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"I know," he said. "The baby will be fine. You don't need to worry about that right now."
"How about the fact that I'm out in the woods?" I asked. "And don't have a midwife or even a doctor with me?"
"You do have a doctor with you," he reminded.
"You know what I mean," I said. "You aren't an obstetrician, and you don't have any of your supplies with you. Unless you are suddenly going to produce a backpack full of clean bedding and birthing implements, we are at a distinct disadvantage here."
I gasped as another contraction hit me. This one threatened to buckle my knees and bring me right down into the dirt. Mark gripped me tightly and help me up, letting me lean my weight on him as I breathed through the pain. They were getting much stronger, and I knew I couldn't fight them.
"Carmela, you need to listen to me," he said when the contraction was over. "I know this isn't ideal. I know it's not what you had in mind, and it isn't what you prepared yourself for. But it's what we have. You are in full active labor, and there's nothing we can do about it. This baby is coming. We can't stop it. We need to be prepared to do this on our own."
I drew in a breath but was shaking and had tears forming in my eyes. "I'm scared."
It didn't matter how much I was trying to tell myself not to be afraid and to only think calm, positive thoughts. The fear was real, and it was threatening to take over again. But Mark was steady. If he was feeling the same kind of fear I was, he didn't show it.
"I know you are," he said. "But I'm right here. You can do this. We can do this together."
I nodded. "All right. Let's keep going."
I was able to get a little farther, but soon it was obvious I couldn't keep going. The pain was too much, and my body felt too tired and weak in between contractions to keep walking. Mark brought me to the side of the path and helped me down to the ground. I leaned back on my arms, and he kissed my head as he comforted and reassured me.
I knew the baby was going to come before the ambulance did. All I could do was hope it went smoothly and the baby arrived healthy and safe.
24
MARK
I had seen a lot of things in my career, including the delivery of plenty of babies in stressful or dangerous situations. But there was nothing that could compare, none of it, to those twenty minutes of my life, kneeling at the side of a hiking trail deep in the woods, catching my own baby.
I was strangely calm. Every instinct was on high alert, every time I had ever been there for another mother fresh in my mind. I was sharper, more in tune with every single moment than I had ever felt. It was like everything I had ever done prepared me uniquely for that exact moment.
Then it happened.
I was holding her.
My daughter.
The emotion overwhelmed me in that moment, and I sat back, cradling her for a split second, staring at her tiny face. The miracle of life had come again, and I was witness to the majesty of birth. Of my own daughter’s birth. I brought her to Carmela, who was propped up with the extra clothes I’d brought so her head rested on something soft and placed her on her chest.
The next few moments were a blur.
The ambulance finally arrived, cutting through the grass and following the trail to get to us as quickly as they could. EMTs peppered me with questions, but when they realized the situation was essentially settled, they relaxed. They joked with me, and I joked back, but I could only remember that they had released that pressure valve with humor, not what they said.
I had just experienced the single most unbelievable and unforgettable moment in my life. The aftermath was not nearly as important. All that mattered was that Carmela was safe, glowing and happy with tears streaming down her face constantly, and our baby girl was on her chest, noisily learning to breastfeed and spending her first moments outside of the womb in our arms.
It suddenly dawned on me that I wasn’t wearing a shirt after a few moments when my skin prickled, and I shuddered. I had taken it off to catch her and to have skin-to-skin contact in the first moments she was out. It was important to me to have that moment with her, and as I followed the gurney to the ambulance, I rummaged in the bag where I had thrown the clothes and found one of the shirts that had been under Carmela’s head. I slipped it on and smiled.
