CHRISTMAS EVE DAY WAS COLD AND OVERCAST and looked like snow. It was probably just one or two degrees below thirty, but who was counting? I think the wind chill was a good bit lower.
Maggie loves Christmas. Our house always showed it too: wreaths, candles, stockings, the smell of evergreen. And she never let us get away with a fake tree. Last year we put so many strands of lights on the tree that when it came time to undecorate it, we couldn’t. We ended up taking off all the ornaments, leaving seventeen strands of lights on a six-foot tree, and hauling the whole thing out to the hard road for pickup. A thirty-four-dollar tree and fifty-four dollars’ worth of lights. Maggie saw it no other way.
“You can’t have a tree if you’re not going to put lights on it.”
“Yes,” I said, “but honey, we don’t have a Christmas tree. We’ve got a fire hazard at the cost of about five dollars a night. Between now and the time we take it down is about $150.”
She laughed, batted her eyelashes, and said, “I know it, but it’s Christmas.”
The “but it’s Christmas” statement really cost us. And shopping? I swear, if the Taj Mahal were on sale and Maggie knew of someone who really wanted it, she’d figure a way to get it. I can hear her now, “But it was only $90 million. That’s half off!”
Our house was always neat, but I did my best to dirty it up. I’d leave underwear on the floor, the toilet seat up, the toothpaste cap off, books right where I left them, shoes where I took them off, pantry door open. Not Maggie. We’d cook dinner, and she’d have all the dishes cleaned and put up before we ate. The kitchen looked as if we were never there. Sometimes at night, I’d get out of the bed to go to the bathroom, and I’d be gone maybe thirty seconds. When I got back, the bed would be made up.
Papa and Nanny’s house isn’t much. Take away my romantic descriptions, and it’s basically an old farmhouse with creaky floors, a built-in draft, bowed ceilings, a rusted roof, and forty layers of cracked and peeling paint. But that didn’t stop Maggie.
Our front lawn looked like Martha Stewart stopped by on her way south. Plants everywhere. Colors? Honey, we got colors. And smells? If you get downwind, you almost can’t smell Pinky. Maggie’s thumb is so green you can take dead branches, give her half a cup of water, some mystery juice that she cooks up out in the barn, three days, and whammo! Blooms. I have seen that woman take dead fern, I’m talking crunchy-in-your-hand dead, and in a week’s time it needs splitting and transplanting.
Maggie’s absence from our home was more evident than ever on Christmas. I had built no fire, and I didn’t intend to. No need to accentuate the obvious. The yard was in disarray. Weeds were rampant. The house was a mess. Laundry was, well, like the weeds. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say a bachelor lived in my house.
The wind beat against the tin roof, and somewhere outside Pinky was making noises. Blue was curled up by the fireplace, whimpering.
“If you’re gonna keep that up, you can go outside,” I said.
He placed his front paw over his nose and looked at me out of the corner of his eye. His tail was still.
I needed to go to the hospital, but this day was harder than others. I showered, dressed in clothes I had worn several times, and headed out. Blue met me at the door and waited while I pushed against the screen. He knows better. Blue and I got into a cold truck and headed for town. Driving past the Silver Screen, I naturally thought of Bryce. I needed to stop in. “After Maggie,” I muttered to myself.
We parked at the hospital, which was more or less deserted, and headed in. Maggie was in her room, right where I left her. In the air I smelled Amanda’s perfume. What was she doing, working on Christmas Eve?
I stood next to Maggs’s bed and held her warm, beautiful, elegant hand. Lately, I’ve sat less and paced more. Or stared out the window talking over my shoulder. Maggie understands. I couldn’t sit still at home. What makes me any different here?
Standing at the window, I heard footsteps behind me. Amanda was getting pretty big, and her walk had turned into a distinct shuffle. She was well into the full-blown pregnant-woman waddle. Which is beautiful.
I have experience with only one pregnant woman. I mean, experience that really counts. And I couldn’t say this before, but few things are more beautiful than my pregnant wife was as she stepped out of the shower or stood in front of the mirror and asked me if I thought she was fat. Nothing was ever more alluring to me than the sight of my wife carrying my son. If you’ve never loved a pregnant woman, then you can’t understand, but if you have, then you do, and you know I’m right.
