She felt poor, poverty-stricken, small and without significance in this larger world she had glimpsed. Almost in tears, her face still buried in the sleeve, she tried frantically to think of what she had.
What came to her were the faces of her children, and the prairie that she knew so well, that surrounded their small ranch. And she felt a little better.
“Here,” she said to Diana, “you try it on,” pulling if off as fast as she could. She wanted only to leave, go home. Diana slipped the coat on, but it was obvious that she had little interest in it.
“I forgot about Phoebe!” Selena said suddenly. “I have to phone, I have to …”
“Take it easy,” Diana said, taking off the coat. “Jason or Kent would have phoned if she had gone in labour.”
“You don’t know how Jason can sleep,” Selena said, as the two of them squeezed past the other women on their way out into the main hall. “And Kent’s not all that reliable. If he and Tony get talking …”
“We’ll be home in an hour, Selena,” Diana said. She pushed open the door into the hall. It was half-empty now, the waiters clearing tables while women stood in groups here and there and talked.
The main doors at the far end of the hall opened and a man came through and stood looking around. His parka was covered with snow. He was joined by a second man, also snow-covered.
“Oh, no,” Selena wailed.
The first man began to speak, then raised his voice to be heard. Everyone in the hall stopped talking.
“There’s a bit of a spring blizzard out there,” he called. “It’s not too bad yet, but I wouldn’t hang around if you’ve got far to go.” He stopped, apparently not wanting to be seen as giving orders. The women’s voices rose again in dismay or annoyance. It was nothing to the town women, and most of the country women had friends or relatives they could stay with if necessary. But Selena thought of Phoebe.
“I’ve got to get home!” she said, hurrying toward where Rhea was rising now from her place, where she had been waiting. They went together to the cloakroom, and searched for their coats.
“I’ve got a funny feeling,” Selena said, as she found hers and put it on. “I had it before I left. I knew I shouldn’t have come.”
“What’s gotten into you?” Diana asked, annoyed. “Kent’ll be with her by now. I’m sure she’s just fine.” She shrugged into her coat, then reached under her collar to pull out her long hair. It fell in a shiny cascade onto her shoulders. Selena looked at Rhea, who was being helped into her coat by a woman who happened to be standing near her.
“Haven’t you ever heard of women’s intuition?” Rhea asked Diana, her tone half-amused, half-serious. Diana hesitated for a second, looked at Rhea, then Selena. She turned then, and led the way to the door, which she held open for them.
Swirling snow greeted them, whirling down the street past the power poles, over the banked-up snow on the sidewalks, whipping around their nylon-clad legs and up into their faces. They pulled up their collars and shivered.
“I’ll go get the car!” Selena shouted, her words swept away in a gust of wind. She hurried down the steps, slipped in the fresh, wet snow and almost fell. It’ll be bad out in the country, she thought, if it’s this bad here, and that man said it wasn’t bad yet!
She was already starting the car as Diana and Rhea climbed in, and she pulled out of the parking place against the curb as the first of the other women emerged from the brightly-lit hall into the storm. A blast of snow billowed up, glittering in front of the car, then was swept away like a ghost.
“I hope those women who drank too much don’t try to drive home,” Diana said.
“There’s a time for drinking,” Rhea said cryptically, and then was silent.
Already they were passing the last buildings in town, starting out down the snowswept grid toward home twenty-five miles away. As soon as they left the protection of the buildings snow began to whip across the hood, driven by the wind with such fury that sometimes she could see a few hundred feet ahead, and sometimes she could see nothing at all.
“Look at the ditches,” she said. “They’re almost full. It must have started to snow right after we went inside.”
“At least it isn’t cold,” Rhea said. It was true, the temperature had barely dropped, but the snow was wet, hard to get through where it had drifted across the road.
“I didn’t even bring slacks,” Selena said. “The sky looked perfectly clear,” and of course, Rhea laughed.
“Put your lights on dim,” Diana suggested. Selena struck the button with her foot and found she could see a little better.
