by Elle Kennedy
For the past eight hours, I’ve been about as helpful as a fish out of water. Or a fish in water, because what the fuck do fish really offer to society?
Every time I try to encourage Sabrina to do her breathing, she glares at me like I slaughtered her treasured family pet. When I offer her some ice chips to chew on, she tells me to shove them up my ass. The one time I peeked over Doctor Laura’s shoulder at Sabrina’s lady parts, she told me that if I did that one more time, she’d break my hockey stick and stab me with it.
The mother of my child, folks.
“Four centimeters dilated,” Doctor Laura reports during her latest check-in. “We still have a ways to go, but things are progressing nicely.”
“Why is it taking so long?” I ask in concern. “Her water broke hours ago.” Eight hours and six minutes, to be exact.
“Some women deliver their babies within hours of the water breaking. Some don’t start having contractions as late as forty-eight hours after it. Every labor is different.” She pats my shoulder. “Don’t worry. We’ll get there. Sabrina, let the nurse know if the pain becomes too much for you, and we’ll administer that epidural. But don’t wait too long. If the baby is too far down the birth canal, it won’t do any good. I’ll be back in a bit to check on you.”
“Thank you, Doc.” Sabrina’s tone is as sweet as sugar, probably because Doctor Laura is the one who controls the drugs.
And yep, the second the doctor is gone, my woman’s smile fades and she fixes me with a scowl. “You did this to me,” she growls. “You!”
I fight a laugh. “Takes two to conceive, darlin’. At least according to science.”
“Don’t you dare bring science into this! Do you even care what’s happening to my body right now? I—” A groan rips out of her throat. “Noooooo! Oh, Tuck, another contraction.”
I snap to action, rubbing her lower back just like Hippie Stacy instructed me to. I order her to breathe and count out each breath, while diligently checking the monitor she’s hooked up to, which is measuring and timing her contractions.
It passes quickly, and the next one doesn’t come for a while, which disheartens me. I read up on the labor process, and it seems like Sabrina is still in the early stages of it. She hasn’t even hit active labor yet, and I pray to God that this baby doesn’t take days to pop out.
“It hurts,” she moans after another contraction ends. There’s a sheen of sweat on her face and her lips are so dry they’re turning white.
I rub an ice chip over her mouth and lean down to kiss her temple. “I know, darlin’. But it’ll all be over soon.”
I’m lying. Four more hours pass before she dilates to five centimeters, and then another three before she’s at six. That brings the tally to fifteen hours, and I can see Sabrina’s energy beginning to drain. Plus, the pain is getting worse. Her latest contraction has her gripping my hand so tight I feel the bones shift.
When it ends, she collapses against the bed in a sweaty mess and announces, “I want the epidural. Fuck, I’ll even take the forceps of doom. Just get this baby out of my body!”
“Okay.” I smooth her damp hair away from her forehead. “We’ll tell Doctor Laura when she comes back to—”
“Now!” Sabrina yells. “Go tell her now.”
“She’ll be here any minute, baby. And the contractions are three minutes apart. We still have time before the next—”
Before I can finish, there’s a lethal little hand bunching up my shirt. Sabrina hisses like a cornered jungle cat and murders me with her eyes.
“I swear to God, Tucker, if you don’t go find her right now, I will rip your stupid head off your stupid neck and FEED IT TO THE BABY!”
Nodding calmly, I pry her fingers off my collar and drop a kiss on her forehead. Then I get the fuck out of there and look for the doctor.
*
The tallies keep racking up.
Time in labor: 19 hours.
Time between contractions: 60 seconds.
Number of times Sabrina has threatened to kill me: 38.
Number of broken bones in my hand: who knows.
The good thing is, we’re finally at the finish line. Despite getting the epidural, Sabrina is still suffering. Her face is flushed a deep crimson and she’s been in tears ever since Doctor Laura instructed her to start pushing. She’s not a screamer, though. In bed? Yes. In childbirth, nope. The only sounds she makes are anguished moans and low grunts.
My woman’s a trooper.
