“Hold the head. Get ready for the next contraction,” I told him panting trying to catch my breath. “The shoulders should come out next.”
“Mom, I can see the baby’s head,” Keegan told me. Her voice was filled with so much uncertain emotion.
I smiled. Even through the pain. I smiled.
“I can too,” Adin agreed sounding just as in awe if not more so. Her words choked in her throat. She was nearly crying.
“Kerry, I have to push again.” The pain was building to a crescendo. I bore down again. Teeth gritted.
“Baby, the shoulders are free,” Kerry said excitement starting to creep in his voice.
The contraction ended. I rested my head back against Keegan. A slight sheen of sweat covered my forehead. Curls of hair flew about my face. My breath was quick and heavy as my chest heaved with the effort. We were close. One more contraction I told myself and the baby would be out.
“One more,” I told Kerry this.
He nodded.
I began pushing down again. Feet pressed so hard into the metal of the car I thought I had surely dented the frame. I heard Kerry’s gasp when our child fell into his hands. Keegan cried. Adin cried. I sighed with relief then tears welled in my eyes. Kerry looked like he didn’t know what to do now. He just stood there holding our squirming child, red and bloody covered in goo. His gaze never left the child in his hands. The hard part was over. The baby began wailing.
Thank you Jesus.
I saw the headlights coming at us out of the corner of my eye. They were too late. Kerry had delivered his own child in the backseat of Adin’s car.
“Thank God,” I heard my husband say the relief so evident in his voice.
Lucy hopped out of Pop’s car, white, crisp nightgown billowing in the breeze. Hair to her waist which we usually didn’t see as she wore it up in a clip was hanging over one shoulder in a simple braid. My mother trailing behind her with Brad’s help. What the hell? She shouldn’t be out of bed. Pop was with them carrying supplies. Kerry held the baby out to Lucy. I still didn’t know the sex of my child.
I was breathing heavy, exhausted from my ordeal. I was scared out of my mind. I could have cared less who saw me without my panties. Everyone who just arrived was pretty much looking in the direction of my vagina bared to them. Then I saw Brad’s face. He was crimson and turning redder by the minute. Pop was standing behind him so he couldn’t see anything. Brad was holding Yancy upright so he had no chance of going anywhere and trying not to look was like trying not to look at a train wreck.
“Hello,” I called. “Could someone cover me? Usually I wouldn’t care who sees my vagina but Adin might not want her husband looking at mine and we all know Pop doesn’t want to see it either and he might want to see his grandchild too.” I had put my legs down to allow for some modesty.
Everyone laughed but Brad. Kerry grabbed a blanket from Pop and covered me. I still had work to do. My mother was holding my child’s finger in her own. Brad still held my mother. Pop just kind of stood off to the side taking it all in. I was fascinated by my mother’s expression. One as if she had just received the best present ever.
“What sex is the baby?” I asked her. I still didn’t know.
She leaned looking into the darkened interior of the car. The light in the SUV was all the light that was present but I could see her weakened state. Her eyes were glazed from the medicine.
“It’s a boy,” she told me.
“I knew it. I told you Kerry McCoy.”
I heard his laughter in the distance.
Then Lucy laid my son on my chest. I could barely see him through the watery tears blurring my eyes. My son’s head was covered in thick black hair just like the hair Keegan had when she was born. His cries were loud filling the car. His tiny fists clenched and flailing. One, two, three, four, five fingers each hand. One, two, three, four, five toes, each foot. Thank you God! He looked a great deal like his sister had when she was born.
“Brad, help me back to the car please,” Yancy said in a whispered voice. She patted his hands on her waist. “Gabrielle,” she said tiredly, “you did well.”
She leaned into the car and touched my face so tenderly that I didn’t want her to leave. Then, Yancy touched my knee. Patted it lovingly. A mother’s touch. Her face looked serine and peaceful. I grasped her hand catching it wanting to hold onto her for a second longer. Her hand slipped slowly from mine as Brad caught her at the door of the car. The thought ran through my head that I would never see her again but I quickly pushed it out of my mind and focused on my child while Brad lifted my mother then carried her to the car.
“Let’s get her home,” Lucy said to Kerry referring to me. I wasn’t sure if she had meant me or Yancy. “We’ll call the paramedics when we get there. You did great Dad.” She slapped him on the bare shoulder in congratulations.
Kerry rolled his eyes and smiled tiredly.
>
The paramedics pulled into the driveway shortly after we arrived at the house. They checked us both and then loaded me onto a gurney, which they rolled to the back of the waiting ambulance.
“Just like when we were in high school life is never boring in the Dawson household,” Ben said who was pushing the gurney behind my head. He was one of the three who had arrived to take Yancy to the hospital the night her pain was so intense.