I didn’t turn around. “Good morning, Amanda.”
“Good morning, Professor. Merry Christmas to you.”
I turned and looked at her. “You look nice. New dress code for working holidays?”
She was wearing casual clothes, not the hospital issue I had grown accustomed to.
“Oh, I’m not working. Just stopped in on the way to my Mammy’s.” She paused. “My grandmother’s.”
“I got it,” I said, turning back to the window.
“Professor, you got any plans for today?”
“Now, Amanda.” I held out my hand. “Don’t you start scheming. Blue and I are spending Christmas Eve right here with Maggie. The last time you schemed, I ended up embarrassing myself in front of your dad and his entire church. Not today. I’m parking it right here. But thank you for whatever you were scheming.” I smiled.
“Professor,” she retorted, “you didn’t embarrass yourself.” Her eyes showed excitement. “Daddy’s been asking me to invite you to church. He said he wishes you’d come back.”
“Yeah, so he could preach that fire and brimstone right down on me rather than just let it filter through the windows and drift a few miles down the road? No thanks. Your dad’s a good preacher and a good man, but I’ll pass.”
My voice grew soft, and I turned back to look at Maggs. “Your father doesn’t need my doubt in his church. Neither does your church.”
Amanda’s face said she realized she was getting nowhere. She opened Maggie’s bedside drawer and took out a brush. She gently stroked and brushed Maggie’s hair. As she did, it struck me how much Maggie’s hair had grown. Maybe an inch or two.
“Where’d the brush come from?”
“Oh, I bought it. Got it at the dollar store.” Amanda didn’t look up.
I fumbled in my pockets and pulled out a handful of loose bills and change. “How much was it?”
“Professor.” Amanda looked straight up at me and put her hands on her hips. “It’s Christmas Eve. You don’t pay people for the gifts they give you.” She dropped her head and continued tending to Maggie.
I sat down next to the bed and slipped my hand under Maggie’s. Amanda eyed my Bible.
“I see you brought along something to read. Kind of dusty, isn’t it?”
“Yeah, that’s what happens when you don’t read it,” I said, looking at the drab cover.
“Umm-hmmm,” she said, as if she had a follow-up statement but decided to keep it to herself. She finished her brushing as snow began to fall outside. Heavy, thick flakes started sticking to the windowpane.
We sat in the quiet for a few minutes. “How you doing?” I asked. “I mean, with the baby and all. What do the doctors say?”
“They say he’s big, and I’m little. Say I ought to think about a C-section. So I’m thinking about it. I’m not opposed to the idea. I’m just not sure I want a zipper on my stomach.” Amanda made a motion across her stomach and smiled.
I laughed. It was the first time I had laughed in Maggie’s room. Amanda too. We actually giggled. It reminded me of Maggie.
Outside, the snow fell more heavily. Inside, the silence hung warm and easy. Not talking was just fine with all three of us. After a while, Amanda stood up from her chair and quietly slid it back against the wall.
“Professor, you take care of Miss Maggie.” Standing in the doorway, she turned to me. “And Professor?” Amanda’s eyes searched my face and bored into the back of my head. “You don’t have to be celebrating Christmas to talk with God.”
I nodded. Amanda left, and Blue and I continued to sit with Maggie. After an hour or so, I rang for the nurse.
“Yes,” she barked over the intercom, as if I had interrupted her nap.
“Umm, do you know where the Bible talks about the birth of Jesus? You know, Mary, Joseph, ‘no room in the inn,’ the wise men?”
“Luke 2,” she said promptly.
“Thank you,” I said, wondering how in the world she knew that. I thumbed for Luke, skipping over it twice, and turned to the second chapter.
Maggie had told me that her dad read the Nativity story to her when he tucked her into bed on Christmas Eve. Holding up the thin pages to the light, I read the whole thing aloud to her. When I finished, the corner of Maggie’s closed right eye was wet, but her breathing was slow and easy.
Maggie was at peace. I placed my palm on her flushed cheek and felt the warmth of her face. For another hour, Blue and I sat quietly with her, watching snow fall on oaks and old magnolias. When I stood up at last to look out the window, snow covered everything in sight.
