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Back The Surrogate
Chapters (65)
  1. Cover
  2. Dedication
  3. Epigraph
  4. Part One
  5. One
  6. Two
  7. Three
  8. Four
  9. Five
  10. Six
  11. Seven
  12. Eight
  13. Nine
  14. Ten
  15. Eleven
  16. Twelve
  17. Thirteen
  18. Fourteen
  19. Fifteen
  20. Sixteen
  21. Seventeen
  22. Eighteen
  23. Nineteen
  24. Twenty
  25. Twenty-One
  26. Twenty-Two
  27. Twenty-Three
  28. Twenty-Four
  29. Twenty-Five
  30. Twenty-Six
  31. Twenty-Seven
  32. Twenty-Eight
  33. Twenty-Nine
  34. Thirty
  35. Thirty-One
  36. Thirty-Two
  37. Thirty-Three
  38. Part Two
  39. Thirty-Four
  40. Thirty-Five
  41. Thirty-Six
  42. Thirty-Seven
  43. Thirty-Eight
  44. Thirty-Nine
  45. Forty
  46. Forty-One
  47. Forty-Two
  48. Forty-Three
  49. Forty-Four
  50. Forty-Five
  51. Forty-Six
  52. Forty-Seven
  53. Forty-Eight
  54. Forty-Nine
  55. Fifty
  56. Fifty-One
  57. Part Three
  58. Fifty-Two
  59. Fifty-Three
  60. Fifty-Four
  61. Fifty-Five
  62. Fifty-Six
  63. Acknowledgments
  64. About the Author
  65. About the Publisher

I didn’t have time to deal with the installation, so I loaded all the pieces (and the instructions) into the backseat and slammed the door. “What am I doing?” I said to myself, angry that I’d wasted ten minutes. “I won’t need the car seat for two more days!”

I ran back into the house and searched for the birth plan, but it wasn’t on the dining room table where it had been, not in the living room, not on my bedside table or in the nursery or in any of the other obvious places. I ran to my desk and searched for my journal, pulled out some of the folded papers stuffed inside. Which one was the most recent version? I wanted to have it with me in case the nurses hadn’t gotten a copy like they were supposed to. I couldn’t tell which was which, so I picked the one that looked complete, jammed it in my purse, and grabbed my coat. My hands were shaking as I struggled to fit the key into the ignition. I adjusted the rearview mirror but then adjusted it back. I hit the garage door opener too soon, and it nearly came down onto the hood.

A block down the street, I remembered I had forgotten the video camera. Turned around and raced back, parked in the driveway, and left the car door open with the warning bell ringing as I ran into the condo and grabbed the camera case and tripod from the closet near my desk. Ran back to the driveway and into the car and felt for my purse, making sure my wallet was there, and my glasses.

At the stoplight, someone honked at me. I drove forward, turned left and a different car honked. For the first time in a long time, it seemed like everything I did was wrong.

Later that morning, when Cally and I arrived on the maternity floor, the nurses checked her in and checked her over. They got her hooked up and comfortable in a birthing room. I draped my coat on one of the guest chairs and piled my camera equipment and purse on top. The nurses had pointed out the free coffee and water station for me, and fortunately, the vending machines accepted credit cards. I showed the nurses the crumpled-up copy of the birth plan and reminded them that they should also have a copy in their file.