The.
Sting.
That’s what she called it.
Like it was a little bee sting or a bug bite.
Not a baby ripping her body in half.
I don’t understand why anyone would ever think to themselves, gee, pushing a head out of my crotch can’t be that hard, why would I want medicine to help?
“I’m going to tell you this right now…”
“You’re getting medicated?”
“Damn skippy.”
“Don’t blame you,” he murmurs. “That’s your call. I told Josie she was insane for not wanting it. She was stubborn, as usual, though. She said she could handle it and dared Dean and me to challenge her abilities. So now she’s learning that she’s an idiot.”
A bubble of laughter bursts out of my throat. “I’m going to tell her you said that.”
“Go ahead.”
Something tells me she’ll kick his ass if I let her know he’s walking around calling her an idiot.
I sit quietly, thinking back over what we saw when we walked into the room. At first, I was like wow, she looks amazing for being in active labor right now.
“Hey, you! What took you so long?”
“We’re here now.”
“Oh, right! Ashley is with you?”
I step out from behind Nik and give her a little wave. “Hi.”
Josie stretches out her arms. “Yay! Come here, come here! I’m so excited to meet you!”
“Probably figured it would be under different circumstances, right?”
She shrugs. “Meh. This is fine. I’m not shy.”
“That’s an understatement,” Nik teases and Josie ignores him, leaning up out of her bed to give me a small hug.
“How you feeling, brat?” Nik asks.
“Well, I yelled at the doctor once,” she says and Dean interrupts with a cough and “Three times,” and she continues with, “but otherwise I’m just ready for us to get this show on the road. The contractions are coming harder and quicker and last time they checked I was almost fully dilated so we’re there.”
“That’s a lot of information,” he says, pulling a funny face. “I take it that’s all good?”
“Yup. You’ll learn. I can’t believe you’re having this guy’s baby.” Josie grins but before I can respond she winces, curling into herself. She starts a series of breathing with Dean by her side, holding her hand and breathing along with her. She looks straight into his eyes and he whispers and murmurs encouraging words. It’s intimate and I feel like we’re intruding on something special between the two.
Before long, she lies back against the mattress, blowing out a deep breath and giving him a faint smile. “That was a big one.”
“Yeah,” he agrees. “Do you need anything?”
“Only… ooh, holy shit! It’s coming again. What the…” She lets out a deep groan, sitting up and repeating the same process from earlier. Dean counts as she works through the contraction. I look at Nik whose eyes are as wide as my own. He mouths, what the fuck to me and I can only nod before looking back at Josie and Dean. He takes a wash cloth and wipes her forehead.
“You okay? Should we get the doctor?”
She shoots him a glare. “And what’s the doctor supposed to do for me? I can have this baby on my own.”
Nik barks out a laugh. “Good grief. Josie, now’s not the time to hold to your stubborn ways. The doctor has to basically pull the child from your body, you know that, right?”
She harrumphs and crosses her arms over her belly. Her very, very large belly. That’s not normal either, is it? No way is my stomach going to grow to that size. Also, there’s no way I’ll say that out loud because I like having my face arranged the way it is and Josie looks like she could murder someone in their sleep right now and walk away as if nothing happened. “No, he doesn’t. He’s not pulling anyone out of anywhere, you dumby. Besides, he hasn’t done much for me so far. He never walks in here to check on me! He hasn’t even been sending in his nurses! I had to make Dean check me to see how far along I’m dilated, which, by the way, he has absolutely no clue what he’s doing so for all we know, I somehow regressed and now I’m only at a two.”
“What are you talking about? He hasn’t been good to you?” Nik asks, his hackles rising.
Dean’s already shaking his head, grinning big. “You’re so full of it.” He dares to say to Josie. “You told him he didn’t know how to help anyone with childbirth because he’s never squeezed a baby out of his body.”
“I did not.”
“Oh, baby, you did. You also told him he wasn’t allowed back in here until he could prove he went to medical school. You said that I knew how to handle it all because no one knew your body better than me so I might as well do their jobs.”
“You’re such a liar!”
“I am not.”
“I didn’t… oh no.” She looks panicked as she tugs on his arm. “I think I did! Dean! Why didn’t you put a muzzle on me?”
“Right,” he snorts. “Like that would have worked out well for me.”
“Well, get him back! He’s the one who can give me the happy medicine!”
“Baby, it’s way too late for that. Besides, you had a plan and told the doctor that he wasn’t allowed to change it up under any circumstance.”
She’s shaking her head rapidly. “I was out of my mind when I said that.”
“I’m not denying that, but it’s almost time. You can’t change your mind now.”
Dean and Josie are completely adorable together.
“I want to maybe go back a little bit in time. Nik, you thought you could invent a time machine when you were a kid. Did you ever make that happen? Go get it and we’ll go back in time a few months.”
“Time machine?” I ask him and he rolls his eyes.
“I was eight,” he explains to me. “And no. You’d probably have known if I made a scientific discovery worth billions of dollars. Suck it up, buttercup. You wanted this. You were sure you could handle it, now you’re about to prove it to yourself.”
Josie looks to me, pleading. “Trade places?”
“Nope. Sorry, I’m happy over here for a little bit.”
“Some friend you are,” she harrumphs.
I want to remind her that we met ten minutes ago and we’re hardly friends, but maybe someday we will be? Hopefully.
Another contraction hits and she buckles over, her face twisting in pain. “Oh hell. It hurts so bad!” Her mouth is pulled tight and she grunts, long and low. Her eyes are closed tightly and her teeth are bared. I believe her when she said that it hurts. It looks extreme. This can’t be right. No one in their right mind would have more than one child if this is the pain they have to endure every time.
“Doctor,” she says breathlessly and Nik jumps into action, racing to the door.
“We need help in here!” he yells.
He strolls back in as if he didn’t just scream something at the top of his lungs and walks to his sister, patting her on top of the head. “They’ll be right in. Just hang tight and then we’ll get to meet the little one soon.”