The Baby Doctor

by Bobby Hutchinson

  Table of Contents

  THE BABY DOCTOR

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  About The Author

  THE BABY DOCTOR

  Bobby Hutchinson

  Copyright © 2012 by Bobby Hutchinson

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  Publisher’s Note: This novel is a work of fiction. The names of characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously; any resemblance to actual personal (living or dead), events, organizations, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  For more information about this author and a free novella, please visit

  http://bobbyhutchinson.ca

  For Laine Jackart

  Babies are the nicest way to make people

  Chapter One

  Dr. Morgan Jacobsen paused in the vestry of the small old church, breathing hard and brushing raindrops from her new blue dress. The September day had gone from sunny to sodden in the past hour, catching her without a raincoat or an umbrella.

  Inside, the congregation was silent, and the pastor’s rich voice floated back to her along with the heady scent of bridal flowers and the special subtle aroma of beeswax and holiness that all churches seemed to exude.

  “Gathered here today—”

  Rats. Morgan’s heart sank and she scowled. She was soaking wet, out of breath, and now she was late for Celia’s wedding.

  As usual, she’d had a last-minute phone call, this one from Joyce Tucker, an expectant mother in her final week of pregnancy.

  “Morgan, my mother wants to know if my grandmother can be there when my baby comes.” Joyce had sounded stressed, and Morgan hastened to reassure her.

  “Sure, Joyce, I’ve got no objections to that.”

  But then Joyce had burst into hysterical tears. “Please, please, don’t let her come,” she sobbed. “I don’t want her there. Granny’s bossy, she’s cranky, she says awful things and she’ll spoil everything. It’s all Mom’s idea to ask her,” the girl had wailed.

  So Morgan had said that Granny absolutely couldn’t be present; Mother, either, if it was upsetting to Joyce. But it had taken time to calm her patient and reassure her that it was a personal decision who should attend the birth of her baby, not a matter of family politics.

  She really ought to keep an umbrella in the Jeep. She’d been halfway across town before she realized it was starting to pour in typical Vancouver cloudburst fashion. And of course it had been impossible to find a parking space near the church on this busy west-end street. She’d finally abandoned her Jeep in a lot blocks away and gotten soaked during the mad dash to the church.

  Now she’d missed watching Celia float up the aisle. It was so maddening, because Morgan loved weddings. Not as much as she loved delivering babies, but weddings came a close second. Like most births, weddings were joyful occasions, even though she’d pretty much given up hope for one of her own.

  At thirty-six, she’d had only two serious romances in her entire life, and they’d both ended years ago. She was philosophical about her single state when she had time to think about it at all. What the heck. She was darned lucky, really. She had a career that consumed her, a foster daughter she was growing to love, a home of her own that she adored. And if she could only get where she was going on time, she’d have it made.

  Feeling self-conscious, she stepped from the foyer into the church. It was crowded, and there was no sign of the ushers. Morgan did her best to tiptoe silently down the aisle to a pew where she spied a single empty space, but she was wearing the beige pumps that squeaked with every step, and the sound made heads turn.

  Several people smiled and waggled their fingers at her. Celia worked in X ray at St. Joseph’s Medical Center, Morgan’s alma mater, and among the guests were lots of familiar faces from the hospital. Morgan was no longer on staff at St. Joe’s. She’d left a year ago to join a small clinic devoted to women’s health, but because the clinic used the hospital facilities, she was back regularly, delivering babies and using St. Joe’s operating theaters.

  Reaching the pew at last, Morgan slid past a man with a huge belly and a woman in a startling yellow hat and settled into the narrow space, aware too late that the man in front of her must be six foot seven, with shoulders that blotted out any view of the bridal party.

  Morgan gave a regretful sigh. Well, at least she could hear what was going on.

  “—take this man to be your lawfully—”

  A manicured finger tapped her shoulder; and she twisted her head and smiled a pleased greeting at the woman seated directly behind her. It was Pam Albright, a nurse from the hospital and now one of Morgan’s patients.

  Pam gave Morgan a wan smile, shifting her hugely pregnant body back into the cushioning arc of her husband, Frank’s, arm. Pam had been in for her checkup two days before, and Morgan expected her to deliver in about three weeks. Pam and Frank had waited a long time for this baby. They were both in their late thirties, and it was their first. They knew from ultrasound that it was a girl, and Morgan hoped and expected everything would go well for them. So far, the pregnancy had been uneventful.

  “—pronounce you husband and wife. You may kiss the bride—”

  Morgan craned her neck, but her view was still blocked by the giant in front of her. The organ began to play softly, and the congregation rustled and whispered as the bridal pair went off to the vestry to sign the register. Morgan glanced down at her lap and noticed that the rain had somehow darkened and puckered the blue fabric of her dress, making it look as if it had developed a bizarre skin disease. And there was a brownish stain she couldn’t account for near the hem.

