Page 120 of Glitterati Omega

“Oh,” Rupert said, and she helped him up, changed his nightgown.

Latisha came in around ten. “Oh,” she said, “I think the babies will be here today.”

“Mm,” Mama said. Her face said she clearly disagreed.

Rupert just closed his eyes, wondering how long this was supposed to go on. He felt like he’d been in labor forever now. The midwife took his vitals, then wrote a quick report to Morgan.

Hours passed. People came and went. Mama made him go swimming again. He mostly just sat on the step and shook his head, even with Mama and Mandisa coaxing him into the water, encouraging him—“Come on now, you’re a strong boy. It’s not so bad yet. You’re doing just fine.”

At some point, Mama took him into the bathroom and made him squat, which made everything so much worse. He cried out sharply, then shook his head, pushing back to his feet.

“Careful, careful,” she cautioned, holding his hands tight. “You have blood now, things will go faster now.”

“Will they?” he managed and she nodded, taking him back to the bedroom.

“It’s better if you squat,” she told him.

“I want to lie down.”

“That’s worse,” she said. “That’s the worst position.”

Latisha returned just before dinner. She looked frightened. “Let’s go to the hospital,” she said.

“No,” Mama said.

Rupert glanced between the two of them, suddenly confused and scared. “Do I need to go to the hospital?”

“No. You’re doing just fine.”

“The hospital’s the best place,” Latisha insisted. “This is a complicated birth.”

“No more than any other,” Mama said.

Rupert lost track of the argument then, twisting his hands in the sheets as a new wave of pain gripped him, clamping around him and squeezing, like every muscle in his body had involuntarily seized on.

He shut his mouth tight as it started again. “Oh God,” he managed as the second one let go, just before the third one clamped its jaws around him. He pushed his legs wider.

At some point, Winston had entered the fray, despite Mandisa trying to drag him out of the room. “He’s going to the hospital, Mama.”

“Winnie?”

“Right here, Roo.”

“Out!” Mama barked, pointing to the door. “No alphas! And no hospitals, you are just going to cut him open!”

“I don’t want to be cut open!” Rupert cried.

“We’re not cutting you open,” Latisha protested. “We can just monitor you better in the hospital, and there’s access if things go wrong—”

“Nothing is going to go wrong!”

“Mama,please.”

Rupert gasped as he came up from the latest contraction. He glanced at Winston, then looked at the midwife. “Hospital,” he said with a nod, then let his eyes flutter shut. He bit his lower lip. “Yes—hospital. Sounds like a—good idea.”

Mama wasfurious. She was even more angry when Morgan breezed into the hospital room, chart in hand. “Evening,” they said, and Mama glared daggers.

“This is your doctor?” she asked Rupert hotly. “No wonder everything is all messed up, you have an alpha looking after you.”