A few hours ago I was able to duck out of the room to take a leak and text my mother and my friends, but since the hard part began, Sabrina hasn’t let me leave her side. That’s fine, because I’m not going anywhere until our baby girl is safe and sound in our arms.
“All right, Sabrina, one more push,” Doctor Laura orders from between Sabrina’s legs. “I can see the head. One more push and you’ll get to meet your daughter.”
“I can’t,” Sabrina moans.
“Yes, you can,” I say gently, tucking her hair behind her ears. “You’ve got this. One more push, that’s all. You can do it.”
When she starts crying again, I cup her chin and meet her hazy eyes. “You’ve got this,” I repeat. “You’re the strongest person I’ve ever met. You worked your way through college, worked your butt off to get to law school, and now you’re going to work a teeny bit harder and deliver this baby. Right?”
She takes a breath, fortitude hardening her features. “Right.”
And then, after nearly twenty hours of huffing and puffing and blowing the house down, Sabrina delivers a healthy baby girl.
After the tiny, slimy infant drops into Doctor Laura’s hands, there’s one split second of silence, and then a high-pitched wail fills the delivery room.
“Well, lungs seem healthy,” the doctor remarks with a smile. She turns to me. “You want to cut the cord, Daddy?”
“Fuck. Yes.”
“Don’t swear,” Sabrina chides, while Doctor Laura chuckles.
My heart is in my throat as I cut the cord that’s tethering my daughter to her mother. I catch a fleeting glimpse of a red gooey thing, but a nurse sweeps her out of sight so fast that I croak out a protest. But they’re just weighing her, and while they do, the doc does some discreet stitching between Sabrina’s legs.
I ache for everything she’s gone through, but Sabrina looks more serene than I’ve ever seen her.
“Seven pounds, three ounces,” the nurse announces as she gently places the baby in Sabrina’s arms.
My heart expands to triple its size.
“Oh my gosh,” Sabrina whispers, staring down at our daughter. “She’s perfect.”
She is. She’s so frickin’ perfect that I’m near tears. I can’t take my eyes off her tiny face and the tuft of auburn hair on her tiny head. She’s no longer crying, and she’s got big blue eyes that stare up at us, curious and unblinking. Her lips are red and her cheeks are rosy. And her fingers are so damn small.
“You did good, darlin’.” My voice is hoarse as I reach down to stroke Sabrina’s hair.
She peers up at me with a wondrous smile. “We did good.”
*
Hours later, we’re both lying in Sabrina’s hospital bed, marveling over the little creature we brought into the world. It’s been about twenty-four hours since Sabrina called to tell me she was in labor. She’s supposed to stay here for two nights so the doctors can monitor her and the baby, but both of them seem to be healthy.
A lactation expert stopped by an hour ago to teach Sabrina the proper techniques for breastfeeding, and our daughter has already proven how she’s better than every other baby alive, because she latched on right away and suckled happily at her mom’s breast while we both watched in pure wonder.
Now she’s full and sleepy and lying half in Sabrina’s arms, half in mine. Never in my life have I felt more at peace than in this very moment.
“I love you,” I whisper.
Sabrina stiffens slightly. She doesn’t respond.
>
I suddenly realize that she probably thinks I’m talking to the baby. So I add, “Both of you.”
“Tucker…” There’s a note of warning in her voice.
I instantly regret opening my mouth. And since I don’t particularly want to hear her say she doesn’t love me back or make excuses about why she can’t say it, I paste on a cheerful smile and change the subject.
“We really need to pick a name.”
Sabrina bites her lip. “I know.”
I tenderly run my thumb over our daughter’s perfect little mouth. She makes a sniffling noise and stirs in our arms. “Should we tackle the first name or the last name?”
I’m hoping she picks the former. We haven’t even discussed first names because we’ve been too busy arguing about the James-Tucker dilemma.
Sabrina surprises me by saying, “You know…I guess James-Tucker isn’t a terrible idea.”
My breath hitches. “James Tucker.”
“That’s what I said.”
