Chapter 7: Thirty-Four Weeks

Ansel drove the Subaru fast and well.

I lay across the back seat with my knees up and my grandmother's silver in a canvas bag under my head.

"Left on Henderson," I said, between contractions. "Not the highway. Henderson."

"That's the long way."

"The highway has a construction zone. Left."

He turned left.

"You're timing them," he said.

"Four minutes. Don't look at me, look at the road."

"I'm a trauma surgeon. I look at everything."

"Ansel."

"Yes, Dr. Coughlan."

It was the first time in seven months anyone had called me that and meant it.

The charge nurse was waiting at the emergency entrance with a wheelchair.

She had a hospital gown over her arm and her phone in her hand.

"Labor and Delivery has a room," she said. "Come on, Haze. Come on."

I held on to the arm of the wheelchair and looked up at Ansel.

"Stay," I said.

I had not meant to say it.

"Rule three," he said quietly. "I'm not asking."

"I know. Stay anyway. Just by the door."

He stayed.

The labor took four hours.

The obstetrician was the same woman who had sent me home on Wednesday.

She did not say I told you so, but she looked it.

At the third hour I stopped being a surgeon.

I stopped being anything but a body doing one thing.

At the fourth hour I took hold of the nearest thing, which was Ansel's left forearm, and held it with both hands.

He did not move.

Under my fingers the scar that ran across the back of his arm was warm and slightly ridged.

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