She landed hard on her side and tried to draw a breath, but her lungs were in terrible pain. she knew she had knocked the wind out of herself and she struggled to regain it again, as painful as it was. Her first thought was for the baby, and she panicked, hoping he was alright. She tried to reach her hands to her belly, but she could only move one. The other arm was in horrible pain, and she could not move it at all. The baby was still in her, and she prayed as hard as she could that he would be alright, but there was nothing except heat spreading swiftly between her legs and she was terrified that it was blood. She tried to reach her good arm down to her leg to touch the material of her dress there, to see if there was blood on her fingers, but she couldn't reach her leg.
She tried to open her eyes, but she couldn't see clearly or focus, and she felt something warm running down her face. Her heart pounded and her lungs burned, and she thought that if it weren’t for the baby inside her, she would wish that she hadn't survived the fall.
"Grace!"
She thought she heard a voice. It was distant, as if it was far away, but she couldn't tell for certain. Her body shivered and convulsed in the freezing wind and the rain around her, and there was nothing but that in her ears and hard cold water pelting painfully all over her body. Her back felt as if it had a spasm and searing pain shot through her as she cried out and held her hand to her back.
"Grace!"
She thought she heard the voice again, but she couldn't be sure. She was in more pain than she thought she could handle, and all she wanted to do was go to sleep so she wouldn't have to feel it anymore.
She laid there for what felt like an eternity, and the sounds around her felt like they were swimming as the water on the ground pooled around her, rushing in a hurry to get past her, and maybe take her with it. She was sure she heard her name again, but it was soft, and it sounded near. She felt something warm on her face. A hand. She struggled to open her eyes and focus, and she blinked fast in the downpour.
"Oh God, oh God... please... please be alright..." It was the voice again. She tried to see in the darkness, but she couldn't make out the face, or the voice because there was water in her ears.
"Grace, can you hear me? Honey wake up, stay awake... open your eyes, please!" the voice was garbled, but she could hear some of what it said.
She was trying to make it out when another wrenching pain shot through her back and moved around her belly, and she was terrified that she had been cut in her fall and the baby was in danger. She cried out and reached her hand to her stomach, holding it tightly, trying to keep the baby in, as hot tears mixed with the warmth running into her eyes.
"Oh God no... no... not the baby, not now... Grace, honey, I'm going to pick you up, try to hold on to me!" The voice was over her head somewhere, but she couldn't quite tell where it was. All she could really focus on was the profound pain that was burning through her body, and the baby she was sure she had lost. Her heart could not take the pain and she held her stomach and wept in agony as she realized the baby had not moved once since she had fallen. There was stillness in her, and it was the most horrible stillness she had ever known.
She felt something warm and solid move beneath her neck and her legs, and a moment later she felt herself lifted off of the ground. She tried to open her eyes once, but vertigo hit her like slamming suddenly into a concrete wall and her good arm flung out, trying to grasp anything to keep her steady. Her hand landed on something solid and she clenched her fingers to it tightly.
"That's it, baby, hold on tight to me. Hold on. I'll get you there. Just hang on to me, please! Don't let go. God, baby... don't let go." The voice was close; she could hear it better out of her right ear, where her head was laying against a warm wall.
She felt like she was locked down tight and flying at the same time. The wind and the rain howled around her as she flew through it, and then suddenly it stopped and it was gone. It sounded like it was far away.
She heard another voice muffled through the water in her ears. "Did you find her? Where was... oh God... is she..."
"Call the doctor now!" said the voice beside her right ear.
She tried to open her eyes again, but there was too much light and it hurt her eyes and her head, so she shut them tight, and the warmth continued to run over her face. She moved her hand from the solid hold she had, and she held tight to her belly as tears rolled from her eyes. Pain ripped through her back and belly again and she could not hold it in. She pushed her head back against the solid warmth behind it and cried out in agony. The pain lasted for a long while, and then it finally went away. She felt weak as it faded and she slumped against the warmth that held her as her tears continued to fall.
Suddenly the warmth was gone, and she felt herself laying in deep softness. Something warm and wet and soft moved over her forehead and the pain it caused made her draw her breath in sharply and she tried to turn away, but she was too dizzy.
"I called the doctor, he's on his way and he is sending an ambulance. How is she... how is the baby?" The voice was clearer this time. It was Henry. It had to be Henry. The warm softness returned to her forehead and though she tried to turn away, she felt something holding her chin still, stopping her from turning her head.
"I know, baby, I know... please... let me help you. You need help." It was Oliver.
"Oliver?" she choked out in a scratchy whisper. She wasn't sure if he could hear her, but she tried to tell him. "The baby... Oliver... something... wrong... baby..." she managed to get out, but it was hard to talk and her head was swimming as her ears began to ring loudly. She held tight to her stomach as another pain tore through her and she tried to writhe away from it, but she could not move and every other part of her body hurt so much that she could not escape any of it.
"It's okay! It's okay, baby... I'm here..." he said softly. The warm softness moved over her face and then she felt something cool laying on her head and the warm softness went to the arm that she could not move.
