by Kate Morris
“The shed?”
“Yes, Reagan would like to deliver in here,” he says.
John doesn’t argue, either, because he is obviously a wise husband and a smart man.
“Are you all right, boss?” John asks her directly.
“I’m about to squeeze a watermelon out of my vagina. So, no!” she barks at him.
“I’m right here. I’ll be here…”
“No, just Simon and Sam. I don’t want the distraction of you and my sisters in the room.”
“But…”
“No,” she says with finality and presses her palm against her lower back.
“But you can help her until the big moment arrives, John,” Simon offers. “Just do the shower and walking. Help her breathe through her contractions. When they get too tough to talk through, bring her back. She’ll be close then.”
“Got it,” John says and takes her hand. Then he wraps an arm around her lower back and leads her from the shed.
“Wow, this is gonna be a stressful night,” Sam frets when they are gone.
“No, we’ll be fine.”
Sam looks at him with skepticism, “You’re awfully confident.”
“Just take a deep breath. I’m nervous, too, but we can’t let that show, not to Reagan. She’ll pick up on it the second she senses our doubt and will panic. We want her calm and under control for this. We’re definitely in for a long night.”
“That’s the understatement of the year,” Sam tells him.
Gretchen comes into the shed a second later and says, “Is there anything I can do? I just heard it’s going to be tonight.”
“Yes, actually,” Simon orders. “Take this bag of equipment to the house. Have Sue boil it all. Then make sure the sisters are preparing clean towels and linens. Reagan will have her baby out here in the shed, not the house, so we’ll need things brought to us.”
“What else?” G asks, taking the cotton bag of delivery and surgical instruments and readjusts her gun belt hanging on her slim hips.
“Keep her calm. Tell everyone else. Spread the word. Doc’s not here, so she’s nervous as all get out. We need her calm.”
“And caffeine for us,” Sam adds, making Simon chuckle.
“Yes,” he agrees. “That would be great, huh?”
“No, doubt,” Sam jokes as she pushes the EKG machine closer to the delivery table.
They both know short of an herbal tea that coffee is out of the question. She found some K-cups of it in a hospital for Doc, but nobody else has touched it. The find was so special, so meaningful to him that nobody had the heart to ask for a cup. He only allows himself one cup every third day so as to ration it, too. Simon wishes he had so much self-control.
“Tell Kelly to do a test on the generator to make sure it’s in perfect working order in case we need it,” Simon adds.
G leaves a moment later, and he is left with Sam in the quiet of the late evening, the sun having set while they were dealing with Reagan.
“Do you think the baby will be all right? He is coming early,” Sam asks with hesitation.
“I think so. It’s not that early. Remember, the mother’s life must come first above all. Reagan is our priority tonight. We must take care of her before worrying about the baby. If it should come to a life-threatening situation, she is the one we save.”
“I know. I hope we don’t have to make a decision like that,” Sam says sadly. “I wish Grandpa was here.”
“Yes, me, too. But, he’s not, and we have to handle this just like any other deliveries we’ve done in the past without him.”
“Right.”
He regards her for a moment, watching her flit about the room in a flurry of graceful movements before saying, “I don’t think the family would forgive me if something happens to either of them. Everyone’s already angry with me for driving you away.”
She stops moving and pauses. Her eyes meet his momentarily before dropping to the metal cart in front of her. “You didn’t drive me away. I’m an adult. It was my choice to leave, and I left.”
“I think we both know that’s not true, Sam,” he says.
She looks at him and says, “Doesn’t matter why I left. I can still come back for brief visits like this. And, besides, I’m happy over there, too. Just like I was here.”
“I don’t believe that, either.”
“Believe what you will. I am.”
Simon can’t help what he says next, “Because you’re with that Henry guy?”
Sam doesn’t answer, which makes him edgy. Does it mean that her relationship with Henry has progressed since he last spoke with her about him? Or does she not want to talk about him because they have broken it off? He lays out more instruments and grabs a stack of towels from the overhead cupboard.
“I’m technically here with you right now,” she mocks.
Simon chuffs and says, “If you are going to be with him, then you’d better start practicing some precautionary tactics, or you’ll end up in this same birthing suite.”
“Don’t be a jerk,” she derides.
“I’m not. I’m just being realistic. You could end up pregnant.”
“No, you’re fishing for intel. I’m not stupid Simon. I know what you’re doing, and you’re not very smooth at it.”
“I’m not prying,” he argues. “I’m just trying to offer solid advice. As your friend.”
“I’ve already told you that we aren’t friends anymore,” she reminds him. “What I choose to do with Henry is my business. The only things I have to tell you are what I choose to tell you, which is nothing. Especially not about my love life.”
This hurts. They were friends first, before and above all else. Throughout their harrowing ordeal with his aunt’s group and before he started lusting after her, they were good friends.
“I really wish you wouldn’t say that,” he says, hating the sound of his own weakness. When he’s around Sam, all he ever comes off as is weak. It’s pathetic really.
“Here,” she says, walking over to him and handing Simon a pair of sterile scissors.
“Thanks,” he replies and snatches her wrist before she can walk away again.