It was ten o’clock when I left. I squeezed her hand and kissed her gently. Her lips were warm and soft. One orange light lit the parking lot and cast an odd glow into the room.
“Maggie,” I whispered. “All this . . . it’s nobody’s fault. It just is.” I brushed her nose with mine. “I love you, Maggs . . . with all of me.”
Blue and I walked down the quiet hallway. A light shone from the nurses’ station, but that was about it. The night nurse was reading the Enquirer and munching on a bag of cheese puffs.
While I was walking down the hallway, it struck me for the second time that I had actually laughed in Maggs’s room. Amanda and I both had laughed. It felt good too. Maybe, under all that haze of sleep and heavy eyelids, Maggs just needed to hear me laugh. The last time I had really laughed was a few hours before we went to the delivery room—just moments before the bottom fell out of my life.
As I was walking out through the emergency room, I passed the counter where they kept the scanner crackling with police and ambulance activity. It served as mission control for the emergency room. For the waiting room, it provided some sort of entertainment. Over the static, I heard Amos’s calm voice saying he was just west of Johnson’s Pasture and headed to the hospital with somebody.
That was nothing unusual. During the week, Amos made almost as many trips to the hospital as he did to the jail. I used to tell him, “You know, Ebony, if things don’t work out with the sheriff’s department, you’d make one jam-up ambulance driver. You already know the entire lingo.”
He never thought that was too funny. There it was, Christmas Eve, and he was probably transporting some drunk who had had one too many at a Christmas party, gotten in a fight, and needed a few stitches. Put me in Amos’s place, and I’d have thrown the sucker in jail, slapped a Band-Aid on his face, and let him sleep it off. Not Amos.
If he was west of Johnson’s Pasture, that meant he was eastbound on 27 and would be at the ER in about ten minutes. I didn’t feel like answering any of his questions tonight, so Blue and I walked through the electric doors and onto the sidewalk. As I did, my feet flew out from under me, I went down, and I almost cracked my tailbone. A solid sheet of ice covered the pavement. Pulling myself up by the flagpole, I cussed, rubbed my butt, and hoped nobody had seen my tumble. Especially not Miss Cheese-puff. Blue stood a few feet away, watching me with suspicion.
The parking lot was empty when I started my truck. Even in this cold, the old girl cranked without a hitch. The older she gets, the more oil she burns, but Chevy made a good truck in this one. The fuel gauge was bumping on E, but I had enough to get home.
We pulled out of the hospital, I touched the gas, and the rear end of the truck slid out from underneath me, spinning us around 180 degrees. “That’s twice,” I whispered to myself. “Better take it slow.”
Three miles out of town, I plowed slowly west on County Road 27. Several inches of snow blanketed the blacktop, and the temperature had dropped to twenty-eight degrees. With both hands on the wheel, and keeping an eye out for hazards, I let my thoughts wander. In front of me awaited an empty and cold house on what would have been our first white Christmas. Behind me lay Maggie. And in between, there was me.
A lonely place.
I wasn’t in any hurry, so I dropped the stick into low gear and spun up Johnson’s snow-covered pasture. Cresting the hill, I coasted down the other side, letting the engine RPMs act as my brake. About midway down the hill, I approached the railroad crossing, where eighty years before Chinese immigrants had laid railroad track for the Union Pacific.
The snow was spreading over the windshield like a blanket. I flipped the wipers to “high” but still couldn’t see anything. As I bumped over the tracks, a light caught the corner of my eye. I was only going about five miles an hour, so I slowed to a stop on the other side of the tracks and rolled down my window. Looking down the hill in the direction of the light, I strained my eyes against the cold sheet of white that was biting into my face. The flash looked like a taillight, but down there was no place for a taillight, much less a car. I guess that’s why it caught my attention.
I started rolling up the window when the wind swirled, and I caught a break in the snow. This time there was no mistake. It was a taillight, at the bottom of the ditch about five feet off the ground. That meant the car, or truck, or whatever was connected to it, was upside down with its nose in the ditch. I pulled to the side and left the truck running. Blue’s eyes followed me out, but he kept his nose muzzled under his forearm and didn’t budge from the passenger’s side floorboard.
