Rooms on Fire

Twelfth.

'My water broke,' Stevie repeats as she sits on the toilet, her legs visibly shaking, 'its too soon Kate,' she whispers as tears begin to stream down her cheeks.

'Stephanie,' I say, trying to keep my voice calm, because she is right, it is too early, seven weeks too early, 'we always knew that this was a possibility and remember what Dr. McDonough said, every week past 30 weeks is a bonus, you got three more weeks.'

Stevie nods weakly, 'we have to get to the hospital,' she says, 'Dr. McDonough said that we should go in as soon as my water broke,' Stevie says looking at the small puddle of fluid on the floor.

'Okay. I reply, 'you stay here and I will grab you some clothes to change into,' Stevie nods and I run out into the bedroom and grab her some underwear, a pair of black leggings and an oversized black sweater from the clean laundry pile and a pair of my Birkenstocks from the closet, I arrive back at the bathroom to find Stevie hunched over the sink rocking herself back and forth frantically as a contraction builds, one hand gripping onto the sink for dear life and the other attempting to apply counterpressure to her back. I stand behind her and knead her back as hard as I can with my weak hands, I'll pay for this with increased pain for days but all I care about right now is making sure that Stevie is getting the support she needs and right now she needs me to do this for her.

'How did you do this Kate?' Stevie asks breathless as the contraction fades and she brings herself to standing, 'it has only just started and it hurts so much.'

'You take it one contraction at a time. You try not to worry about how long it is going to last or how bad the pain will get, you just concentrate on getting through the next wave, anyway I think you have been in labor for a while. I think that is what your back spasms were. When did they start?' I ask her smiling.

'Last night, before bed, they woke me up every 20 minutes all night. I was having Braxton Hicks with some of them too,' Stevie tells me and I laugh gently.

'Those were contractions my beautiful girl, you are already eight hours into this, maybe more. You don't need to worry about how you are going to do this because you are doing it.'

Stevie nods and I begin to help her get dressed, I have only just got her leggings on when another contraction hits her, we are both more prepared this time and Stevie is able to handle it better, 'that one wasn't so bad,' she says as it finishes and I am able to finish dressing her.

'What do we do with Julia?' I ask out loud as we begin to shuffle slowly out of the bedroom, 'is your dad well enough to look after her or should we take her with us?'

'Stephanie, what is going on?' Jess calls from the bottom of the stairs, 'are you alright?' he sounds breathless and worried.

'My water broke daddy,' Stevie says with a nervous smile.

'Do you need me to do anything?' Jess asks concerned.

'Can you drive us to the hospital?' Stevie responds before turning to me, 'that way if he gets too tired he can drive himself home later and we can decide what to do with Julia then.'

---

45 minutes later we are at UCLA Medical Center waiting for Dr. McDonough. Stevie is hooked up to a fetal monitor and the baby looks great, their heartrate is showing good variability, Stevie is doing less well, she is well and truly into transition now and the contractions are coming one on top of the other and the baby is posterior meaning that Stevie is feeling all the pain in her back and thighs and it is intense enough that she is dry heaving as the contractions peak.

'More pressure,' she begs as another contraction begins, but my hands can't press into her flesh any harder and I feel useless. Jess is outside in the waiting room with Julia and part of me wants to find an excuse to go and check on them because I can't bear to see Stevie in this much pain anymore. Dr. McDonough finally arrives just as Stevie announces she needs to push and I have never felt so relieved in my life. A quick check reveals that Stevie is indeed at 10cm and then she is pushing. I sit on the bed supported my a pile of pillows and Stevie sits in front of me, with each contraction she pushes as long and as hard as she is able, in between she collapses into my arms, completely spent of energy, sometimes she dozes off in between the contractions, her head resting on my chest, 'I like the sound of your heartbeat,' she tells me. Pushing is slow going, it often is for posterior babies and I lose track of time, suddenly something changes, there is a shift in the energy of the room and Stevie cries out, 'your baby is right there Stephanie,' Dr. McDonough says and sure enough I look down and the baby is crowning. Two more pushes and the head is born, one more brings one shoulder and the other brings the rest of his body, Stevie and I both look down in awe, tears streaming down our faces as he emerges and I am surprised by how big the baby is.

'Its a boy!' Dr. McDonough exclaims as he begins to cry, he sounds strong and Dr. McDonough hands him straight to Stevie. I am a little surprised by that. I would have expected Dr. McDonough to at least have looked him over first considering his prematurity.

'Stevie, I think it is possible that we miscalculated your dates when first calculated how far along you were,' Dr. McDonough says, 'based on his size and his respiratory effort I would guess he is closer to 37 weeks than 33 weeks.'

Stevie nods, too overwhelmed by our son to give Dr. McDonough much of a response. Dr. McDonough gives Stevie a shot of Pitocin and delivers the placenta and Stevie barely flinches as we drink in our baby boy. He is perfect, ten perfect fingers, ten perfect toes, 'I know we didn't really get around to talking about it but what do you think of the name Joshua, Joshua Jess?'

I nod, too choked up to speak, Joshua Jess and Julia Stephanie, my son and my daughter, it barely seems possible that I could be so lucky. I know that before too long the world is going to be sharing my perfect little family with the world and that some people are not going to react well but right now, in this moment, none of that matters.