Chapters (65)
- Cover
- Dedication
- Epigraph
- Part One
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-One
- Twenty-Two
- Twenty-Three
- Twenty-Four
- Twenty-Five
- Twenty-Six
- Twenty-Seven
- Twenty-Eight
- Twenty-Nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-One
- Thirty-Two
- Thirty-Three
- Part Two
- Thirty-Four
- Thirty-Five
- Thirty-Six
- Thirty-Seven
- Thirty-Eight
- Thirty-Nine
- Forty
- Forty-One
- Forty-Two
- Forty-Three
- Forty-Four
- Forty-Five
- Forty-Six
- Forty-Seven
- Forty-Eight
- Forty-Nine
- Fifty
- Fifty-One
- Part Three
- Fifty-Two
- Fifty-Three
- Fifty-Four
- Fifty-Five
- Fifty-Six
- Acknowledgments
- About the Author
- About the Publisher
“It’s hard to sleep.” It was also hard to get in and out of cars, put on shoes. I went to the bathroom a lot. I waddled. People stared at me.
“Any pain in your groin?” said Ruth.
“Not usually,” I said, but Ruth frowned. She couldn’t help herself. I was carrying her precious child.
The doctor smiled at Ruth and raised his hand to stop us from talking, then took off his glasses and explained how everything was normal, he wasn’t concerned and we shouldn’t be, either. The baby was in a good position and I was on track. He’d see us next week, and we should call if anything changed. Day or night.
I thought about my mother, what she’d have said if she could have been in the room with us, hearing that fierce heartbeat, watching my giant belly. Would she have approved of what I was doing? Or would she have said I was selling a baby, which was what Digger told me his mother had said behind my back. Maybe my mother would have been proud of me for making so much money. I didn’t know her well enough to guess what she’d have thought. I was too young when she left.
Ruth had taken me for a tour of the maternity ward, to see the rooms where women gave birth and those where new mothers recovered afterward. The facilities were homey but still hospital-like. Ruth thought it would be good for me to be prepared and to “visualize” myself in these rooms, so it would be less stressful when I got there for the big event. We saw the bathtubs where some women chose to give birth, but we both knew this was not for us, and we had a laugh about that. At one point on the tour, Ruth asked about getting a room for herself on the maternity ward, could she check in and stay there?
“This isn’t a hotel,” said one of the nurses. “The rooms are for patients.”
Ruth blushed. “Oh, I realize,” she said. “I’m just asking about the facilities for the parents. The family.”
“The family is free to stay in the room with the mother and baby.” The nurses showed us how the bedside chair reclined into a cot, how the padded window seat held pillows, sheets, and blankets, and how a small person could also sleep there. But I could tell that Ruth wanted her own bed where she could wear a hospital gown and check her blood pressure and order room service.
When I did go into labor, I knew it was happening.