Stepping into the snow, I pulled the collar up on my jean jacket, crossed back over the tracks, and stood in the emergency lane of the eastbound traffic. The taillights were sticking up in the air, creating a small red halo effect around the car. On the snow beneath it were the scattered remains of what looked like blue plastic police lights that were once strapped atop the car. Leaning sideways, I read the upside-down reflective letters on the back of the car: Colleton County Sheriff’s Department.
I hit my butt and started sliding down the bank. I had intended to scoot down to the car, using my heels as a brake, but the cold and wind had turned the snow-covered bank into a sheet of ice.
My descent was fast and painful. I couldn’t stop, slow down, or veer to the left or the right. Midway down, I hit a small embankment that tossed me head over heels and sent me tumbling like a human snowball. Gaining speed, I passed Amos’s car and shot headfirst into the ditch. The splash surprised me, but not as much as the cold water. After a millisecond, the only thing I wanted was out.
I planted my boots in the muck below and reached for the bank. Pulling at snow and frozen grass, I kicked my toes into the bank, pushed up, and reached for the window frame of the car. The car was resting on the edge of the ditch, and every window was shattered. A few more inches, and water would have been pouring in. Dragging myself up on the bank, I didn’t have time to think about being cold because I bumped the body of what appeared to be a big, limp man lying in the snow. When I found the face, it shocked me.
“Amos!”
His glassy eyes were looking at me. He was wet, and his face was a blood-soaked mess. Surprisingly, he was not shivering. Without saying a word, he slowly lifted his left hand, clicked on his flashlight, and pointed it through the driver’s window. The light was swaying back and forth, and I could tell he was having a hard time staying conscious. Hanging upside down in the passenger seat was a mangled mess of long, black, wet hair. Amos’s drunk party-goer, no doubt.
“All this for some drunk . . . ” I grabbed the flashlight and scrambled around to the other side. As I did, the car slid an inch or two further into the ditch, and water started seeping in, filling what used to be the top of the car. I shined the light into the bloody and swollen face of the passenger. Her eyes were closed, and her arms were hanging limp down below her head. Brushing away the hair, I slowly tilted myself sideways, trying to see who I was looking at.
Amanda.
“Amos! What the . . .”
I don’t know how long she had been hanging there, but her face looked blue and puffy in the light. The passenger’s window was also blown out, and little pieces had cut her face. Glass was everywhere.
If she wasn’t dead already, Amanda needed to get out of that car, because in a few minutes her head would be underwater. I reached up, put my hand around her throat, and felt for a pulse. It was slow and weak.
“Amos?” I said, scampering back around the car.
His eyes were still closed, and he hadn’t moved. His breathing was slow, shallow, and apparently painful, ’cause he winced every time he tried to breathe too deeply. If I had to guess, I’d say he had two or three broken ribs.
Looking inside the car, I saw that the air bag hung deflated, and the steering wheel was bent where both his hands had been. In the back, Amos’s workout bag was sitting on the ceiling- cum-floor in an inch of water. I pulled it out and looked inside, where I found a set of gray sweats. I wrapped the sweatshirt around his head and propped it up with some snow.
Amos looked at me through two glassy eyes that kept rolling back behind his eyelids.
“Hey, buddy,” I said, tapping his face, “stay with me.”
Like his face, Amos’s uniform was splattered with blood, and the gray sweatshirt had begun to spot red. To make matters worse, I was starting to notice the cold, and my fingers were getting pretty numb and close to useless.
I grabbed the radio off Amos’s shoulder and punched the talk button. “Anybody . . . HQ . . . anybody . . . this is Dylan Styles.” I closed my eyes to think. “I’m at the railroad tracks at Johnson’s Pasture. Amos had a wreck.”
What road is this? Come on, Dylan, think.
“County Road 27. We need an ambulance! Now.” I dropped the radio and grabbed Amos’s head with my left hand. “Come on, buddy, focus.”
The dispatch crackled. “Come again, Dylan. This is Shireen. Come back, Dylan.”