She winced in pain as the softness moved over her arm and her outcry made Oliver try to calm her again. "It's alright... I'm just taking care of you. You'll be alright. You're going to be alright... please God, let her be alright." He spoke almost too quietly to hear at the end.
Grace could not worry about the dizzying pain racking her body, or the sounds of Oliver talking to her. All she could think about was the baby. He had not moved once since she fell, and she didn't know how much time had passed, but it felt to her as if it had been an eternity.
She felt like she was falling slowly into a dark hole, and it was warm and quiet, but just as she was about to succumb to it, her body twisted in the agony of more pain, this time in her lower belly and she cried out, terrified for the baby, and she felt Oliver's hands on her, stilling her, trying to hold her and calm her.
The pain lasted a long while, but as it eased up again, she heard more voices and sounds in the room and she tried to open her eyes, but the light was too bright still, and it hurt her head and her eyes.
"We're going to lift her," said a strange voice.
"Oliver?" she asked, calling out to him and reaching her hand out to where she thought she had last heard him. There was nothing there.
"I'm here!" he called out to her, sounding further away.
"Ready, and go," said another voice, and suddenly there were arms and hands beneath her and she was lifted again for a moment, and then she was laying on something hard.
"Oliver?" she cried out as fear crept its icy fingers over her. She had no idea what was going on, and she tried to hold her belly, but there were hands around her arm that would not let go.
"I'm right here! They're here to help you, Grace, it's going to be okay. Everything is going to be okay," he said, his words ending quietly.
Something hard covered her face and she tried to breathe, but it was difficult. Panic set in as another pain tore through her belly and she couldn't move or breathe. She took shallower faster breaths and she heard the voices speaking back a
nd forth around her; anxious, serious, fast... and then she was falling into the warm quiet darkness again, and this time, nothing brought her back.
Chapter 9
It was dark and quiet for a long time, and then she realized there were soft sounds in the distance, and as she looked for them, they gradually became louder and clearer. It was the sound of machines. Her body felt heavy, as did her mind, and it seemed like she was struggling to think. She tried to open her eyes and look around, but it was difficult. She tried to move her body, but it was stiff and would not move.
With some concentration, she got her eyes open and she looked around. She was in a strange place. All of it was strange. The ceiling, the walls, and the machines beeping next to her. She tried to remember where she was and what had happened. There was something over her face. It was an oxygen mask, and she realized that she was in a hospital. There was no one around her. She was alone in the room. Then she remembered.
The fall. In the rain.
The baby.
Instinctively, she tried to draw her hands to her belly, but one of them was locked down. She looked, and discovered that it was in a cast. She tried again to move the other arm and discovered that there were what seemed like millions of tubes sticking out of it. She managed to get that arm and hand to move and she reached down to touch her belly. It was gone. The belly was gone. The baby was gone.
Realization swept through her and she remembered that he hadn't moved at all after her fall. Agony broke her heart and she began weeping hot tears that rolled down her face and into her hair and ears. The beeping noises got faster and faster as she sobbed and her heart rate picked up. Moments later, the door opened and people rushed in. A nurse. Two nurses. A man. Oliver. She looked at him in panic and tried to reach for him as he rushed around the bed to her.
"Oh God, honey I'm so sorry... I'm so sorry. The one minute I leave and you wake up. I've been sitting her for three days waiting, and nothing, and the one time I walk out for a second, and you wake up. I'm here. I haven't left your side. Everything is okay. Everything is just fine," he told her with a wide smile as tears fell out of his eyes and rolled down his cheeks.
She shook her head in desperation and tried to tell him the baby was gone, but the oxygen mask was in her way. She tried to reach up to take it off, but he grabbed her hand.
"Can we please get that off of her? Does she still need it?" he asked the nurse. The woman's hands moved around Grace's head and a minute later the mask was gone.
Grace turned her head to Oliver and wept miserably. "The baby! The baby's gone!"
He held her hand in his and reached up to stroke her cheek with his other hand. "I know, Grace. It's alright."
"It's not alright!" she cried out in anguish.
"Grace, honey, he was born... he's okay. He's here at the hospital with us. He's just fine," he told her through his happy tears. "He's fine, and you're going to be alright, too."
She looked at him in confusion as her breath seemed to come back to her. "He's here? He's alive? I couldn't feel him! He wasn't moving!" she said with a pained whisper.
The nurse beside her smiled and touched her shoulder. "I'll go get him. He's the cutest baby we've had here in a long time, and he's so good. I'll be right back. You keep calm and try to rest, okay? You won't do yourself any favors getting upset."
The nurse left and Grace looked back at Oliver. "He was born? How...? I was running and then I fell on the stairs and... then it was strange and there were people... how was he born?" she asked again, trying to piece it all together in her head.
Oliver shook his head and raised his eyebrows. "Actually, we were all pretty amazed, because you kept passing out, and we thought we were going to have to do a C-section, but he was coming fast the natural way and you woke up just in time to give a few pushes, and he was born, and then you passed out again." He laughed a little bit.
"You... you were there?" she asked him, struggling to remember it.