  She recrossed her legs so the stain didn’t show, but a second later the organ music swelled into a rendition of the wedding march and she surged to her feet with the rest of the congregation, wishing for the millionth time that she was taller than five-one. She stood on her toes and craned her neck for a glimpse of the bridal pair.

  Suddenly, a sharp cry from the
pew behind her made her look around. A single glance at Pam’s stricken face made Morgan struggle past the bodies blocking her from the aisle.

  “Excuse me, s’cuse me. Let me past, please.”

  At last she broke free. Pam’s husband, his face ashen, had half lifted his wife into the aisle. Bloodstained fluid was gushing down Pam’s legs, pooling on the oak flooring. The membranes had ruptured, and Pam was obviously having violent contractions.

  “There’s something hanging down.” Pam’s anguished whisper alerted Morgan, and oblivious to the craning heads and curious, shocked faces surrounding them, she squatted down and lifted the hem of Pam’s long, loose maternity dress.

  Holy toot. A bolt of panic went skittering through her. The umbilical cord, the baby’s life-line in the uterus, had prolapsed, slipping into the vaginal canal along with the rush of amniotic fluid. The baby’s life was in terrible danger, its vital supply of oxygen already cut off.

  Morgan reached up and deftly pulled Pam’s underwear down around her ankles, then grabbed her hands and urged her to her knees.

  “Down. Get down on your hands and knees, right now, head on your hands, bottom in the air. Frank, help her.”

  Morgan’s voice, deep throated and urgent, rose above the organ music, and when Pam hesitated, Morgan took her upper arms and, with Frank’s help, bodily forced her to the floor.

  “Hold her there. Don’t let her move,” she commanded Pam’s horrified husband.

  He crouched with an arm across his wife’s body, stammering, “I don’t understand. What’s going on? Is the ba-baby coming right now?” His eyes were filled with terror.

  “Just keep her down. Keep her still.” There was no time for explanations. Morgan threw herself to her knees behind her patient, searching for the unborn baby’s shoulder and lifting it away from the compressed umbilical cord.

  Pam’s scream of agony rose above the organ music, and there were shocked and appalled exclamations from wedding guests who didn’t understand what was going on.

  “Someone call 911, get an ambulance here fast. This baby’s in a hurry to get born.” Morgan tried, for Frank’s sake, to sound calm and upbeat, but the effort she was exerting made it hard to talk at all. It was absolutely essential she maintain a steady pressure on the baby, pushing her back into Pam’s pelvis, preventing the unborn child’s weight from cutting off her own oxygen supply. She couldn’t release the tension for an instant, not until anesthetic was administered, or the baby would surely die. And the pressure required was utterly agonizing for Pam, as well as for Morgan.

  In spite of her years as an obstetrician, Morgan had only seen this condition twice before, and both times it had occurred in the delivery room, with help readily available.

  Here, in a church...well, it was going to be touch and go.

  “Ambulance is on its way.” One of the guests from the hospital had understood all too well the seriousness of the situation and used his cell to make the call.

  “Somebody get me some wine, quick.” It dawned on Morgan that alcohol might slow or stop the contractions tearing through Pam, who was now alternately moaning and sobbing with pain.

  The request was relayed urgently from guest to guest, and it was the pastor in his white robes who finally crouched beside Morgan, proffering an overflowing water glass filled with wine. His hands trembled so hard that some of the dark red liquid normally used for the sacrament sloshed across Morgan’s shoulder and trickled slowly down her aching arm.

  “Not for me. Give it to her, please.” Morgan could smell the spilled wine, like vinegar, pungent even over the animal scent of hot blood and amniotic fluid.

  Mighty cheap wine for the sacrament, she thought hysterically. “Drink it down, Pam. Try to swallow some,” she begged. “It’ll slow the contractions. It’ll help us here, honey. Do it. I know this is hard, but you’re so brave, you’re doing just great. Hang in there, okay? Frank, see if you can get some of that into her.”

  Morgan could hear Frank pleading as Pam gulped the wine, and she felt the tremors of her patient’s body as she tried not to retch. Morgan’s shoulder and entire arm began to tremble with the strain, and she wished to goodness someone would tell the organist to either pack it in or play something a bit more upbeat. Even a Sousa march would fit this occasion better than Handel.

  The guests who worked at the hospital were grouped around, doing whatever they could to help. A nursing aide in a pink satin dress was kneeling, rubbing Pam’s back, and someone else—oh, bless them—was massaging Morgan’s shoulders with strong, capable strokes, but it seemed to take an eternity before the ambulance crew finally raced in.

