by Claire Kent
“Liz will be here in a half-hour.” Liz had been coming over to spend most nights so that Erin would have someone with her if she went into labor. “I better call her and tell her she doesn’t have to come.”
With a little groan, Seth rolled off the bed. “I’ll go clean up some.”
Erin reached for the phone without having to shift positions. Dialed up Liz.
Only then realized she’d have to try to explain to Liz how and why Seth was going to spend the night with her.
***
Seth had to leave at 4:30 the following morning.
Erin still hadn’t gone into labor, so evidently the surefire, traditional method hadn’t worked for them.
Which meant Seth would leave town today, before Erin had the baby.
She woke up when he slid out of bed just after 4:00, and she felt a heavy sinking in her gut as she heard him moving around in the bathroom.
He came back over to the bed, fully dressed, before he left. Knelt down beside her. Saw that she was awake in the light shining into the dark bedroom from the bathroom.
“I’m sorry, Erin,” he murmured, one hand on the mattress beside her. “I have to go.”
“I know.” She smiled at him determinedly. It was kind of a fake smile, but she thought it might possibly be convincing.
“There’s no way I can reschedule this. It’s the court’s schedule—not mine.”
“It’s fine.” Her head was still on the pillow, and she didn’t bother to pull herself up. “We’ll be fine. Have a safe trip.”
“I’ll be back sometime after midnight tomorrow night. As soon as I possibly can.”
“I know.” Her throat, and chest, and belly ached, but she kept smiling at him relentlessly. “Stop stressing about it, Seth. I’ll be sorry if you have to miss out on the birth, but don’t worry about it on my account. You better go. You’ll be late.”
His face twisted briefly. “Try to hold out until Saturday now.”
She snorted. “Poor pumpkin. We’ve been pressuring her to get moving for two weeks, and now we’re telling her to wait.” She patted her belly. “She doesn’t seem to be in a hurry, so you probably won’t miss out on anything.”
She said that, but she didn’t believe it.
Seth reached out and put a hand on her stomach. Then leaned forward a little—as if he were going to hug or kiss her.
Erin even raised herself up a little, responding instinctively to him.
But he just removed his hand and stood up. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.” He stood there for a minute without moving.
“Seth,” Erin chided at last. “You can’t come back if you never leave.” Her words were supposed to be teasing, but something about them suddenly struck her as poignant.
So poignant her voice broke on the last word.
She cleared her throat. “I’ll let you know if anything happens, and I’ll see you when you get back.”
He hesitated only a moment longer. Gave her one last look that she couldn’t really understand. “Okay. Take care of yourself. And of her.”
“Of course.” She swallowed hard. Stretched her mouth into one more smile. “Bye, Seth.”
“Goodbye. I’ll see you early on Saturday morning.”
She stared at him, feeling dazed and achy and like her face might break in two.
And she saw him turn around and walk out of her bedroom. Heard him moving through her apartment. Heard the front door close behind him.
He’d left.
He’d actually left.
She’d known, of course, that he was going to leave, but she’d never been able to convince herself that it would really happen.
She felt like she should cry, but she didn’t have it in her. She just slumped down under the covers and hugged herself gently.
It wasn’t that big of a deal. Yes, she’d wanted Seth to be at the birth. Yes, his support, his presence, would have meant a lot to her.
But she’d be perfectly fine on her own.
“Well, it looks like it’s just you and me, pumpkin,” Erin said out loud in the dim light of the room. “But we’ll have your Grandpa and Aunt Liz with us. We’ll be fine, won’t we?”
She released a sigh. Resigned herself to having this baby without Seth.
It wasn’t certain, of course. It was possible she wouldn’t go into labor for the next two days.
But Erin knew she would. Knew it. That was the way the world worked. She could have gone into labor at any time during the last three weeks, but she hadn’t. Would instead give birth on one of the two days Seth couldn’t be present.
The world was shaped by ironies, and there was no sense in whining or complaining about them. You accepted them. Made do.
The world was what it was.
Erin almost laughed—only slightly bitter—as she thought about how her life had changed in nine months.
How it would change in the next two days.
It was only a question of whether her daughter would come today or Friday. Probably today, so there would be absolutely no chance of Seth’s making it to even the tail end of the labor experience.
It would be purest of ironies, and so naturally she assumed it would happen.
Erin was right, of course.
She went into labor seventeen hours later.
Eleven
Erin had been lying on her bed with her laptop when she felt the first contraction.
At first, she wasn’t sure if it was the real thing. She’d been having Braxton Hicks contractions on and off for the last few weeks, but something about this one felt different. Made her sit up and take notice.
It wasn’t very painful, however, and it didn’t last long, so she simply kept writing an email and waited to see what would happen.
An hour later, she got off the bed and padded into the living room to tell her father that she was pretty sure she was in labor. The contractions were coming regularly, and she could tell they were gradually progressing.
Liz had been working on a story for her paper outside of Atlanta and hadn’t been sure she’d get back tonight, so her father had volunteered to stay the night. He was currently sitting on the couch, watching a cable sports channel, and leisurely sipping a beer.
