Pursuing My Rejected Luna by Cara Anderson novel Chapter 127

Chapter 127

Skye

C

+15 8gnus

From the minute I crawled out of bed after breathing through the first contraction, to the time NIcolai woke to find me bracing myself in the bathroom doorway, it seems fifteen minute pain intervals have become ten. And want to find the person who wrote the chapter on early labor being a chance to prepare and have a word with thent.

Who could possibly think straight through pain like this, let alone prepare myself mentally for the pain to get worse? Because honestly, worse is unthinkable at the moment!

That’s why I made a plan ahead of time. And my plan was specific. My plan had stages with clear delineations and reasonable timeframes. Just like all the books I read on childbirth told me I would.

Apparently, they lied! Because my plan seems to have crumbled in the face of the child currently attempting to evacuate my uterus but taking his damn sweet time about it. He appears to have inherited his father’s complete disregard for other people’s schedules and his mother’s absolute certainty that when he decides/something it happens immediately. 1

The contractions are manageable at first. Though that term is relative. Intense. Rhythmic. Something with a pattern to it that I can find my way through-breathe into the peak, breathe out the other side, and recover with just enough time to prepare for the next one.

I’m competent at this, I tell myself. I’ve handled three years of Jaxon Vale, survived a kidnapping attempt, managed a divorce in front of a pack council and a formal inquiry in someone else’s sitting room. I can handle contractions. I will not fail at labor.

Then transition begins. I revise this assessment significantly. It’s clearly time to admit I’ve left competent in the rearview mirror and landed directly in “I have no fucking clue how I’m going to get through this.”

Dr. Chernov arrives within forty minutes of receiving Nicolai’s call, which feels simultaneously too long and not long enough. I’m going to assume it was the absolute best he could manage given Nicolai did not sound accepting of anything less when he talked to the man. Still, he arrived without drugs so from my perspective, he could have taken another moment or two to ensure he had all the necessities before leaving home.

The doctor is calm, reminding me gently of my previous desire for a natural childbirth. The medical team Nicolai arranged-two nurses whose names I learn and immediately lose-are calm. Nicolai is calm. This is fortunate because whatever is on the furthest end of the spectrum from calm is what I become when I announce to the room that natural childbirth can go straight to hell!

“Try to breathe through it,” one of the nurses says.

“I am breathing through it,” I growl at her. “I have been breathing through it. Breathing through it is not – “A contraction arrives and interrupts the sentence. “-helping.”

“She knows,” Nicolai informs the nurse, with the tone of someone who has learned the difference between information Skye needs and information Skye does not find helpful. “She’ll tell you if she needs something different.”

The nurse takes this in. Takes Nicolai in. And being the wise woman she is, adjusts her approach.

The man is a revelation in crisis. I knew he was good under pressure. I’ve watched him in business meetings where the subtext was violence, through the formal inquiry where he offered DNA testing before anyone could ask, through the night someone grabbed me in a garden and he drove three hours before dawn.

But this is different. This is me, specifically, in pain, occasionally saying things I’ll need to apologize for later,

1/2

He doesn’t ask for permission. He doesn’t need to. I understand the offer and I take his hand.

Because right now I’ll take every hand available.

Cara Anderson Author

Thank you for reading!

1017

Comments

Support

Share

2/2

+15 8gnus