Sam doesn’t look up at him but continues to stare at his hand.
“I don’t want us to fight all the time, Samantha,” he admits quietly. Still, she will not look at him. There is so much he wants to say and so little time before the room will be bombarded with people. “I hate that our relationship has turned into this. I miss you.” This gets her attention because her blue eyes rise to meet his. “I don’t like this. I don’t want to fight with you. I don’t want to hurt you, either. I just want to be your friend again.”
“That’s not true, Simon,” she says. “You want to control me even if we aren’t friends anymore. I don’t even live here now and yet, you want to tell me who I can and can’t date.”
“I just don’t like him,” Simon remarks and drops her hand.
“You don’t like him, and you probably wouldn’t like anyone that I decide to be with because you’re overly protective of me and think you’re my father figure. There is nothing wrong with Henry. I’ve spoken to people about him and have found out for myself that he is a good and caring man. Nobody has ever said a single, negative thing about him. As a matter of fact, you are the only person I know who doesn’t like him. I wish you could just come to terms with the fact that you aren’t in charge of me anymore.”
“Fine. I will. You can make all the bad decisions your little heart desires. Then can we go back to being friends?”
“No, and that was condescending. It’s never going to go back to being the way it was,” she informs him with sadness in her soft voice.
“Why not?” Simon asks, trying to ignore the anger that is edging its way into his tone.
“Because I have…had feelings for you, and we just can’t pretend that I didn’t. Simon,” she says, stopping to look at him, “I bared my soul to you, and you completely rejected me, rejected the idea of us bei
ng together, and basically ruined it for us. Or maybe I ruined it by chasing after you. Had I known then what I know now I probably wouldn’t have confessed my feelings. I should’ve just kept them bottled up inside. Then we could still be friends. But it just doesn’t work that way. I can’t take the words back, and we both can’t just forget they were ever issued. It changed our relationship. Everything’s different now.”
“But the night of the tornado, I was the one you came to for comfort, not him. That has to mean something.”
It definitely meant something to Simon. He was so afraid that she was going to be killed. Simon didn’t particularly care if he was, but the idea of Sam being in harm’s way had greatly upset him. He wanted to go out and fight the tornado, look it in the eye and fend it off from hurting her.
“Yes, it means I trust you and took solace in what you were offering. But, if you remember, the next morning, you split. You didn’t even stick around to say goodbye when I had to leave.”
“Wait,” he says, holding up his hand, “I didn’t say goodbye because I didn’t know you were leaving. I was out in the woods or something with Huntley working on cleaning up the tornado debris and chasing animals. I was mad that I missed you.”
Sam shakes her head and walks away to the patient bed where she begins pulling a clean sheet over it. “It doesn’t matter, Simon. It’s over. It’s never going to be anything now. You’ve made yourself clear many times on the subject. You don’t feel the same way about me that I felt about you.”
He hates it that she keeps referring to her feelings about him in the past tense as if she has completely moved on and forgotten about him. Simon is pretty sure it’s true, and that bugs him even more. She doesn’t even want his offered friendship.
“That’s not…”
“It’s ok,” she says. “Don’t lie. Don’t cop to something just to make me feel better. That wouldn’t be you. You’re not a liar.”
This makes him frown hard. If she only knew what a fraud and a liar he truly was. She’d probably hate him even more, almost as much as he hates himself.
“You’re a good person, Simon. You’ll find someone. I’m sure you will. And then you’ll be happy…”
She drones on about this for another minute while Simon mentally kicks himself. There is so much he’d like to tell her, but doesn’t.
“Can I just ask you one thing?” she says, startling him from his thoughts.
“Anything. You know that,” he says, glad to have any interaction with her.
“Why did you kiss me? Why had you kissed me in the barn the night of the tornado? Why did you do it at my parents’ house and at the clinic? I don’t understand. You seemed like…I don’t know…like you had feelings for me. It didn’t seem fake.”
Simon’s pulse quickens. He’d like to pull her into his arms and do it again, but Sam is right. It’s over. He has no right to even think about kissing her ever again. This is what he wanted, for her to move on and find happiness elsewhere so that he could stop being a lecherous bastard about her. So far, it hasn’t worked out according to plan.
“Sam, I… I’m just... I can’t help…” he stammers and sighs. “This is a horrible, sick…”
Huntley bursts through the door, always at the most inopportune time, in Simon’s opinion. He never gets more than a minute alone with her, not here, or the clinic, and certainly not over at Dave’s compound where she seems to always be in high demand. He wants to confess to her how depraved he is where she is concerned. He certainly doesn’t want to disgust her, but Simon would like Sam to understand. It isn’t an easy subject to broach, and it is humiliating and debasing to admit to, but his lust for her is like a physical sickness. He wishes he could move on, but Sam is always on his mind, in his thoughts, his dreams, his fantasies. Especially his fantasies. And that’s the biggest problem of all.
“Hey! I just found out. This is awesome!” Huntley declares with excitement.
“Yeah, Hunt,” Sam says. “Kind of scary, though. I wish Grandpa was here.”
“Nah,” Huntley says with way too much confidence in them. “You’ll be fine, shadi. And you’ve got the Professor with you. You guys’ll be great!”
