Water Broke at Midnight, Husband Waited for Her BFF's Hair, Baby's New Daddy Didn't novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: Her Hair Could Wait
Kira's water breaks, Garner stands still while Lacey finishes her hair, and Kira walks out to the neighbor's truck; Tilly is born with the cord around her neck and Kira has Garner removed from the ward.
My water broke at midnight, three weeks early, on the hallway floor of my own house.
It soaked my socks and ran under the radiator.
"Garner!" I yelled. "Hospital! Now!"
My husband came out of the bedroom in his boxers and grabbed the bag we had packed by the front door.
He was fast.
For one moment, he was the husband I had married.
Then the guest room door flew open.
Lacey stumbled out barefoot with her honey blond hair dripping down her robe.
She has been my best friend for six years.
She had been sleeping in our guest room for three weeks, since her breakup.
"Oh my God, is it happening?" she said.
She pulled the towel off her head and pressed it against the wet floor around my feet.
"Okay, hon. Breathe. In through your nose. I was mid-rinse, give me ten minutes and I'm ready."
Garner stopped with his hand on the doorknob.
A cramp folded me in half and I grabbed the wall.
More water ran down my legs and onto the floorboards.
"Garner," I said. "Open the door."
"Mar, you're going to be fine." Lacey rubbed my back in slow circles. "Nobody delivers in ten minutes. I looked it up."
"My water broke on the floor, Lacey."
"I know, and I'm right here." She smiled at me. "I'm the godmother. I can't walk into that hospital looking like a wet dog. There will be pictures, and you'll thank me."
Next to the front door stood two hospital bags.
One was mine, the gray one.
The other was a zipped pink duffel with her initials on the tag.
I had never asked why she packed her own.
I looked at Garner.
He was staring at the dripping hair, and he did not move.
"Garner," I said again.
"She's got a point, Mar." He rubbed the back of his neck. "First babies take forever. Let her finish. Two minutes."
Lacey went back into the bathroom and turned the hair dryer on.
I heard the dryer start up and it went on and on.
The clock over the stove said 11:58 when my water broke.
It said 12:12 when I understood that my husband was not going to open the door.
I bent over the bag, took my phone and my keys out of it, and left the bag where it was.
"Kira, where are you going?" Garner said.
"Out."
"Don't be dramatic. You're not even that far along."
I took my coat off the hook.
So I stepped out.
I got down the porch steps with one hand on the rail.
A truck was pulling up to the curb, and the man getting out of it already had his keys in his hand.
It was Greg, who lived in the unit under ours.
He drove an ambulance on the night shift and had fixed our porch light the week he moved in.
I had never heard him say more than ten words in a row.
He looked at my legs, then at my face.
"How far apart?"
"Four minutes," I said. "Maybe less."
"Okay." He opened the passenger door and put his hand under my elbow.
He did not ask where my husband was.
He did not look back at the house.
He got me into the seat, buckled the belt over my coat, and was in the driver's seat before I could finish a breath.
"Don't push," he said. "Look at me, not at the road. I'm calling ahead."
He drove with one hand and held the phone to his ear with the other.
He spoke in numbers and short words, and the voice on the other end said they would have a room.
I held the door handle with both hands.
My phone buzzed against my thigh.
*Garner: Where are you? Lace is almost done.*
I turned the phone face down.
We reached the hospital doors before the next contraction finished.
Two nurses met us with a chair, and Greg walked beside it the whole way to the elevator.
"You can stay in the lobby," I told him.
"They'll tell me if I should go," he said, and he stayed at the elevator doors until they closed.
The labor moved fast and the doctor never looked up.
At one point she said, "Heart rate's dropping, I need her now," and the room got very busy.
Tilly was born at 1:20.
She was small and gray and then she screamed, and I cried so hard the nurse laughed at me.
Five pounds, nine ounces.
"The cord was wrapped twice around her neck," the doctor said as she handed her to me. "Another hour at home, and I wouldn't be saying this."
I held my daughter against my chest and did not say anything.
At ten past two, the door opened.
Garner came in first with a bouquet from the lobby gift shop.
Lacey came in behind him in a white knit set, her hair curled and glossy, her phone already raised.
"There she is!" Lacey said. "Oh my God, Garner, look at her. Mar, hold her up a little, the light is perfect."
Garner stepped toward the bed with his arms out.
"Babe, you scared me. Why did you leave without us?"
I looked at him for a long moment.
"Which part of the last two hours did you think I'd say thank you for?"
His face went red.
"We came as fast as we could."
"Fifty minutes after she was born," I said. "With her hair done."
A nurse stepped in from the doorway and glanced between us.
"Is there a problem?"
"Yes," I said. "Both of them. My husband and his friend are not allowed in this room. Please take them off my visitor list."
"Kira!" Lacey said. "I'm her godmother!"
"Not today," I said.
Garner grabbed my hand.
"Mar. Don't do this in front of people."
"You're the one who stood in front of people," I said. "Let go."
Security was at the door within a minute.
Lacey went out first, still holding up her phone.
Then she stopped in the hall and the phone sank.
Greg was at the nurses' desk, still in his coat, holding a paper cup of coffee.
Lacey went white.
"Greg?" she said.
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