  It was a difficult and clumsy procedure to load Pam onto the stretcher, still in the head-down position, with Morgan attached to her like a human lifeline. Luckily, the attendants managed the awkward process with a minimal amount of confusion.

  Prolapse required an immediate C-section, and Morgan had the ambulance crew radio ahead to St. Joe’s emergency room, ensuring that an operating room would be ready with a neonatal specialist and obstetrical team standing by.

  “Boy, this little girl really wants to make a dramatic entrance, huh?” Morgan was worried sick about the baby, but she did her best to reassure Pam and Frank with as much light chatter as she could manage. “Don’t get too upset, either of you. She’s got a great chance of coming though this fine,” she lied as perspiration dripped from her chin and her arm trembled as if she had palsy.

  In moments they screamed into St. Joe’s emergency bay, and in spite of her acute discomfort, Morgan felt a proprietary pride in the swift, efficient way Pam was transferred from ambulance to operating room, with Morgan perched on the end of the stretcher, still steadfastly pushing the baby into the pelvis. She’d jettisoned her high heels back at the church, and she was gasping with the strain. She was on the verge of collapse.

  Another two minutes. You can do it, Jacobsen....

  “Here we are. The gang’s all here and everything’s gonna be just fine. Good girl, Pam. Are you ever brave,” she said as the charge nurse whisked Frank to an adjoining room.

  Pam’s clothing was swiftly removed, and both Pam and Morgan were covered and draped. Then the anesthetist began the exacting procedure of administering general anesthesia. Morgan had just enough stamina left to be pleased that Jeffrey Liung, who’d taken over her previous position as chief resident in obstetrics, was the doctor who’d be doing the Caesarean. Jeffrey was top-notch. She knew because she’d trained him.

  At last, Pam was under.

  “Ohh, hurry up, Doc. My arm’s gonna fall off,” Morgan groaned to Jeffrey. He was already quickly cutting through the abdominal layers with his scalpel.

  “How’s baby doing?” Morgan couldn’t see the monitor.

  “Heart rate’s flat,” a nurse said softly.

  Morgan could sense the tension in the room, and her heart sank. There was none of the usual cheerful chatter or bantering. The only sounds were the hissing of the machines and the clatter of used instruments as they clanged into a pan.

  She gritted her teeth and endured, refusing to think about disaster.

  Jeffrey was now in the uterus, stretching the incision carefully but firmly. An intern pushed down on the top of the uterus to give leverage as Jeffrey slid one hand into the incision.

  “Gotcha, little one.” There was both relief and alarm in everyone’s eyes as he lifted the baby’s head and turned it to keep the infant from sucking in any fluid. The head came out slowly, a tiny round ball topped with wet black hair.

  Morgan groaned, at last able to remove her aching, trembling arm from Pam’s pelvis and straighten from her contorted position.

  The doctors immediately inserted a bulb syringe in the baby’s mouth, suctioning mucous as Jeffrey eased the rest of the tiny body out of Pam’s womb. The baby girl was small but perfectly formed. And she was dark blue. The neonatal specialist whisked her to a separate area the moment the cord was severed.

  Morgan stepped shaki
ly down from the table. No matter how many times she witnessed birth, she usually felt an overwhelming surge of tenderness and acute wonder at this first emergence of a human being into the world. This time, however, there was gut-wrenching apprehension because she was well aware that this scrap of a girl might not make it. Her birth had been traumatic in the extreme.

  Morgan glanced over at the table where the specialist was working over the limp and still baby, and she uttered a silent, passionate prayer to the angels that she believed hovered over every mother and child at this moment of birth.

  Thank you for saving this precious child, she repeated to herself. She tried to feel only expectant confidence, but her heart hammered with apprehension as precious seconds ticked away.

  Streaks of blood were shockingly bright against the white, sticky vernix that covered the baby’s skin, and the awful tension in the room intensified as the silence stretched unbearably.

  And then, to everyone’s delight, the baby suddenly startled and gave a choked, squawking cry.

  A ragged cheer went up from the entire team.

  “That’s my sweetheart,” Morgan crowed as more short, sharp cries came from the baby. Her skin pinkened and her tiny limbs thrashed.

  “Sounding good, young lady,” the specialist declared in a pleased tone. “Apgar’s six, so it’ll be a while before we know for sure, but my guess is she’s going to be fine,” he told Morgan a few moments later after examining the baby thoroughly.

  Morgan nodded, too choked up to even answer. Tears spilled out of her eyes, and she felt like whooping with joy or singing at the top of her lungs. She compromised by doing a spirited little tap dance, and everyone laughed, all of them used to her antics.