The One Who Lived

Epilogue - Six Years Later

You expect your labor and delivery to be some easy thing. You expect it to be like it is in the movies. You give a few pushes, and the baby is here.

They seem to miss the part where they tell you about the 52 hours of hard labor before those few pushes after the first 25. They seem to miss the part where they tell you about the pain coursing through your body just so your baby can come into the world.

The only thing that you can think of in this moment is the baby you are trying to bring into this world. You remember that you have been pregnant for 40 weeks and 6 days and you were ready to hold your baby.

I can still remember sitting in that ER utterly terrified and then finding out I was pregnant.

And now here I am — in labor.

It is funny because as big and manly as Ander is — he is terrified. He keeps acting like I am dying or something and not bringing our baby into the world.

I thought I could do this. I survived losing my sister and I could survive this pain. I made it through the worst thing possible — I could do this right?

Wrong.

Nothing compares to the pain of losing a sibling, but this is a pain that is completely different. This is pure pain that seems to be completely unending.

Then 52 hours and 18 minutes later at 3:48 AM — they tell you to push one last time.

I take one last look at Ander, because this was out last moment together as two, before I pushed with every ounce of strength that I have in me.

Not even five seconds later, there is a bloody screaming baby laying on my chest.

My mom always told me that you know what love is.

You love your parents, siblings, friends and husband but not in the way you could ever love your child. My mom said that you would die before choosing your child over any of those friends or family you have.

When I was pregnant — I didn't understand it. I have been so focused on getting a house ready, getting a job, and trying to enjoy what little time I had left with Ander as just the two of us, that I couldn't understand feeling anything.

I didn't understand until they just laid my baby on my chest.

I thought I would feel some sort of terror as the baby screamed on my chest, but I didn't feel that. I don't know how to explain how I felt, but I can sum it all up to the fact that I thought Ander was saving me for himself and for me, but in reality, he was saving me for him — for our son.

I had to live through Anni's loss to be alive for our baby.

It is almost like one of those moments in the movies where someone kissed someone or something, and there is this big wave of shock sent around the earth — this moment is that. It was this heart bursting moment when you realized how quickly you would die before letting anyone hurt your baby.

I look up at Ander with so much more love than I have ever had for him before. "We did it." I laugh through happy tears as happy tears stream down his face.

"You did it, Ade. You did all of it." Ander cries before pressing a hard kiss to my temple. "God, I love you so much." Ander puts his big hand on our tiny baby. "I love you two so much."

I smile rubbing my nose against the baby the nurses took to clean but brought right back. "Will you go get my mom and yours? I want our family here." I say making him smile and nod.

"Yeah, I will be right back, Adan." Ander says before disappearing through the big doors our family would soon be filling.

I watch as nurses take our baby and do the things they need, but they manage to bring him back quickly and before Ander gets back with our parents.

I look down at the perfectly perfect baby that Ander and I created together. "I promise to protect you, baby boy. I promise to protect you with everything I have in me." I run my finger down his perfect button nose. "I love you." I coo even though he is completely oblivious to the vow that I am making him.

Minutes later, our family comes in and lays their eyes on the most perfect being that has ever been created. Not biased at all. "Tell us." My mom says about his name because it is the only thing that we kept a secret.

"Mom, Dad." I nod to the two people who created me. "Vivian, Grant." I nod to the two people who created Ander. "Hawkins, Lavender." I nod to the two godparents of our baby who promised to protect him as well. "Meet our son, your grandson and godson, Beau Elton Hawkins Grey."

At 3:48 AM on the tenth of December our son Beau Elton Hawkins Grey was born weighing a perfect 8 pounds and 6 ounces.

3:48 AM — the exact time of morning that Anni departed from this world a little over seven years ago.

I wonder if she was one of the messengers that brought Beau's soul from her world into mine.