.”

  “Considering the amount of stuff you’re putting in this cart, I guess you’ve been able to run them pretty hard too,” I joke as Sam puts in a case of Dinty Moore beef stew to join the roughly hundred pounds of other stuff in the cart. I swear, anywhere you go in North America, you go into the woods . . . and someone’s going to have a can of Dinty Moore nearby. It’s damn near a law.

  “You would’ve laughed your ass off at this city boy who came out, bag packed full of beef jerky and socks,” Sam says, pausing his story dramatically to grab two twenty-five-pound bags of rice. “Damn fool had nothing else. Not a knife, map, flashlight, or even matches in there at all.”

  “What the hell was his idea? Was he going to build a tent out of socks? Keep the bears away with athlete’s foot funk?”

  Sam laughs. “I don’t know. Susan geared him up properly with your stuff and we headed out, supposed to be a five-day trip. But wouldn’t you know, by nightfall day three, we hadn’t even made it halfway to the turnaround point, so the next morning, we took a shortcut out and I radioed Susan to pick us up on the main trail in the SAG wagon. That big boy ATV you left sure came in handy. Got us out and home for Susan’s apple pie before dark, and city boy said he felt like he’d had ‘a life experience he’ll never forget’. Can you believe that?” He laughs good-naturedly. “Damn fool never even got to the peak I wanted to show him.”

  “At least he didn’t die,” I point out. “A credit to you.”

  “Your gear too,” Sam says honestly. “He put a beatdown on your stuff with his bumbling ways, but it took it all. Even when he thought that you were supposed to hammer tent stakes into a tree.”

  After finishing his list, Sam and I load up the cargo trailer on his snowmobile and jump into the passenger cabin to drive deep into the woods. “I know it seems a waste down here, where the snow ain’t deep,” Sam says as he adjusts his throttle, “but once w
e go about two or three miles, you’ll see why. While you’re out here, I’ll give the ATVs a test run. Some of the trails are clear enough.”

  “They’ll handle anything you put in front of them without a problem,” I assure him.

  As soon as we’re surrounded by trees, I feel a tightness in my chest loosen. The fresh air, bright in my lungs, rejuvenates me, and the pine boughs waving in the breeze as we slowly roll by seem to welcome me home.

  Susan’s greeting is much the same as Sam’s, although her hug isn’t nearly as backbreaking since she’s less than half his size. “Good to see you, Nic. How’s civilized life?”

  “Lots of good, but I’ll tell you about it inside. I see you’ve built a fire and I don’t wanna waste the good oak,” I reply, looking at the idyllic looking cabin. “And I heard something about pie?”

  “Of course,” Susan says with a knowing glance at her husband. “Come on in.”

  To say the dinner is delicious is a ridiculous understatement. The stew is venison, shot by Sam himself, while the pie is mountain berry, picked and canned by Susan back in October and aged just right. As we eat, we catch up more, and I tell them about what’s been going on over the months since we last saw each other.

  “So after our last visit, I flew around a bit, same as always, visiting with customers and negotiating with potential customers. A resort that had gone another way called us back, and I flew out to Great Falls, a town back east that I’d been to right before seeing you guys. Ran into a woman there I knew from my last trip.”

  Sam looks over at Susan, mouthing ‘a woman he knew’ as he waggles his eyebrows. She giggles, slapping his arm lightly. “Be good and let the man finish his story. Tell us about this young woman.”

  They turn back to me, and I smile at their easy camaraderie. “So, I see Rose—that’s her name—and she’s pregnant. She uh, well . . . she didn’t know how to get ahold of me, and there was a bit of a mix-up with a phone call message when she finally did find me, but long story short, we’re having a baby.”