“No, I mean, that should be her name—James Tucker.”
“Are you nuts? You want to name her James?”
“Yeah,” I say slowly. “Why not? We can call her Jamie. But the birth certificate will say James Tucker. That way she’s equal parts both of us, without the hyphen we both seem to hate.”
She laughs and leans in to kiss our baby’s perfect cheek. “Jamie… I like it.”
And that’s that.
33
Sabrina
Little James is in the back of the truck. The nurse waves to us from inside the foyer. I have a bag full of free shit sitting at my feet. Tucker’s hands are on the steering wheel. But we’re not moving.
“Why aren’t we moving?”
Tucker swings his bloodshot eyes toward the backseat. “We have a baby in this truck, Sabrina.”
“I know.”
He swallows hard. “This is fucked up. We shouldn’t be allowed to leave the hospital with a kid. I’ve never even had a pet before.”
I shouldn’t laugh at Tucker’s misery. In fact, it sort of hurts to do anything but sit in a still, slightly reclined position. But his frustrated, somewhat terrorized expression is so unlike him that I can’t stop a giggle from escaping. I cover my mouth to muffle the sound, having learned quickly in the forty-eight hours since the delivery that sleep is a precious and all-too-scarce commodity for new parents.
“I love that you’re the one freaking out. Start the car, Tuck. The family behind us wants to leave.”
He twists to peer through the back windshield. “They already have two kids. Let’s follow them home.”
“Let’s not.”
Gingerly, I reach over to Jamie’s car seat and tug the blanket down, because even though baby Jamie is sleeping and I should definitely not disturb her, I can’t help but want to stare into her beautiful, wrinkly face again. Her tiny baby mouth is slightly parted and her little baby fists are clenched tight by her side.
“Let’s go home,” I say firmly. “I want to hold her.”
My arms feel empty. Yes, Tuck and I are only twenty-two years old. Neither of us have steady jobs. I’m living at home with my angry nana and my asshole stepfather. Tucker’s living with a guy whose dream is to be an extra on the set of Entourage. And now we have a child together.
But looking at Jamie’s sweet face, all I can think of is how much I love her—and Tucker.
I ease back into my seat and watch as Tucker gets the truck into gear and pulls out slowly. I could walk faster than he’s moving the pickup along, but at least we’re leaving. Still, it takes us nearly forty-five minutes to make the drive home because Tucker maintains a steady speed of five miles under the speed limit.
“I’m surprised that even the Boston cop flipping you off and honking didn’t make you drive faster.”
“That asshole should be written up,” he retorts. “Stay there and I’ll come and help you out.”
I’ve learned in these last ten months that Tucker really gets off on helping me out of the truck, and I’m not gonna lie, I’m getting used to it.
He’s got these old-school courtly manners. Like, doors are always held open. I have to walk on the inside of the sidewalk in case there’s a drive-by shooting. He even holds my coat.
Mama Tucker raised him right. I could learn a lot from her. And since we’re bound together by this child, by her son, I’ve decided that we’re going to get along. No matter how many arrows she slings my way, I’m going to take them and prove to her that I’m good enough to be the mother of her grandchild.
“I wonder if I should get one of those baby-on-board signs. That way the assholes behind me can learn a little patience instead of laying on the horn like we’re all in some motherfucking emergency,” Tucker grumbles as he helps me out.
“What’s going to happen when one of those fuckers comes to your door wanting to take Jamie out on a date?”
Tucker stops abruptly, causing me to collide with his stiff back. “She’s going to an all-girls school.”
“Okay, so what happens if one of those fuckers is a female wanting to take Jamie out on a date?”
“None of this would be a problem,” he accuses, “if we stayed in the hospital like I suggested.”
I giggle and brush him aside so I can get to my girl. “She’s still sleeping.”
His solid frame presses into my back as he leans over to peek inside. “She’s so gorgeous. I can’t believe we made her,” he says quietly against my ear. “I’m buying a chastity belt.”
“I don’t think she needs one yet.”