Erin stood at the entrance to the living area, watching her father take another swallow. She gulped, feeling kind of emotional and really glad he was there.
Finally, he glanced up and noticed her standing in the hallway. He immediately straightened up and put down his can. “Baby?”
She wasn’t sure if that had been an endearment posed as a question or a concise inquiry about the impending arrival of his granddaughter.
It didn’t really matter. “Yep. I think things have finally started.”
He jumped to his feet. “Do we need to go to the hospital?”
Erin smiled. She wasn’t in too much pain at the moment, and she had enough time between contractions to adjust to them fairly easily. “No need to panic. It’s only just started. We’ve got a long time before we need to leave.”
“Right. How often are the contractions?”
“Every eight or nine minutes, I think. And they're not bad. We need to wait until—”
“They come every five minutes for an hour,” her father interrupted. “I know. You’re doing okay? Can I get you anything?”
Erin shrugged and let him guide her over to the couch. “I’m fine.”
She was fine. It was happening the way she’d learned in childbirth class. She felt fairly relaxed, not very anxious—just a slight acceleration of her breathing and heartbeat. In fact, it seemed a little anti-climactic.
She sucked in a breath as she felt another contraction, an ache in her pelvis that felt a little like a bad menstrual cramp, although it was mostly indescribable. It wasn’t very severe, though, and she managed to meet her father’s eyes and smile during the discomfort.
“I’ll go get the stopwatch,” he said, looking pleased to have something to do. “We should start timing them o
n and off so we’ll know when to get moving.”
Erin smiled again and leaned back on her couch. She knew this would last for hours, so there was no sense in getting worked up about it yet. She'd been told that average labor for first time mothers lasted fifteen hours—often even longer than that. And she wasn’t even positive that she was technically in labor yet.
She couldn’t believe she was finally having this baby.
Her dad returned with the stopwatch and perched on the edge of an easy chair with his thumb poised over the start button.
Erin couldn’t help but chuckle. “It’ll be a few more minutes before the next one comes.”
“I know,” he replied, his expression responding to her amusement. He was full of coiled energy, and his eagerness helped Erin feel a little more excited herself. It wasn’t just that she had hours of excruciating pain to look forward to now.
She also had her pumpkin to look forward to.
“Do you want to walk some?” her father asked, obviously trying to rehearse all of what he’d learned as his daughter was preparing for childbirth. “Or take a shower? Or—”
“Dad,” Erin interrupted. “It’s only just beginning. I actually feel pretty good right now. No need to drag out all the emergency measures yet.”
“Right. Well, what do you want to do?”
Erin swallowed again, feeling a tight ache in her chest that she tried to ignore. “Um, I guess I want to call Seth.”
His face softened. “Of course. Why don’t I take your bags to the car?” Before she could object, he added, “I know we won’t be going anywhere for a long time, but it won’t hurt to be prepared.”
She knew he didn’t really need to take her stuff to the car at the moment. He just wanted to give her some privacy. “Thanks, Dad.”
He just smiled at her cheerfully and went puttering off to get the bag she'd had packed for a month.
Erin picked up her phone and stared at it for a minute. It would be a few hours earlier in Seattle, so he may still be working. Probably was. Or else he was having dinner. Maybe she shouldn’t interrupt him.
Then she shrugged. He would want to be interrupted for this. In fact, he’d probably be furious if she didn’t.
So she dialed his number and listened to it ring.
On the fourth ring, she realized that he probably wouldn’t answer, so she began to compose a voice mail message in her head—trying to work out the calmest and most reasonable way to break the news.
She hadn’t yet finished mentally composing her message when Seth picked up.
“Erin?” His voice was brusque, urgent.
She was startled and befuddled by his abrupt answer. She’d been expecting the voice mail, and so she wasn’t prepared to actually talk to him. “Um, hi,” she said awkwardly, trying to switch gears again. “It’s me. Erin.”
“Erin, what is it? Is everything all right?”
She felt another little tightening in her chest at his words—the same question he asked at the beginning of every conversation with her. “Yeah. Everything's fine. Sorry to startle you. Did I interrupt anything important?”
“What’s going on?”
Erin just blurted it out. “I’m going into labor.”
There was a brief pause. “Right now?”
“Yeah.”
“Are you on your way to the hospital?”
His terse inquiry actually made her relax a little. “You’re just like my dad. No. I’m not going yet. It’s not anywhere close to time. The contractions aren’t—” She paused as she felt another contraction develop but managed to talk through it. “They aren’t that frequent yet.”
“Did you just have one?” His voice sounded odd now. Thick and a little unnatural.
“Yeah,” she replied, breathing easier once the contraction had passed. “They're not bad at the moment. Thank God. Apparently, some women’s early contractions are really painful. If I didn’t want to jinx things, I’d say that things are starting off pretty well for me, other than being two weeks late. Hopefully, it will continue that way.”
“I’m sure everything will be fine. Is Liz there with you?”
“No. She was getting in late tonight, so my dad came over. He’s here now.”
