Heaven (Casteel 1)

help more than necessary. And right from pain one

she seemed to know this birthing was going to be

different, and more complicated than the others. Tom

ran to hunt up Pa and bring him home as Grandpa

reluctantly got up from his porch rocker and set off in

the direction of the river, and I ordered Fanny to take

care of Keith and Our Jane, but not to take them too far from the cabin. Granny and Sarah needed my help. This labor was taking much longer than it had when Our Jane came into the world on the same bed where all of us had been born. Exhausted, Granny fell into a chair and gasped out instructions while I boiled the water to sterilize a knife to cut the umbilical cord. I tried to stop all the blood that flowed from Sarah like

a red river of death.

And finally, after hours and hours of trying,

with Pa in the yard waiting with Grandpa, Tom,

Keith, and Our Jane, and Fanny nowhere to be found,

while Sarah's face was white as paper, through all that

blood emerged painfully, and slowly, a baby. A little

bluish baby lying exceptionally still and strangelooking.

"A boy . . . a girl?" wheezed Granny, her voice

as weak and thin as the wind that fanned our worn

curtains. "Tell me, girl

, is it Luke's look-alike son?" I didn't know what to say.

Sarah propped herself up to look. She stared

and stared, trying to brush back her hair that was wet

with sweat. Her color came back as if she had gallons

of blood to spare. I gingerly carried the baby over to

Granny so she could tell me just what kind of baby

this was.

Granny looked where some type of sex parts

should be, and neither she nor I saw any.

I could hardly accept what my eyes told me.

Shocking to see a baby with nothing between its legs.

But what did it matter that this child was neither girl

nor boy when it was dead and the top of its head was