Nora waved back to them. “Be good. Stay out of trouble okay?”
Tilly was still waving as Atlas pulled out onto the dirt road.
Anna closed her eyes. She felt every bump, even though the hover glided over the ground instead of directly on top.Luckily, Atlas drove fast. His singular focus was fortunate, as she didn’t really have it in her for more conversation. Sometime during the walk from her home to the hover, and sitting now on the seat, the contractions had started in earnest. She tensed as they hit, breathing through the pain. “They’re definitely getting worse.”
Nora grabbed her hand, squeezing tightly.
The facility’s front was mostly empty when they pulled up. The only ones present were Sterling and Zero waiting by the entrance, a wheelchair by Zero’s side. Zero opened the hover door and helped Anna down.
Sterling pulled the wheelchair close. “How are the contractions?”
Atlas took over once Anna was seated, wheeling her in. “Spaced apart, might be awhile.”
But Anna shook her head, shifting in the wheelchair. “Painful as heck.”
“Okay. The baby is ready to come.” Sterling smiled down at Anna. “Ready to meet her?”
No.That wasn’t true. She wasn’t ready for this experience, but . . . “Yeah. Ready as anything.”
Thankfully the facility walkway stayed mostly empty as they walked in, though a few model-Ms lining the hall wished her luck. Her hands worried in her lap as Sterling led the way toward the human area. And then through the common room, empty, and down that long hallway with the bedroom she’d spent her first night on Mars in.
Anna eyed the photographs as they went by before turning her gaze away from the pictures lining the walls. She also avoided looking in the glass room altogether to see if that extra crib was still in there.Doesn’t matter. We have her crib set up back home.Being here at all, even temporarily, made her skin crawl. “Are Ria and Pearl around?”
“Most likely already asleep.” Sterling’s voice was chilled. “They are curious though.”
Anna scrunched her nose. “How do you know? I heard they just complain?”
Sterling chuckled. “Why would they waste so much energy complaining if they weren’t?”
Finally they arrived in the same room that Sterling gave her the ultrasound in a few weeks before. Only now the plants had been removed, placed in the back room. And Sterling himself put on a clean gown over his standard suit, washed his hands, and put on gloves.
Zero suited up as well, exchanging his regular outfit for a surgical smock. Anna eyed him in confusion until he gave a sheepish grin. “Are you okay with me being the nurse? I have been learning about medical processes. We thought you might feel better with me than someone random, but I can go get Alice or another female nurse.”
Anna cut him off, thinking of that unsmiling Alice in the glass room. “No. You’re fine, Zero. Thank you.”
“Great!” Zero finished suiting up, snapping the buttons on his shirt excitedly. “This will be my first delivery. But I linked up to Sterling earlier—he’s delivered over six hundred babies. Everything is pretty straightforward now.”
Atlas rolled his eyes as he helped Anna out of the wheelchair. “Don’t oversimplify it.” He held up a gown. “Here. Let’s get you changed.”
Anna sat on the table after she was dressed, pulling a blanket over her legs. She felt exposed. “So. How long does this take? What happens? Do we just wait?”
“Yeah. Nature kind of does its thing. At any rate.” Nora waved her hand at the monitors, now all tracking Anna’s vitals. “Back when I had Tilly, we had none of this stuff on Earth. Everything was still fine. I had her at the schoolhouse, with a few older ladies helping.”
Anna settled back further in the chair. Cold and uncomfortable. Even with a blanket over herself she felt exposed. She remembered that day well. Nora had already been living in the desert on her own by then. Anna had gone to visit to help get her set up. One of the few and only times she had, back before she had the bakery. And Paul.
That thought didn’t sting much. Not anymore. And especially not right now with Atlas worrying over her, stretching the contraction monitor band over her belly. “Yeah, by the time I got to the schoolhouse, you already had her.”
“Tilly didn’t want to wait at all.” Nora chuckled. “Still doesn’t.”
Sterling frowned. “Did you see any doctor at all?”
“Nope,” Nora said. “Everything was a surprise. I didn’t even know Tilly was a girl until she was born.”
“In fact,” Anna added, “usually if you see a doctor back on Earth, you get sicker.”
“That’s true!” Nora said. “You come back having caught something else.”
Nora shared stories with Atlas and Sterling of medical care and life back on Earth. She attempted to involve Anna in them, mostly about how they learned to cook when they worked at an inn together, but Anna could hardly focus.
