This past year has proved to me just how lucky I am. Yes, I am in constant pain and life can be difficult, but I finally have people here right alongside me. Granted, I could have had that all along. Lyndsey had been in my life for almost six years before I met Liam, and yet it took letting him back in to open me up to the idea that other people want to be around me because they want to be, not because they have to.

I’m not some big bad monster who pushes everyone away. When you find the right people you won’t worry about them breaking your heart, because you know they will do anything in their power to protect it for you.

Chapter Thirty

Liam

How the fuck do women do this?

It has been two hours since we got to the hospital and every second I am being humbled. I’m not a small man, I have fought giants and had my body beaten a hundred different ways on the ice, but I have never seen anything like this. Ellis is clearly in pain and yet her determination doesn’t waver.

There is sweat pouring down her face, her hair stuck to her bright red forehead and she is doing it all without murdering every person in the room.

If one more person comes and sticks their hand in her without much warning I might hit someone. She is their patient and I know that, but seeing her wince with each cervical check kills me. Knowing we are closer and closer to the big moment when she will start to push, and not being able to take the pain away, is making me feel so incredibly useless.

Still, I stand by her side, patting her face with a damp cloth and holding the mask with the gas for her while she grunts through another contraction.

Ellis is focusing so completely on breathing through the pain that she doesn’t see how hard I am shaking. She is no stranger to pain, but this is more than I could imagine.

I read books and watched documentaries in preparation for this, but I think a little part of my brain thought that all the pain wouldn’t happen to Ellis; that she would push once and the baby would just fly out.

I was delusional but I have my reasons. If I thought hard enough about how much pain she was going to be in I think I would have spiralled. I needed to be a wall of support for Ellis so I couldn’t give in to the idea that she would be suffering and I would be as useful as a chocolate fireman.