“I do believe she did,” Chelsea said.
“I like her, you know,” Mom replied.
“I do, too,” Chelsea responded.
“Tria?” the doctor came over and touched my wife’s forehead. It wasn’t the doctor we had been seeing but some guy dressed in Dockers and a blue button-down.
Tria looked up at him just as another contraction hit her. My fingers were nearly crushed in the process, but she got through it. I let her squeeze the shit out of my hand, figuring it was the least I could do, and tried not to show in my expression just how much it hurt. I definitely wasn’t going to say anything anymore; it just wasn’t safe.
“I’d like to take a look at you, all right?”
The doctor managed to shift Tria to her back so he could check her out, and I hoped she wouldn’t smack him on top of the head. I tried not to think about the whole thing as another guy getting up in my wife’s goods, but it was hard not to. I mean, he had his hand in her, for Christ’s—
“Mr. Teague?” the doctor said, startling me. “May I speak with you?”
Chelsea came up beside me and took my place holding Tria’s hand while I moved to the other side of the room with Dr. Whoever-he-was.
“May I call you Liam?” he asked.
“Sure, I guess.”
“Liam, your wife has been in some pretty hard labor for over twenty hours now.”
Had it been that long? My mind whirled around in a little circle, and I conjured up images of all the “frog in a blender” jokes I had heard as a kid.
“She really hasn’t made any progress, and she’s still only about two centimeters dilated.”
“She’s supposed to be at ten to have the baby, right?”
“That’s right,” he said with a nod. “But the baby’s head isn’t in the right place.”
“What do you mean, not in the right place?” I bellowed.
Julianne was suddenly at my side, and she put a hand on my shoulder.
“You have to stay calm, Liam,” Mom said. “For Tria’s sake, remember?”
I restrained a growl but glared at the doctor as he tried to explain.
“She’s turned face up, and her head is pushing against Tria’s pubic bone, not her cervix.”
“What the fuck does that mean?”
“It means your wife has been in some seriously rough labor for a long time, and I’m concerned it won’t matter how long she does this. The baby’s not going to come out that way.”
My head tried to find some kind of frame of reference for what he was saying, but I couldn’t figure it out. What did he mean, she wasn’t going to come out? She had to come out eventually, didn’t she? She couldn’t just stay there!
“It sounds like you are suggesting a cesarean,” Mom said.
I turned quickly to my mother’s concerned eyes.
“I think it’s best for both Tria and the baby.”
“She doesn’t want one,” I told him. “There’s no way—she doesn’t even want an epidural.”
“We may not have a choice, Liam,” the doctor said.
I tried to ignore his words. I couldn’t even get over the tone. I looked to Mom for some kind of magic answer, but the look on her face made it clear she didn’t have one.