Page 45 of Wicked Things
“I’m here to make you hurry the fuck up,” I tell her, my mouth moving against her skin. “They need the room back. Your St. Peter’s of Mercy discount card has been revoked. They’re charging us by the minute.”
Sloane smiles; it looks like it takes a hell of a lot of effort on her part. Her eyes go to Ramesh. “That true?” she asks weakly.
Ramesh laughs, the concern that was all over his face when I walked into the delivery room now banished, nowhere to be seen. “Not at all. You’re our golden child. You have all the time in the world. We just thought you might like to get this over before shift change. A lot of your colleagues are waiting to say hello to this baby before they go home.”
Sloane attempts to smile again, but then a shudder runs through her body, shaking her violently as she curves upward, strain marking her face. “Arrrrrgghhhhh!” Her grip tightens on my hand, her fingernails digging into my skin.
I’ve watched countless people scream in pain before, but this is different. The agony ripping at Sloane isn’t inflicted upon her externally. It’s coming from within her, from inside her very being, and it’s swallowing her whole. She falls back onto the bed, whimpering as the contraction ends, and I want to fucking die.
“Good job, Sloane,” Ramesh says in a soothing tone. “You’re doing so well. Brace yourself for the next one. They’re riding close on each other’s heels now.”
Sure enough, minutes later, another contraction tears through her. My knuckles pop as Sloane squeezes my hand, her face a rictus of pain and misery, sweat rolling down her cheeks. She slumps back again, panting, crying a little under her breath.
“Can’t you give her some more pain relief?” I demand.
The nurse standing on the other side of the bed, monitoring the read outs on the silenced heart monitor connected to Sloane’s chest and stomach, shakes her head. “She refused any pain relief.”
It takes a beat for that to process. “What…the…fuck? She’s hasn’t hadanything?”
“A lot of women prefer not to,” she continues. “The pain meds available to us are relatively safe for the unborn child, but there are always risks. They can suppress the baby’s ability to breathe properly once they’re out of the womb.”
My head spins. I didn’t even ask Sloane whether she was going to take the meds available to her. I just assumed…
“Quit talking about me…like I’m not…here,” Sloane pants, wincing in between words. “We’re doing this naturally. We have to. It’s too…late for any of that bullshit now anyway.”
I look around, wildly scanning the room, searching for a cabinet or some kind of drawer that’s clearly marked, ‘the good drugs,’ so I can end this madness now and dose her up myself. Sloane gives my hand a light squeeze. “Hey. It’s okay. I got this. I just…need…” She stops talking as another contraction rolls through her.
There aren’t many gaps for talking after that. The waves of pain come one after the other, bleeding into one another. Sloane seems to enter this doped state, her eyes unfocused, roving around the room as she strains and grinds her teeth together again and again.
Half an hour.
An hour.
I can’t take much more of this. Sloane falls asleep, her body giving out on her when the contractions cease, only to wake up screaming thirty or sixty seconds later.
“Do something,” I snarl at Ramesh. “This is fucking torture. She’s not going to make it if she has to do this much longer.”
The doctor ignores the threatening tone in my voice, his focus entirely trained on what’s happening between Sloane’s legs. “She’s not dying, Mr. Mayfair. She’s fighting. Give her a chance. Let her fight.Help her fight.”
And so I do. I do it the only way I know how. I provoke her.
“You’re making this way harder than it needs to be,” I whisper into her ear. “You’re letting our unborn baby kick your ass.” Her eyes widen, refocusing a little as she gives me a sideways glance.
“I’d like to seeyou…do this.” She sounds exhausted, but there’s a spike of defiance in her tone.
“I’d have gotten the job done hours ago. We’d already be home by now.”
“Fuck…you.”
“Seriously. I’m surprised I’m even having to say this, but I didn’t think you were thisweak.” I hate the words coming out of my mouth. I hate the arrogant smile I’m sliding into place, and the bored expression I adopt after it.
“Fuckyou,” Sloane hisses again. She suddenly seems more awake. “You can leave if you’re going to be an asshole.”
“I’m staying,” I tell her. “You can’t make me leave. Not unless you get on with it and have this baby.That’swhen I’ll leave.”
She screams as another contraction hits; she pushes harder than she was a moment ago, her teeth bared, eyes screwed shut tight. She puts her whole body into it this time.
“What the hell wasthat? You didn’t even try.”
