After a Complicated Labor, a Nurse Handed Me My Baby and Whispered, ‘Watch the Video I Sent You Before You Trust Your Husband’
“Nothing,” he said. “You’re just really pregnant.”
“That’s the plan.”
My husband smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes, and I filed that away under pregnancy paranoia and let it go.
***
Rachel called me the following morning, the way she always did.
“How are my nephews?”
“Kicking me as if they’re mad about something.”
“That’s the plan.”
“Good. That’s a healthy sign,” she said.
“Ryan’s being weird about Noah’s name, though.”
My sister was quiet for a second. “Weird how?”
“I don’t know. Distant.”
“Eve, if anything ever feels off, you call me. Any hour.”
“You worry too much,” I said, trying to brush her off.
“I worry the right amount,” Rachel said.
“Ryan’s being weird.”
I was still laughing about that one afternoon, two days later, when I stood at the kitchen counter rinsing a coffee mug, 38 weeks and one day pregnant.
The pain came without warning.
It ripped through my stomach and dropped me to my knees so fast I couldn’t catch myself on the counter. My cheek hit the tile. I couldn’t breathe.