“Thanks, little brother,” Sam answers.
She offers Huntley a soft smile, which warms Simon’s heart. He wishes that he didn’t think about her so much, but then she goes and smiles like that, and it’s as if the sun itself has illuminated her from within. Or her dark hair will swish and shine in the moonlight, or she acts in a defiant manner that makes him long to snatch her into his arms and kiss her into submission.
“You’ll take care of Little Doc, right, Simon?” Huntley questions.
“Yes, sir,” he answers and wipes down the countertop. “She’ll be just fine. We have everything we need here. Are Sue and Hannah preparing the other items?”
“Yep, G brought them in earlier,” Huntley answers and rolls his eyes. He and Gretchen don’t always get along so great. Simon understands completely. G is a sassy girl with a fondness for cussing and smoking, and Huntley wouldn’t even dream of breaking a rule or doing anything bad. “I’ll go check on them.”
He leaves in a flurry of long black hair flowing freely tonight. Simon smiles and shakes his head.
“I’ll get a bucket and a mop,” she volunteers and walks past him toward the back of the shed.
Simon snags her arm and holds on firmly. “Can we talk later, Sam? I feel like I just…I just wish I could explain to you…”
Her blue eyes are beseeching and filled with curiosity and wonder. Or perhaps her eyes are always like this. Her dark pink lips are slightly parted, making Simon wish he could kiss her. But that would just further confuse their situation. She deserves an explanation, not more confusion.
“Got the towels,” Sue says as she strides through the door. “Looks like it’s gonna rain.”
Sam breaks away as inconspicuously as she can, although Simon is sure that Sue saw him holding her close to him. She sniffs out whatever Hannah does not, which isn’t much. Together they are a fearsome team in action.
“What? Oh, yes, rain. It might,” Simon concurs.
“I’ll make sure Kelly checks the generator in case you need it,” she says and walks toward the door. “I think I saw him heading that way.”
Simon is distracted because he is watching Sam walk away to the back of the shed to obtain more supplies.
“Everything ok, Simon?” Sue asks, garnering his attention.
“Yes, ma’am,” he says, turning back to her.
“Are you going to be able to do this?” she asks with real concern.
“Of course, Sue. Don’t worry,” he says. Simon knows she is fretting because Reagan is her little sister. He doesn’t blame her. He would be, too, if it were Paige in this situation. He thanks God that it isn’t. He probably would’ve killed Cory for that. “I’ve got this under control, ma’am. No worries, all right?”
She nods unsurely and leaves the shed. She’s right. Simon needs to get his head in the game and stop troubling himself over his relationship with Sam. She’s a distraction, always has been, but tonight, his mentor is in his hands, and she needs him. Simon can’t let her down. He shoves aside all thoughts of further conversation with Sam and gets to work, trying hard to remember every tiny thing he’s learned from Doc over the past four years on obstetrics and gynecology. This is the single, most important medical procedure he’s ever handled. The entire McClane family is counting on him.
Chapter Eighteen
Reagan
After midnight, her contractions increase to the point where she can barely continue walking through them. Her groin muscles, which have been sore and tugging lately, feel as taught as metal cording instead of human muscle tissue.
“I have to use the bathroom,” she tells John in their bedroom.
“Let me help you down the stairs, babe,” he says.
Reagan sends him an impatient look.
“All right,” he answers with apolog
etic eyes. “But I’m right on your six. Be careful.”
She makes it to the second-floor bathroom where she relieves herself. Then she washes her hands and accidentally pees some more on the floor.
“Damn it!” she curses loudly.
John blasts through the door with a startled expression and asks, “What is it? Is everything ok?”
“I just peed on the floor. So, I’d say no. No, John, I’m not ok. That’s probably my water finally breaking. Turn around! I have to go again.”
Her husband swiftly spins and presents his back to her so that she can finish leaking into the toilet instead of on the floor. It seems to go on forever.
“Done? Can I turn around now?”
If she weren’t so miserable and in such pain, Reagan would laugh at the hesitation in his voice. John is not the kind of man who is ever unsure of himself.
“Yes, I think I’m finally done, and yes, you can turn around. Ooooh…..”
“Another contraction?” he asks, flushing the toilet for her and taking her by the hand and elbow and leading her toward the sink. He has already wiped the floor dry.
Reagan nods and tries to control her breathing, tries to slow it down because she is on the verge of hyperventilating. John rubs her back as she leans down on her forearms against the countertop. The contraction recedes, leaving her sweaty and breathless.
“Want another shower?” he asks patiently. “You said it helped your back pain.”
“No, it’s time to walk some more,” she says. “Can we do it outside? I need some fresh air. The house feels too stuffy and hot.”
“Got it, boss,” he says and sweeps her into his arms.
“John! Put me down. You’re going to drop me. I’m so fat,” she argues.
Her strong husband only chuckles as he carries her down the stairs.
“I’d rather it be my fault that you take a tumble than to watch you trip and fall down these stairs on your own,” he tells her, then kisses her cheek. “And you aren’t fat, dear. You’re pregnant.”