“Just go slow,” Rhea said complacently, “and you’ll be all right.”
“This damn country!” Selena said, aware she was quoting Kent, and then went on in her own words. “Sometimes I hate it!”
“Now, now,” Rhea said. “You don’t mean that. It’s spring moisture for the farmers.”
“Fuck the farmers,” Selena said, and Diana laughed. She laughed so hard she sounded as if she was choking and they could hear her rolling around in the back seat. Selena had to laugh, too.
“For heaven’s sake, calm down,” Rhea said. “It won’t help any if you drive us into the ditch.”
Diana stopped laughing and settled into silence.
“How did you like Ladies Night Out?” she asked, after a bit.
“I liked it fine,” Selena replied, hunched over the steering wheel. “I’ve never in my life done anything like it, and I’ve begun to think, just now, as we’re talking, that it’s something I’ve always wanted to do, only I didn’t know it. It was good. It felt good.”
“Funny,” Diana said. “It was so different from the things you do in the city.”
“What?” Selena was torn between straining to see the road, and listening to what Diana was saying.
“It was all about … pretty things,” Diana said. “About the things we women seem to yearn for, or need, maybe. Our kind of women, anyway, who don’t have much more than the necessities.”
“It was a celebration,” Rhea said. Her tone gave the word some special meaning Selena couldn’t divine. Diana was silent.
“Oh, God, I wish Kent was here,” she moaned, braking again. They were ten miles from town and the storm was getting worse. “We could end up spending the night on the road.”
“No,” Rhea said. That was all, just no. The wind screamed against the car, plastering snow against the windshield and then blowing it off again.
“My turn-off should be coming up pretty soon,” Diana said.
“You might have to get out and walk in front of the car to find it,” Selena said. She hadn’t taken her eyes off the road, or what she thought was the road, for miles now and her eyes were blurring from the strain. She blinked hard a few times and they cleared. A wall of white descended in front of her, she braked, then touched the gas carefully again when it passed.
“Never mind her turn-off,” Rhea said. “You’ll get us lost trying to find it. Just keep going.” Selena expected Diana to protest, but she said nothing. They kept inching forward, finding, when the wind tore rents in the sheet of white, that sometimes they were on one side of the road, and sometimes on the other.
Phoebe, Selena thought. Her hands, gripping the steering wheel, were sweating, the muscles running up the palms to her wrists were aching. Her coat felt much too confining and bulky, as if she might be able to see the road better if she weren’t wearing it.
“We’re almost there,” Rhea said.
“What?” Selena asked, surprised. “How can you tell? I haven’t seen a fencepost or a crossroads or a stonepile in the last fifteen minutes.”
“I can tell,” Rhea said calmly. “There!” It was so sudden and so loud that Selena slammed on the brakes, throwing them all forward and then back.
“Jesus, Selena!” Diana said, more ruefully than angry.
“There what?” Selena asked Rhea, angry with her again.
“The turn-off to your place,” Rhe
a said calmly. Selena stared through the windshield but couldn’t see anything in the darkness and the blowing snow. “Just back up a little and you’ll see it,” Rhea said.
“What if I back up into the ditch?” Selena muttered, but shifted gears and backed the car as slowly as it would go.
“Eighty years I’ve lived in this country,” Rhea said. “I guess I know your turn-off when I come to it.”
Selena had stopped the car again and was peering, mystified, into the storm. But there it was, the new fencepost Kent had sunk in the corner of the field when one of the neighbours had run off the road in the mud and snapped the old one off.
“Well, holy cow,” she said, and sat for a minute in surprise before she shifted back into low. They started down the side road toward the house at the other end which had been swallowed up by the night and the storm.
Now Selena knew. Phoebe was in labour, and she was alone.
“Phoebe’s in labour,” she said, her voice low, filled with apprehension.
“What?” Diana asked, startled.
“I know,” Rhea said.