I grabbed the mike again and mashed the transmit button. This time I shouted, “Shireen, send an ambulance. Amos is hurt bad. So is Amanda Lovett. Railroad tracks on 27. Shireen, get an ambulance.”
Shireen said something, but I couldn’t hear it because I was too busy pulling on the passenger door. It was jammed. I gently patted Amanda’s cheek. “Amanda.” I patted harder this time. “Amanda, help’s coming. Hang in there. Help’s coming.”
There was no response. Reaching for her throat again, I felt for a pulse. Still there, but no improvement.
The snow was still falling heavily. By the looks of the car, they had flipped over several times. I needed leverage to get Amanda out, so I checked the trunk, which was dangling open. I yanked out the tire tool, shoved it into the door crack, and leaned hard against it. The door still wouldn’t budge, but the car did. It slid another inch or two into the water. I leaned harder and Amanda rocked in her seat belt, waving her hands back and forth in the air below her head.
“Come on! Open!” I leaned into it with everything I had. “Please don’t do this to me.” The door creaked and moved another inch and stopped. As I pushed, the car slid a foot farther downhill, pulling me down into the water with it, where once again the cold took my breath away. When I stood, water was covering Amanda’s hands and was mid-thigh on me. I dropped the crowbar on the bank, placed one foot on the side of the car, and pulled against the door handle.
Nothing.
Growing frantic, I started banging on the door with Amos’s crowbar. My fingers were frozen, my footing was bad, and I was running low on options and time. I began swinging the tire tool as hard as I could. On about the sixth whack, it slipped out of my hands, ricocheted off the frame, and spun through the darkness. Splashing in the water a few feet away, it was gone. I was now almost waist-deep in water with nothing to pull on, no footing, and I was losing control over my muscles.
Looking back inside the car, I could see Amanda’s hands covered in water that was bubbling up against the top of her head. I don’t know if it was the sight of Amos, cut and bloody; the sight of Amanda, blue, limp and unconscious; the thought of my wife, lying in that bed for four months; the thought of my son, lying in a cold, dark box; or the thought of me living in the middle of it all, but somewhere in there, I came apart.
It began low and guttural. Pretty soon it was angry, violent, and all I had. The snow had been beating against my back, so I turned to face it.
“Where are You?” Swinging at the snow, I fell chest-deep into the ice and water. “Huh? Where? You may be in that river watching over a baptism, and You may be hanging on the wall and watching when those numb people walk down and eat and drink You in every steeple-topped, vine-encrusted, pigeon-drop palace around here, but where are You now? For six days You left Amanda stripped and tied to a tree, You left me alone in a puddle on the delivery room floor, and You aren’t here now!”
I kicked the water and screamed as loudly as I could. “Why won’t You answer me?”
The wind picked up, and the snow fell harder. “Don’t You hang up on me! Nuh-huh. Not now, when I’ve got Your attention. You want my attention? You want my belief? Is that what You want? Not until You get in this ditch!”
I stood up in the water. My clothes were stiff, wet, and covered in ice. I leaned my head against the car, breathing heavily, and closed my eyes. The snowfall had stopped and the moon appeared over my shoulder, casting my shadow on the water below me. Listening to my own wheezing, I stood weakly, close to broken, and hanging by a thread. “Lord,” I whispered, “I need You in this ditch.”
The car gave way, slid another foot, and partially submerged Amanda’s head. I opened my eyes. “That’s not helping me.”
I lifted her head forward and gently pulled her shoulders toward me. Her eyes flickered. I pulled on her arms, but she didn’t move, and I couldn’t reach up across her stomach to unbuckle the seat belt. I reached into my back pocket, pulled out Papa’s knife, fumbled to open the blade, and then cut the seat belt across her chest. The lap belt held, so I reached up, hooked under it, and pulled. I knew I was taking a chance, but I didn’t have many others. Amanda’s limp body fell forward, and she groaned. I pulled her arms and head out the driver’s side window, but her stomach was too big. I cradled her in my arms and rested my face against hers.
“Amanda? Help’s coming. Help’s coming.”
Her eyes opened and closed.
“Amanda? Amanda?” I gently slapped her face, and her eyes opened, but her pupils were everywhere. “I can’t pull on you. You got to kick yourself out of this car. Move your legs. Come on. Help me get you out.” I cradled her tighter and tugged until she groaned. “Help me, Amanda. Please help me.”
