Page 103 of Unnatural
Dizziness overcame him. The room spun, and he stood, a sound of distress falling from his lips as he gripped his head. This was… He stumbled back. He had the vision of Autumn’s wide, watchful eyes just before he turned and hurried from the room, bursting out the door and all but plastering his body to the first empty wall he came upon. Someone moved past him, back into the room. The birthing room.Autumn’s giving birth.He was pretty sure it was the woman who’d left them alone. The nurse or the midwife or whoever she was.
Oh Christ Almighty.
How did he come to terms with this?
You’re going to see your baby born.
Hisbaby?
Wait…he couldn’t…except apparently, hehad. Theyhad. He pressed harder against the wall, bringing his hands up and gripping his head. Someone clapped him on the shoulder, and he startled, his arms dropping.
Bill stood there, looking at him solemnly. “I don’t suppose this is what you expected to return to,” he stated.
Sam couldn’t yet form words. The sound that came from his chest spoke of his confusion and distress and something much different lurking just under those two emotions, but one Sam couldn’t quite identify just yet over the buzz of shock.
Bill nodded as if the sound he’d made told him all he needed to know. “Yeah,” he said, and though he nodded somewhat gravely, his lips tipped at the corners. “This is it, Sam. The end of one journey and the start of another. Take a minute. Let it settle. This is where you choose to go away again or accept the miracle you’ve been given. Miracles don’t always come in the form of a gentle, guiding light. Sometimes miracles zap you right on your ass. I know a thing or two about that, believe me.” His smile grew as Sam simply stared. “Anyway, it’s your choice, no one else’s. If you need me, I’ll be in the kitchen drinking and waiting to become a grandpa.” With that, he walked away, whistling.
Sam exhaled, taking that minute that Bill suggested. Letting it settle, though that might take longer than a minute. That might very well take a lifetime. All these months, Autumn was pregnant. And now she was giving birth.You don’t have a lifetime, Sam. Get it together.
He pushed off the wall, rushing back into the dim, herb-scented room.
“You need to be in a hospital,” he declared, standing over the tub Autumn was immersed in.
She opened her eyes and gazed at him with such calm in her expression. She reached her hand out, and he took it and then fell to his knees beside her once again.
“No, Sam, no hospital.”
The older woman on the other side of the tub assisting Autumn smiled at Sam as well. “Hi, Sam,” she said. “I’mJackie. I’ve heard a lot about you, and I’m glad you’re here. Autumn has had a low-risk pregnancy and is right where she wants to be. Birth is rarely a medical emergency and I have every confidence that Autumn won’t require either equipment or medication. Birth is the most beautiful, natural thing a woman’s body ever does.”
Sam took a deep breath, his muscles relaxing as he gripped Autumn’s hand more tightly in his. Of course she hadn’t wanted a hospital. Not the smell or the memories. She wasn’t sick. She was welcoming new life. They both were. That other emotion, the one that had sat just beneath the shock and the fear, emerged, stronger, mightier than the others. It wasjoy.
“Water,” Autumn murmured, closing her eyes again and leaning her head against the side of the tub.
Jackie gestured to a cup with a straw sitting on the table next to him, and he brought it to Autumn’s lips.
“I can’t have… I didn’t think…”
Autumn let out a small breathy laugh though her eyes remained closed. “Apparently you were misinformed.”
He gazed at her, his eyes roaming her beautiful face, the one he’d pictured every day for the last eight and a half months. But even though he’d kept the vision front and center in his mind, it didn’t compare to the real one before him now. She was the only woman who existed on God’s green earth. “I love you,” he said. The words came easily. They were simple because they were true.
Her eyes did open then, but only for a moment. “I love you too,” she whispered, the last word turning into a moan as she gritted her teeth and squeezed his hand. After a minute, she relaxed again, leaning back. “Did you know more babies are born during full moons?” she asked him.
“I didn’t know that.”
She smiled. “Well, now you do. Tell me about where you’ve been, Sam.”
So he did. He told her about the red-hued cliffs of Arizona and the rainbow-sheened springs. He described the majestic mountains of Colorado rising over lush fields of wildflowers. He told her of the ranch he’d worked on and then the supply room of the general store, moving from place to place, learning things about himself he’d never known.
He told her about the roar that had always come from inside him, the one he’d feared all his life. Finally, he’d closed his eyes, and he’dlistened,realizing that what he’d thought was the monster rising within was the howling song of his soul. And though it was a song of sorrow, a wail of longing and loneliness and long-endured misery, it was a song all the same. It was the expression of his humanity, an undeniable truth, the yearning for love and the hope that what was sorrowful now might someday be joy. He’d hung his head, and he’d let it sing, tears coursing down his cheeks as the monster faded and the man emerged.
And he’d known it was time to go home.
Time to figure out what to do with the rest of his life—something using his hands, something that connected him to the earth. And time—apparently—to be a father and a husband if she’d have him.
She smiled, though her eyes remained closed as she focused on the growing pressure, and then she reached for him and laced her fingers with his.
Jackie left them alone as Autumn’s contractions drew closer together, and Sam blotted her skin with a cold washcloth, telling her how much he loved her and what awarrior she was. And she gripped his hand and murmured that he was a warrior too, and their baby would be as well.