BIRTH
Phoebe was in the kitchen. She had apparently been trying to phone because the phone was off the hook. The chair that sat under the phone was on its side on the floor and Phoebe was lying next to it, on her side, her knees drawn up, her eyes closed, her arms over her belly. Selena was on her knees beside her at once, reaching for her pulse, one hand on her forehead. Phoebe’s face and neck were slick with a fine film of sweat, but her body was not clammy to touch, only warm, as it should be. But her slacks were soaked down to the ankles, and Selena, frightened as she was, couldn’t suppress irritation with Phoebe.
At her mother’s touch, Phoebe opened her eyes.
“It’s coming,” she said, and gasped, stiffening, tossing her head from right to left and back again. Her face contorted and she let out a grunting cry. Selena looked up at Rhea, who stood at Phoebe’s feet.
“Calm her down,” Rhea said. “I think she can make it upstairs to bed.”
Diana crouched beside Phoebe, opposite Selena, and began to stroke Phoebe’s damp hair, to lift it from where it was plastered to her face and neck, and to murmur to her, “It’s okay now, Phoebe dear. We’re here. It’s all right now.”
“Phoebe,” Selena said, her voice crisp, “we’re going to get you upstairs to bed. Do you hear me?” Phoebe gasped, grimaced, then, as the contraction passed, relaxed a little.
“Okay,” she said, lifting her head a little. “Just let me … rest a bit.”
“You can rest upstairs,” Selena said. “We don’t want your baby born on the kitchen floor. Now get up.” Phoebe rose on one elbow, the other arm still holding her abdomen. Selena lifted and pushed on her left while Diana did the same on her right. They managed to help Phoebe onto her feet and start her moving down the short hall to the stairs. The next contraction came before she had put her foot on the first step, and she hung onto the newel post and cried out.
“When we get you to bed,” Selena said, “I want you to stop fighting it, you’re only making it worse.”
“It feels … like … my bones are being … pulled apart,” Phoebe gasped.
Selena held to her more tightly, but Diana said, both wry and grim at the same time, “I guess nobody’s told her that labour isn’t pain,” and Rhea snorted.
“She’s just scared,” Rhea said, behind them, and Selena was surprised, had forgotten she was there. They had almost reached the top of the stairs when the next one came, and Phoebe would have fallen if Rhea had not been behind her, and Selena and Diana on each side, lifting and holding her upright.
“Thank heavens we changed all the sheets this morning. Her bed is clean and ready.” Rhea gave instructions while Diana threw back the covering on the bed and Selena helped Phoebe undress.
“We’ll need some scissors and some boiling water to sterilize them in and I guess … some old sheets, if you have some, Selena. We’ll put them under her so she doesn’t ruin the mattress. And where are the baby clothes and the blankets?” She looked around the room. On the other side of the window the wind howled and whistled and plastered wet snow against the pane. “I can’t think of anything else,” she muttered, her hands on her hips.
Diana had already hurried out of the room to collect the things Rhea had asked for. They could hear her opening and closing closet doors. Phoebe, lying on the bed with pillows propping her into a half-reclining position, began to moan and gasp. She clutched at her mother, tears smearing her contorted face.
“Oh, God!” she gasped. “I can’t … stand … it.”
“Tsk! Tsk!” Rhea clucked disapprovingly. Phoebe fell back, letting go of her mother, and Selena finished pulling off her wet slacks and soaking panties. Gently Rhea bent the girl’s knees and spread her feet. Another contraction seized Phoebe and she reached out blindly, thrashing, as if to strike someone. Selena took her daughter’s arms and pulled them down to her sides, smoothing her forehead with her palm.
“Phoebe, you’ve got to stop this,” she said, her voice unexpectedly sharp. “I’m disappointed in you. You’re not a child anymore. You’re a woman—a mother—now calm down. Stop this nonsense.”
“Get her to come down the bed this way,” Rhea said, her voice still calm, as though she hadn’t noticed what was going on between Selena and Phoebe. “Take those pillows out from under her now.”