“Good. He knows what to do?”
“Yes. Of course. Both he and Liz are as educated about this as I am. We’ve got it all together. Liz really got into the childbirth class. She’s been like a drill sergeant with those stupid breathing exercises. Every time she sees me, she makes me practice.”
Erin paused for a moment. She’d asked Liz to take the childbirth class with her instead of Seth—because, at the time, she hadn’t been certain whether Seth would even want to participate in the delivery. It had turned out to be a good choice, given that he wasn’t here now, but she occasionally wondered if Seth had been hurt or offended by her not asking him.
Pushing past that uncertainty, she added, “Not to mention the other exercises.”
“Other exercises?” Seth’s voice sounded dry. Normal again.
“Pelvic floor exercises. She’s been making me squeeze the muscles of my, er, privates at every opportunity, since that’s supposed to help in childbirth and afterwards. She’s even been doing them with me. Says she hopes it will improve her love life.”
Seth laughed softly. “I think that’s more than I wanted to know.”
Erin found herself smiling at the sound of his laugh and feeling kind of sad at the same time. Then she ruthlessly told herself that she had no reason to feel sorry for herself.
It was perfectly all right that Seth wasn’t here.
“So how long do you think it will be before you go to the hospital?” he asked.
“Who knows? But I don’t want to go any sooner than I have to. My dad’s all excited about timing the contractions, so we’ll go when they come every five minutes for an hour, just like Dr. Warren said.” Erin sighed. “Apparently, it might take eight hours or so before that happens. It's going to be a long night.”
“Right.” There was an awkward pause, and Erin wasn’t entirely sure why conversation had suddenly died. Then he continued, “When you get to the hospital, make sure you don’t let them push you around.”
“I won’t.”
“And make sure they don’t try to hook you up to monitors all the time or an IV, unless it’s absolutely necessary. You need to be able to move around.”
“I know,” she replied patiently, feeling both annoyed and fond at his concern. “That’s all in the birth plan.”
“And make sure they don’t try to do anything outdated.”
“I know. We’ve already worked that out.”
“And make sure you get an appropriate room in the hospital. It should be all arranged. You’re supposed to get a suite in the maternity center. If you don’t, or if you don’t like it for some reason, make sure you call me. I’ll take care of it.”
Erin had no doubt that he would. “I’m sure the room will be wonderful.”
“And make sure—”
“Seth,” she interrupted. “Everything is fine.”
“Right.” He sounded calm and matter-of-fact, but with just an edge of something underlying it.
Erin wasn’t sure what to say next. “How are things going there?”
“Fine.”
That was all he said.
She paused again, feeling both uncomfortable and emotional. She knew why. She needed to say something. Something that had been building inside her for the last eight months—and that finally needed to come out. So she might as well say it now.
“Seth?”
“Yes?” His voice had changed, had gotten a little more breathy.
“I wanted to...I mean, I needed to say...” She trailed off, trying to find both the words and the courage. Wished opening up like this to him didn't always feel like such a risk.
“Erin?” he asked softly, urgently. “What is it?”
She cleared her throat again. “It’s just that... You know what
I said when I first told you I was pregnant? About how, if I'd had a choice, I wouldn't have chosen you as the father?”
There was a long pause on the other end of the call, until he finally murmured, “I remember.”
She couldn’t read anything in his voice, but she tried not to let the uncertainty about his reaction distract her. “I just wanted to… Even though you’re bossy and arrogant and occasionally overbearing, and even though you’re so closed-mouthed it makes me want to scream sometimes, and even though things might always be weird and complicated in this, and even though you had that stupid trip to Seattle at exactly the wrong time...” She had to pause to inhale. Recognized a strangely tense silence from Seth’s end of the call.
She concluded in a rush, “I don’t think the same thing now that I did then. I mean, I’m really glad her father is you.”
Her cheeks burned, and she felt too vulnerable, too earnest for her own peace of mind. Cynical, no-nonsense people shouldn't have to admit such things. It made them too uncomfortable.
“Thanks.”
Just the one gruff word. Nothing more.
Erin hadn’t really expected anything else. “Well, I think I’ll hang up. I feel another contraction coming on.”
“All right. Take care of yourself, and let me know how things are going.”
“We will. Hope your work stuff goes well.”
Erin disconnected the call with a sigh. She felt a little glum but forced that feeling away.
She was having her baby at last, and she was going to be excited about it.
It was perfectly fine that Seth couldn’t be here when it happened.
Her dad returned then. “Did you reach him?”
“Yeah,” she said, forcing herself to grin. Then she sucked in a breath and exhaled slowly as she felt another contraction begin.
He ran for the stopwatch.
When the contraction passed, Erin smiled fondly at her dad. He was happily watching the seconds run, waiting to time the contractions. “We’ve still got a long way to go, you know.”
“I know. What do you want to do to pass the time until we go to the hospital?”
“I don’t know. They say I should try to relax and rest up, but I’m not sure how I'm supposed to sleep. I’m starting to feel all jittery.”