I slapped her face again. Harder this time. She groaned, tried to move her legs, groaned again, and then her eyes closed and she let out a deep breath.
“Nuh-huh. Not you too! Don’t you breathe out on me like that’s your last breath.” I dug my feet into the muck below and pulled as hard as I could. I placed my mouth against her ear. “Amanda, you do not have my permission to die in this ditch. You hear me? I know you’re in there. You do not have my permission.”
I pulled again.
“Amanda, open your eyes. D’you hear me? Talk to me. Please don’t let this happen.”
Amanda hung limp in my arms. Losing my grip, and slipping further in the ditch, I bear-hugged her head and shoulders and rocked her back and forth in the car. Her hips slid, and something gave way.
“That’s right. That’s right.”
Amanda’s petite frame slid through the window up to her stomach. She groaned, and it was then that I realized that her stomach was rock hard.
“Amanda,” I whispered in her ear again, “I’m going to turn you and slide you out this window.”
She groaned, but I turned her anyway. Her sweater caught on some glass, ripped, and exposed her stomach. I dipped down into the water and lifted her shoulders and head up. Her eyes flickered again. I lifted, pushed, pulled one more time, and she slipped out of the car and into the water.
Sliding out, all of Amanda’s weight drove me down into the water. My feet lost their grip, and the water rose around my shoulders and my neck and then wrapped its cold fingers around my face and head. Pulling at me, it swallowed my head and ears. My head submerged, and I shouted under water. It was an eerie, muted explosion of anguish. I heard the swish of the water above me, felt the weight of Amanda’s limp body on my outstretched arms, but my left hand told me that Amanda’s head was out of the water. For an eternity, I fought the ice and water to hold her above my head, while struggling to get my feet under me. In fear, and involuntarily, I sucked in a lungful of water.
I kicked my feet into the muck below and caught something solid. Maybe a rock or a root. My legs shot us out of the water, and we landed on the bank. I was coughing, gasping, screaming for air, and Amanda lay on the ground, limp, lifeless, and without expression.
I tried to drag her up the ditch, but she was too heavy. I took off my coat and feebly wrapped it around her, but she wasn’t shivering.
Resting my arm underneath her head, I leaned down and placed my face close to hers. Through the moonlight, I saw that she was open-eyed and crystal-clear focused on me. Her eyes startled me.
“Professor?” she whispered.
“Yeah . . . yeah. Hey, I’m here. Right here.”
“My son.”
“Don’t talk. We got to get you to the hospital. The ambulance is coming.” I looked back up the bank for those headlights.
“Professor . . . my son.” Amanda gritted her teeth. “He’s coming.”
I looked down, placed my hand on Amanda’s stomach, and felt the contraction hit. She groaned.
“What, right here?”
Above me, coming around the back of the car, I heard movement. Expecting Blue, I looked up, but it was Amos crawling to me with the sweatshirt still wrapped around his head. “Amos! Get to the road! Stop the ambulance!”
“Not coming,” Amos whispered. “Road’s too iced over. Sending a four-wheel drive, but it’ll be twenty minutes ’fore he gets here.”
“But she’s having this baby now!”
Amos looked at me, leaning against the bank and breathing heavily, and said, “I know.” He had regained his focus. “We were sitting in church when her water broke. We were on our way to the hospital when we hit the tracks.” He tossed his head in the direction of the road. “Guess we’re delivering that boy right here.”
Amos closed his eyes and breathed as Amanda’s stomach went soft again. She opened her eyes, they rolled back, and her head fell limp to one side. The left side of her head was cut, swelling, and bleeding a lot.
Amos grabbed my arm with his right hand and jerked me down on top of him. His eyes were three inches from mine. Through clenched and bloody teeth he said, “Dylan, you got to deliver that boy right here.” He winced. “D.S., this is your time, your minute. You hear me? I can’t help you, but I can talk you through it.”
He opened his arm toward Amanda and slid down next to her. “D.S., place her head on my chest.”
I did what he said.
“In my trunk is a wool blanket. Wrap it around her.”