Selena obeyed, carefully lowering Phoebe onto the cool sheet. Phoebe opened her eyes. That old, inward-turning look that had so disturbed Selena was gone. The old Phoebe was there again, alert and fully present, only her body was in the lead now, speaking to her with an urgency that would not allow retreat.
“Having a baby does have a way of getting your attention,” Selena said, laughing, tears blurring her eyes because Phoebe was at last returned to her, but Phoebe paid no attention, probably didn’t even hear.
“Concentrate on your breathing, Phoebe,” Rhea said. “Take long breaths now, and when you have to push, don’t fight it. Push hard, the harder you push, the faster the baby will come.” Phoebe had begun to push again, her mother murmuring encouragement to her, and holding her hand. They could hear Diana coming up the stairs, two at a time. She deposited three of Selena’s sheets, folded neatly, at the foot of the bed, and as Phoebe relaxed, panting, they lifted her just enough to slide them under her.
“You took that class,” Selena said to Diana. “Isn’t she supposed to puff or something, at some point?”
“Honestly, that was three years ago,” Diana said. “I don’t remember.”
“I don’t recall puffing when I had my children,” Rhea remarked, and the other two had to laugh. Rhea had rolled the long sleeves of her dress up past her elbows and her arms still looked firm and strong.
Diana said, “I phoned Kent and Tony,” but Phoebe had begun to push again and she didn’t finish what she was going to say.
“A long, deep breath,” Selena instructed Phoebe. “Now let it out, slowly, slowly.”
When the contraction released, Selena went into the bathroom and put a facecloth under the cold tap. It was cold in there, it always was, and she shivered in the blast of cold air that found its way around the old, worn-out window frame, then turned to go back to the bedroom.
Jason had appeared in the doorway, squinting in the light, his pyjamas rumpled and his hair standing on end.
“What’s going on?” he asked, his voice thick with sleep. Selena didn’t know whether to laugh or be angry with him.
She was about to tell him, but overcome by irritation, snapped, “Nothing! Now go to bed!” He put one hand up, the palm forward, to shade his eyes, trying to see her, then gave it up, turned, and went. She was impatient with him because the two boys had been so resentful of Phoebe’s condition, as if she had done it on purpose to embarrass them, and because he had let her down tonight. But they were her sons, after all, and Jason was still more child than adult. She hurried back to the bedroom and sponged Phoebe’s face wi
th the cloth.
“I can see the baby’s head,” Rhea said, suddenly, and there was a new note in her voice.
“Push, push, that’s it.” Phoebe was responding now, working with Selena, she was going to deliver this baby. “It’ll be over in a few minutes now. That’s the way. You’re really working now. Good.” She bent and kissed Phoebe’s wet cheek.
Diana said, “The weather’s letting up. The men said they’d come right over on the snowmobile. I know that thing, they’re probably having trouble starting it. They’ll take her to the hospital on that sleigh thing Tony bought for the kids.”
“No need for that!” Rhea said, not raising her head. “She’s doing fine right here.”
Phoebe was pushing again and Selena and Diana urged her on, praising her and encouraging her.
“Where’s that water?” Rhea suddenly demanded.
“Coming,” Diana said. She hurried to the door and was gone, her feet tapping hard and rapidly down the stairs. In a minute they could hear her coming slowly back up.
“The head’s coming,” Rhea said, and couldn’t hide a little delight.
“Now work,” Selena said, “work!”
“It’s out!” Rhea said, as a moan escaped Phoebe, the first one since Selena had scolded her, and Selena put one hand on each side of Phoebe’s face, and held them there. “I’ve got it … only a little more, Phoebe, dear,” Rhea said. That rich, powerful scent of flowers filled the room and this time, as Selena became aware of it, it no longer seemed strange, but instead, fitting and right.
“Aaaah,” Rhea said, and lifted up a squirming, slick little bundle, setting it to rest on Phoebe’s stomach. Diana, still holding the basin of hot water, quickly set it down on the chest of drawers, fished the scissors out of the basin, and handed them to Rhea, who cut the cord, as if it were something she did every day, knotted it and handed the scissors back to Diana.
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