The Exception

3. To better days.

These few words didn't make sense.
The baby was due in a couple of weeks, not today. Not here. No no. Definitely no.

The planning was perfect. Two weeks on the boat, a week in New York to find a flat and a job, then the birth. Theoretically.
Stefan felt like he was enduring the utmost bad time curse.

"Wh.. ?? But... What?" His mouth had gone to dust.

Mieke grunted low in her throat, the tear between her legs increased quickly and seemed to never stop.
She couldn't hold back a scream, her lower part being literally sawed in half.

Stefan rushed, in all four, and faced Mieke, alarmed by her poor condition.

"Mieke! What's going on?"

"Stefan, the baby is coming!" She panted heavily.

He wondered how he could manage that. He was pretty handy, both with wood and humans. Years on the battlefield had made him kind̂ of a specialist with blood and open wounds. He could stop a life threatening bleeding or sew some stitches, but a birth!
He regretted not to have been more careful as Wilma was rambling about the billion of babies she helped to bring into this world, including the births of her own three boys.

No. It couldn't be true. It couldn't be happening. Not now.
After all, contractions are common at this stage, Mieke already had some.
Wilma's words hit him
" The womb is a muscle. It has to stretch to adjust to the baby whilst it gets bigger. That's what the contractions are made for. The more it contracts, the more it's able to relax, the more it stretches."

Which proved that he had more listened to the old lady than he had thought. It matched. It was just random contraction, not labour. It had to be. It could not be otherwise.

"Mieke, it's too early. It may be just a random contraction." He said, putting his hands on each knee of his wife, trying to cool her down.

A loud crack came from under the blankets, soaking them instantly.

"Tell me more. My water just broke!" She snapped at his dimwitted face. Which had him bemused and shocked. She 'd never spoke to him that way. Her actual killer glare was way more frightening than the one she threw at him while she pointed the barrel of a gun to his head.

Another growl had him back to reality. Mieke was in labour, their child sneaking its way through her core. For real.

Shit!

He wondered whether or not a doctor had been hired on this ship. He knew there was highly unlikely a midwife on board. Women were usually banished from both merchant and military vessels.

What should he do? What could he do? What had to be done in such circumstances?

'Scream and run away'
His first thought.
No. He shook his head.

Stop being useless. Do something.

"Mieke. What should I do?"

Finally, her husband was back. The dumb idiot who doubted her was gone, she could read it in his eyes.

"You'll have to help me to give birth. I can't do it all by myself. I need you. Stefan..." she hissed again.
"Help me! Hugh!"

She was desperate. She was freaked out. And she was in pain. Full pain.
So was Stefan.

Mieke was contorting herself, willing to escape her own body. Her tortured body.
And all he could offer was to helplessly witness her agony. Which was killing him.
He flirted with death when the shrapnel made a mess with his bowls and knew how unsustainable being ravaged from inside could feel.