I reached into the open trunk and grabbed the blanket. Then I slid off Amanda’s underwear, the middle of which was soaked a deep red, and wrapped her, as best I could, in the blanket.
“Can you see the head?”
I shined the light. “No, not yet.”
“How far apart are the contractions?”
“I don’t know . . . a minute. Two at the most.”
Just then Amanda’s stomach tightened, she grunted, and her limp legs stiffened.
Opening his eyes, Amos asked, “That one?”
“Yes.”
“How ’bout now? Can you see the head?”
I looked again. “Sort of. I can see something.” I shined the light again. “Yeah, I can see the top of his head.”
“All right.” Amos wrapped his right arm over Amanda’s chest and cradled her to him. Talking in her ear, he said, “Amanda, baby, I know you can hear me. I know it hurts. I know everything in you hurts, but you the only one can do this. Can’t Amos or Dylan do this for you. You got it?”
Amanda made no response.
“Good, don’t talk. But when it hurts . . . you push.”
Amanda’s stomach tightened, she groaned louder, her legs tightened, and the baby’s head came through the canal.
“Head’s out, Amos.” I caught Amanda’s son’s head in my fingers, and a warm, slippery, sticky liquid coated my hands.
It was no longer cold. The moon broke through from behind a single cloud, cast a shadow on the three of us, and glistened off the snow. I didn’t need the flashlight to notice the blood.
“Make sure the cord isn’t wrapped around his head.”
“How? What am I looking for?”
“Just run your finger around his neck and tell me if you feel a cord.”
Shoving the flashlight in my mouth, I looked for a cord. I held the baby’s head with my left hand and felt for the cord with my right.
“No cord,” I said around the flashlight.
“Good,” Amos said. “All right, Amanda, one more. This boy’s coming right here. This is it.”
Amanda’s stomach tightened, she groan-coughed, and the baby’s right shoulder slipped out.
“Amos, I got a shoulder.”
“Gently, Doc.”
Amanda’s breathing was labored, and she was moaning.
“Make room for the other shoulder. Don’t be afraid to use your hand. Make room. Pull if you have to, but not on the baby. You know what I mean. You’ve seen this done before.”
I nodded. I ran my finger along the baby’s back, slid my fingers in between Amanda and the baby, pulled gently outward, and the baby slid out. A wet, gooey, warm baby landed in my hands. Pulling him to me, I saw that he was blue, limp, and silent.
“He’s out.”
Amanda let out a long, deep breath.
“Is he breathing?”
I stuck my ear against his face.
“No.”
Amanda whimpered.
“D.S.” Amos raised his head, and the veins in his neck showed in the moonlight. “Get him breathing.” His tone was urgent. “Put your mouth over his nose and mouth, and breathe into him. Breathe a full breath, but don’t force it.”
I cradled Amanda’s son in my arms, placed his mouth and nose in my mouth, and breathed.
“What’s happening?” Amos asked.
Again I pulled the baby’s mouth to my cheek. “Nothing.”
“Do it again.”
I did. “No good.”
“Take three fingers and compress his chest. Think of it like you’re pushing on a roll of bread and you don’t want to push through. Just mash it down.”
I did.
“Anything?”
“Nothing.”
Amos’s eyes showed fear, and he kicked the ground beneath him. “Slap him.”
“What do you mean, ‘Slap him’? Where?”
“Slap the kid, Doc! Just slap him!”
I smacked Amanda’s son on the bottom. He jerked, sucked in a deep, gargled breath, and screamed at the top of his lungs.
Bathed in the moonlight, we sat listening to Amanda’s newborn son. It was, quite possibly, the most beautiful sound I had ever heard.
Amos nodded, “Nice job, Doc. Nice job.” His head fell back against the bank, his eyes closed, and there, in the middle of all that, Amos smiled.
I grabbed the sweatshirt off his head and placed the baby on Amos’s chest. Shining the light on the bank, I found my knife, cut the cord midway between Amanda and the baby, tied a knot, and wrapped the baby tight inside the sweats. Amos’s big hand cradled the child while his right arm covered Amanda.
“Amanda, honey,” Amos assured her, “this boy’s fine.”