“I’m thinking ahead.” He gently moves me aside to pluck the carrier out of the base.
I arch a brow. “I heard you once had a threesome.”
He nearly trips on a non-existent crack in the sidewalk. A light cough precedes his query, “A threesome? Who’d you hear that from?”
Ha! He doesn’t deny it. Amused, I brush by him to get the front door. “Carin heard it. Said it was always the quiet ones.”
“No threesomes for Jamie,” he declares. “Maybe we should homeschool her until she’s thirty.”
“We’re turning into hypocrites.”
Tucker nods enthusiastically. “Yup, and no guilt here.” Right before he ducks into the house, he murmurs, “By the way, it was a foursome.”
I gasp. “Two guys and two girls?”
He smirks. “Three girls and me.”
“Wow.” I’m more impressed than angry. “Good for you, stud.”
Snickering, he pushes into the front hall and kicks off his flip-flops.
Inside, the house is surprisingly quiet. Ray must still be in bed, because the television is on but the volume is low, and instead of ESPN, a game show is playing.
“That you, Sabrina?” Nana calls from the kitchen.
“I’ll take the baby to the bedroom,” Tucker says, trying to keep as quiet as possible.
I head to the kitchen. “Hey, Nana. I, ah, survived.” I raise my hands in a lame victory pose.
She wipes her hands on a towel. Behind her, bacon is sizzling in a pan and the smell of eggs and vanilla fill the air. My stomach rumbles in appreciation. Hospital food is terrible.
“The baby sleeping?”
“Yup.” I open the oven door. Thick slices of golden French toast rest in a syrup of peach juice. My mouth waters. “This looks so good.”
“You should eat and then go lie down. These first few weeks aren’t easy.” She nudges me toward the table, her tone and her touch surprisingly loving.
“Do you want to see Jamie?” I ask, trying not to sound too hopeful. Carin and Hope had visited yesterday, whereas Nana had stayed away. It definitely hurt my feelings, but since Nana is my go-to caregiver, I don’t want to be a jerk about this.
“She’s sleeping,” Nana says dismissively. “There’ll be time enough for holding when the little thing wakes up. Babies never sleep for long—you have to take advantage of it while you can. Your man here?”
“Right here, Ms.
James. What can I help with?” Tucker strides in with purpose, filling up the small room with his tall frame and broad shoulders. Whatever trepidation he had upon leaving the hospital seems to have worn off.
“You sit down too. We’re having breakfast. French toast and bacon.”
“I wish I could stay, but I have to go. My boss called and one of the crew members fell off a ladder on a job. He said he’d pay me extra if I came on short notice.”
“Extra money’s good,” Nana says with a nod.
Tucker leans down to kiss my cheek. “Walk me out?”
I get up without question and follow him outside to the truck. Now that I don’t have a baby bump between us, things feel awkward. He’s seen me at my worst, though, and is still sticking around. “Thanks for everything.”
“I haven’t done much.”
“You were there with me. That’s a lot.”
He runs his thumb along my jawbone. “You were out of it in the hospital. Do you remember much of it?”
Like how you told me you love me?
“I don’t remember much,” I lie. “I was operating on pure exhaustion.”
His face tightens with disappointment. “All right. If you want to play it that way, I’ll let it go for now.” He opens the driver’s door. “I’ll see you after work. Call me if you need anything.”
I want to tell him I need him to say he loves me when I’m not screaming my head off in pain or when I’m not weeping about how scared I am of motherhood.
A dozen emotions slide and pulse beneath the thin membrane of my self-control. Feeling vulnerable, I step back. “We’ll be fine. Come when you can.”
From the way his jaw hardens into granite, I know it’s not the answer he wants.
With a small wave, I hurry inside, not waiting to see him roar away. In the living room, I find Nana holding Jamie.
“She was crying,” Nana says defensively.
“It’s fine,” I tell her, fighting a smile. “Mind if I hop in the shower? I feel gross.”
“You go on ahead.” Her gaze is glued to Jamie’s face. “This little one loves her grandma, don’t you? Don’t you?”
