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The doctor comes in again, checking my progress. “She is moving quickly. Where did your family go?”
I explain the situation between contractions, and I really wish J.R. was back. I have the overwhelming desire to push. The doctor appears to be a little anxious for their arrival, too.
Finally, J.R. and Knox return, and it’s right in the nick of time. Any longer, and I think he may have missed his daughter’s birth. Again.
J.R. instructs Knox to make herself comfortable in the chair next to the window in the room, and I happen to glance at her as she settles in. Her eyes are big and attentive, and I think she’s both excited and terrified. I am, too.
“All right, Rachel,” the doctor says as he takes his position in front of me. “You ready?”
I look up at J.R., and he’s looking down at me. I notice a look in his blue eyes that I can’t interpret, but he smiles at me. “Ready?”
I nod, and he takes my hand. I breathe, feeling the next contraction build. The doctor tells me when to push, but this isn’t my first rodeo. I know what to do.
I push. Hard. With everything I have. My back aches, and I cry out. I feel sweat and tears trickle down my face. J.R. says something to me, but I’m not sure what he says. I just feel him holding my hand, and I’m thankful to have him here this time, even if I do want to kill him a little in this moment.
I push again and again. The pain is so intense that I’m mostly numb, but finally, I hear the doctor say, “One more and she’s here.”
“I need a break. Just for a second,” I whisper. My hair clings to my face, and I’m not sure I have the energy to push again. Not yet. With Knox, it was two pushes, and then I was done. Now, I don’t think I have it in me to push anymore.
“You can take a break later, Rachel. Right now, you’ve got to push,” the doctor says loudly.
I cry, and I shake my head. I just want to wait a minute. A couple of minutes. I just need a minute. That’s all.
“Come on, Rach,” J.R. coaches me. His voice is calm and gentle. “Just one more. I know you can do this.”
I know they’re right. Both of them. I can’t just not push. It doesn’t work that way. So, as the next contraction builds, I force myself into the back of the hospital bed, still holding J.R.’s hand tightly, and I give it one more push. It’s the hardest one of them all. I squeeze my eyes so tight, the blackness behind my eyelids seem to twinkle, and I hear a loud cry escape from my mouth. I grip J.R.’s hand so tightly, I can feel his pulse; and sweat like I’ve never felt before trickles down my chest and back.
Finally, I hear her. My baby. The cackling cry of a newborn. I sigh with relief, and I collapse into the sheets. J.R. keeps my hand, but he’s looking at our girl as her cord is cut and she is moved from the arms of the doctor to the nurse. I watch her, too.
J.R. touches my cheek, and I look up to find his blue eyes looking at me. They’re wet, and he smiles at me. “You are amazing.”
I smile at him weakly, and then I turn my head back to the baby’s cry. The nurse places her on a scale, and I notice the baby’s tiny arms stretched upward as her fingers curl with each angry cry. She’s screaming so loudly, I can’t help but laugh.
J.R. turns away from me and invites Knox to the bedside. Her little head appears over the railing of the bed, and her eyes are wide. I think she looks partially afraid, too. I smile to reassure her that I’m okay.
“What do you think of your baby sister?”
“She’s loud,” Knox says. Her face is sort of scrunched up the way a person does when they hear or smell something they don’t like.
“Yeah, but she won’t stay loud.”
“Are you okay, Mama?”
“I’m okay.”
The nurse cleans the baby, and then she wraps her in a blanket, sliding a tiny hat over her head of hair. The nurse looks up at us as we gawk at our newborn in her arms. “Do you want to hold her?”
I nod, and J.R. walks to the nurse, taking our baby. He holds her carefully, afraid he may break her. She looks so small in his arms, but I know I’ve waited my entire life to see the love of my life holding our tiny baby in his arms. I feel my heart swell, and I cry again—but this time out of nothing but pure joy.
J.R. never takes his eyes from his baby girl, even as he places her in my arms now. There’s a tear on his cheek, and he wipes it away.
I take my baby, and just as I did with Knox, I pull the blanket away and gaze at her face. Her eyes are pinched closed, but she’s stopped crying. I find her hand, and I brush my finger across her palm.
“Hey, pretty girl,” I whisper. Her eyes open, and immediately my eyes are full of tears. Her eyes are blue. Just like Knox and J.R. She even looks like J.R., and I laugh. “What luck.” I turn my eyes to Knox. “Can you see her?”
J.R. lifts Knox so that she can see her new sister better, and I smile as the two of them gaze at her. They both look to be in love. My heart is full.
“We haven’t picked out a name yet,” Knox points out.