Kneeling in the snow between Amanda’s legs, I looked down and noticed the dark, sticky flow. “Amos, I got a lot of blood.”
“How much?” Amos asked.
I shined the light. “It looks like Maggie.”
His brow wrinkled. “Can you get us to the hospital in your truck?”
“Maybe, I’ll check.” Scrambling to the top of the hill, I found my truck quiet. No exhaust was coming from the pipe. It was dead as a doornail. I turned the ignition and mashed the accelerator to the floor, but she had seized up and wouldn’t turn over.
Sliding back down, I whispered, “It’s dead.”
“Dylan, you got to get us to the top of this hill. That truck’ll be here soon.”
I carefully took Amanda under the arms and pulled her toward the top of the hill. Beneath her, the snow trailed red. Digging in his heels, Amos inched upward with his right arm and held the baby with his left. His head was bleeding again. As Amanda and I reached the road, I heard the low whine of gears and saw headlights climbing toward us. As I lay there in the road, in a pool of blood, holding Amanda’s head in my arms, two men jumped out of the truck and ran toward us.
They quickly placed Amanda on a stretcher, wrapped two blankets over her, and slid her under the topper of the pickup. One of the men took the baby from Amos and then helped him to his feet, holding him steady. I crawled into the truck next to Amanda, and one of the medics handed me the baby. The other man grunted, lifted Amos into the truck, and laid him down on the other side of Amanda.
The first man looked at me and said, “Do you know her name?”
I nodded and said through my chattering teeth, “Amanda Lovett.”
Just before the driver shut the tailgate, Blue jumped in with us. The man ran around to the front of the truck and jumped into the cab. We could hear the radio exchange through the open window between the cab and the back.
“HQ, this is 716.”
“Go ahead, 716.”
“Shireen, we’re inbound with four. I need a blood type check on Amanda Lovett.”
“Did you say Amanda Lovett?”
“That’s affirmative.” The driver paused. “And Shireen, tell ’em we need lots of it.”
As our speed increased, I realized that the driver, whoever he was, was pushing the limits of what the snow and ice would allow. A dim light inside the topper shone on Amos’s eyes. He was looking at me. He didn’t say a word, but his eyes flashed to Amanda and back to me. She was entirely limp.
I shook my head. Amos’s right hand came up and grabbed hold of Amanda’s. The baby was quiet and still in my arms. His face was shiny and puffy, and his eyes blinked open and shut in the dim light. He appeared to be comfortable, and thanks to Amos’s sweatshirt, mostly dry. A whitish paste covered him, and he was sticking long fingers in his mouth. The little guy was as bald as a cue ball.
In a few minutes we reached the hospital. The truck stopped; somebody raised the window, lowered the tailgate, and a woman in a white uniform appeared. She reached for the baby, I extended the boy to her, and she disappeared behind two sliding doors and into a host of people.
Two men pulled Amanda from the truck. They placed her stretcher onto a gurney with wheels and disappeared between the two electric doors. Pastor John and Mrs. Lovett met them at the door and ran along behind them.
The doors to the emergency room were crowded with people. Two large men dressed in blue smocks jumped into the truck, grunted “One, two, three,” and lifted Amos onto a stretcher, then briskly rolled him through the sliding double doors while holding a towel on his head and shouting his vitals as they ran.
Back in the truck, I was shivering so hard that my head was bobbing back and forth, and I could not stop my teeth from chattering. Two more nurses climbed into the back of the truck, grabbed me under each arm, and lifted me onto a stretcher. They rolled me inside, down a hall, past a room with a lot of shouting and bright lights, and into a tile-covered room under a stream of a warm shower.
“Can you stand?” one of them asked.
I nodded.
They lifted me off the stretcher and set me on my feet. I was bent half over, my head hanging and my arms pressed against my chest. Warm steam filled my lungs, and warm water crawled down my back.
I stood.
One nurse worked to cut off my clothes while the other prepared some sort of IV and a breathing mask. “What hurts?” the first nurse said.
“N-n-n-nothing.”
After five minutes in the warm water, he looked up from his cutting and asked again, “What else hurts?”
“E-e-e-everything.”
He nodded. “Good. That’s good.”