He smiled down at her and ran his fingers over her cheek. "I never left your side. Not from the moment I found you in the rain. I was there for all of it. I even got to cut the cord. It was the proudest moment of my life."
She suddenly thought of someone else. "Was Lance there?"
Oliver's lips pursed tightly into a thin line. He shook his head. "No, he wasn't there."
"I was there!" she heard another voice call out, and she looked over to see Henry wheeling in a hospital bassinet. "Well, I wasn't in the delivery room, but I was right outside the door," he clarified with pink cheeks. He had swiped the baby from the nurse the moment she left the nursery with him, and Henry had wheeled his grandson in to meet his mother.
Henry was beaming brighter than she had ever seen him as he smiled down at the bundle in the bassinet, talking and cooing to the baby there. Oliver helped her raise her bed up as she watched anxiously. Henry reached in and scooped the baby into his arms, patting his back as he walked over to Grace and held the baby out to her. She reached for him with her good arm, and as he was placed in the crook of her arm and she gazed at his tiny face for the first time, she felt whole again, more than she ever had in her entire life.
She grinned down at him. He had small dark curls around his head, and his skin was the color of light milk chocolate. He had dark eyes like her and Lance, a little pert nose, and a small red rosebud mouth. He stared up at her and blinked his eyes, and made a little 'O' shape with his tiny mouth.
Grace fell in love in an instant. She nuzzled him and breathed him in, loving his baby scent and his soft skin.
Henry rocked on his heels and held his hands behind his back, grinning from ear to ear, and Oliver watched her with fascination and shook his head happily. Henry coughed lightly and smiled at her with a raised eyebrow. "Not to rush you, or anything, but he's three days old now and... our little fella doesn't have a name. Did you have something in mind?" he asked hopefully.
Oliver shot his father a light scowl. "Dad! She just woke up!" he said only half teasingly.
Henry raised his other eyebrow and shrugged helplessly, "Well... the kid's got to have a name, you know..." He looked at Grace again and she smiled at him.
"I was thinking Mason, because he built a family out of all of us. Mason Henry Carter," she said, looking up at Henry again. Henry had been better to her than almost anyone in her whole life, and sharing his name with her son was a blessing to them all.
The old man's eyes grew wide for a moment and red and watery in the next instant. He turned away from them and pulled his handkerchief from his pocket, sniffling quietly with his back to them for a full minute before he tucked his handkerchief away and turned back to them.
He smiled warmly. "I love it, and I'm so honored. Thank you."
She smiled at him and then looked back at her son. "You were right, Oliver. Everything is just fine."
***
Grace and Mason were allowed to go home the following day, with medication and follow up appointments made. She was grateful that she had focused on the nursery instead of the wedding, because Mason had been born a month early, but it was all ready for him when they got there. Not that he was sleeping in the nursery, she had his bassinet beside her bed.
It was tricky for her, managing a newborn with a cast on her arm, but she managed, and Oliver was right at her side the whole time, sleeping in the nanny's room, helping her out with every feeding, with diaper changing, burping, and rocking little Mason to sleep, right up until Lance came home four days after Grace had brought Mason home; a full week after he had been born.
Henry met Lance in the foyer and gave him a cold hard stare. "I don't know where you've been, or why you didn't take your cell phone with you, but I'd like to congratulate you on the birth of your son, and to encourage you to take his upbringing as if it was the most important thing in your life."
Lance stared at him agape. "My... my son? He was born? He's not due for another... where is he?" Lance asked, swallowing hard.
Henry pushed his hands d
own in his pockets and frowned at Lance. "He's upstairs with his mother."
Lance looked ill. He nodded and turned to face the stairs as if he was marching to his death by firing squad. Henry watched him as he climbed them all, one at a time, and reached the top landing, and then Henry went into his office and closed the door behind him.
Lance knocked on Grace's partially open door and hesitantly walked in as she called out a hello. She looked up with a smile, expecting to see Henry, and was amazed to see Lance.
"Well! Look who finally made it home. Lance, this is your son, Mason. He was born a week ago." She bit back the negative things that were edging for the tip of her tongue and swallowed them like a bitter pill. This was the first time he was meeting Mason, and she didn't want to ruin it for him.
Lance walked up to the edge of the bassinet and looked in. The baby was sleeping.
"He's dark... like you," he said flatly.
She leaned over a little and looked at him pointedly. "Yes, he is. You can pick him up and hold him, if you want to."
He stared down at the infant for a long moment and then shook his head and looked up at her. "No, I'm going to pass." He seemed to notice for the first time then, that her arm was in cast and there was a bandage on her forehead.
"What happened to you?" he asked curiously.
"I fell in the rain," she said shortly. She had been out running in the rain because of their fight, but that was her choice, and she couldn't blame him for her bad decision.
"Oh. That must suck," he said, looking from her to the baby. Then he backed away and began walking toward the door. "Thanks," he said with a nod, and then he was gone.
Oliver walked out of the nanny's room and sighed, raising his hands up and clasping them behind his head as he closed his eyes and let his breath out slowly.
"He hasn't ever really been overly affectionate," Oliver said, as a light offer for his brother's poor response to meeting his son for the first time.
The Baby Shower Page 65