Borderdance Chapter 14, a bonanza fanfic

XIII

Hoss and Elin had discussed what would happen when her time came. She had ordered him to scrub the bath house all clean, and he had been so stunned he didn't even know how to start the protesting.

'Of course', she had said, her eyes wide from surprise and disbelief in them just ogled the fact that anybody would have an objection.

'Of course not', he had said, and just looked at her, his eyes equally wide and his mouth gaping, for that matter. For him, it was unbelievable and never heard, that somebody would even think of such a place for birth.

'It is the place we wash the bodies; of those who come to life and of them who already passed away.' With that, and a turn on her deep-dug heels, she had had her way, like she normally did, five times of eight.

Well, at least it would be easy to keep hot water at hand.

Elin had turned her back on him when he had slowly let go of his resistance and thought of the possible advances, and laughed at him with her white teeth shining. 'You don't believe, Erik, soon I will be able to lie on my back again.' The bliss on her face had made him laugh, but it made him also worried about how exactly was she going to get the baby out.

'Oh, shush', she had said, and waved her arm in the air in a large arch. 'On my four feet. Or I'll go like a frog.' Hoss still remembered her childish frown that judged her own incapability.

'You squat?'

'Yes. I'll squat.' She had eyed him with her teeth grasping her lower lip, and continued to examine the possibilities. 'You can tie my hands to the ceiling and hang me up, and wait for the baby to fall down.'

For a moment, Hoss had been struck with horror. What had she proposed?

Then, her hands had curled around her own large body and the corners of her eyes had creased to frame a hearty smile that came out as laughter, when she enjoyed the fact that he had been fooled so easily. 'Don't worry, Erik min', she had continued. 'Nature would be dad burn stupid if it would create only one way to survive.'

Absently, she had patted his large arm and continued her planning, folding towels and small baby blankets, and digging up old quilts and wraps she had made for her three first ones. A pair of white booties, that had been worn to a shade that resembled more the yellow onion or old bones, had caught Hoss' attention, and made him sit still for a long moment, just staring at the little booties.

Elin had interrupted his silence, and her hands surrounding his humbled shoulders had felt so very light. 'Hoss, dear, when I need it, you'll send for Mrs. Eulalia Maud Sanders from the home-stead that way? I trust her.'

Elin used to give leftovers for the children to feed the little crow. They smashed the food small, and the fish and the liver kept her feathers shining and her eyes bright. "You should also use the mice and the shrews the cats bring as gifts to you", she teased, and made the children protest. She took the bribes from the cats herself and played with the crow with the little rodents, making her hunt and catch the thrown food to keep her instincts awake. Elin showed Tor how to create a contact for the bird, and advised him to let the bird do as her nature would tell. She should spread her wings and try to fly, try to catch and try to hunt, no matter how easily she had accustomed herself to sitting on Tor's arm or shoulder.

Hoss had wondered about her calm interest in the bird, even though she had opposed the new guest's presence in the first place. "It must come from my father and his grandmother. Descending from her, he taught me to respect all life. Every life is precious, every life will bring death, but before the death comes, all life has had a purpose." She raised her gray glistening eyes to him bright as the heart of a clear mountain spring, and let her hand run over the smooth feathers of the bird. "That is what I want to believe, too, because that is what is precious for me."

If her hair had turned to grass and ferns, with little flowers and butterflies, Hoss wouldn't have been surprised. So much of her expression was melted into the nature around her, even though she was sitting on a bench right outside their house. But then again, maybe their house wasn't so far away. From what, Hoss didn't know, and in the end, he didn't exactly have to.

The crow didn't speak, yet, although Rebecka used to finish her sentences with a croak to demonstrate they had a common tongue. Quite often Tor and Sigrid would answer her with croaks, too, and that made Elin roll her eyes and threaten to keep the table empty.

"You won't", Tor protested, and smiled at his mother very arrogantly. He rested his forks on his plate and leaned his arms against the table's dark surface. "You eat so much you wouldn't survive an hour by an empty table."

Hoss raised one of his eyebrows warningly at the boy, and kept his blue eyes fixed at him, although he didn't pause from helping himself to the fish and the potatoes with a delicious sauce Elin had composed for dinner. "You'll keep that tone away from your mouth when you talk to your Ma, Thor." Hoss inserted the large portion he'd gathered on his fork into his mouth, and pointed at the boy with the weapon's four spikes. "I don't care to hear no nonsense whatsoever of that sort, young man."

Tor blew the air out between his pursed lips. "No."

Hoss frowned and looked at his plate. "No, sir, young man."

Tor made a face. "No, sir." Hoss kept glowering at the boy, who had sank down with a glare, too.

Elin put her hand on the table with a loud thud. "Stop it. Both of you. Erik, Tor didn't say anything he wouldn't say any day. Or anything I wouldn't hear from any of us, for that matter. Stop being grumpy." Turning to Tor, she eyed the boy with an equally level gaze. "And you, you remember I hold the key to the kitchen pantry. I'll have a feast of my own right there, if I'm the only one behaving like a human in this house."

Tor laughed at her. "But if I'll steal the key, you are in no shape to run after me!"

Rebecka smacked his arm and attached a snappy comment in her own mother tongue at Tor, and made her brother duck. His grin didn't disappear, though, and Rebecka grew very irritated. She had taken a very defensive attitude towards her mother. She took after an idolizing way of imitating Elin, copying her way of walking, doing her chores and learning her routines, and the few dolls she had gotten from her Uncles lay arranged in baby beds, being well-nourished and cared for in her stories.

Sigrid took advantage of their squabble and ate what was left on Rebecka's plate.

Elin rested her knife and fork, and peeked at Hoss' face while he kept his eyes lowered down. "Hoss." Her voice was almost as low as a whisper, and her crossed arms were warm and inviting despite their closed position. "Now you can be grumpy." She nodded towards the wrangling children.

Hoss looked at her carefully held composure. He still felt she was making a mock of him, but nevertheless, he banged his hand on the table to require silence. "Can't you finish your food in peace?" His frown shaded his blue eyes and the tassel of a front hair pointed against the children like an odd-shaped horn.

When he finished his plate in silence and wiped his mouth, Elin stood up with a lot of effort, leaning her hand over her back, and her movement made her children spring up very quickly to start to collect the plates.

"We'll get the plates, Mamma", Sigrid said, and hurried to pick up Hoss' finished portion.

"We'll do the dishes", Tor promised, and pulled reluctant Rebecka to the kitchen, too.

"I guess I'll swipe the floor", they heard Rebecka say, before their voices were muffled behind the door. Elin looked at the direction to which they had gone, and they both heard them searching for cakes and sugar.

Elin sighed. "I'm sorry", she said, and looked out from the window.

Hoss put the napkin on the table and folded it neatly, and didn't say a word.

Elin came next to him and hauled his attention with her sheer presence. "I wasn't thinking", she said, and lowered her head. For a moment she stood still, and for a moment Hoss didn't move, and finally she put her hand over his shoulder. "You once said to me, together, and for a moment, I forgot. I'm sorry."

Surprised, Hoss raised his head.

"Ailynn..."

He pushed the chair further away from the table, and pulled her closer. "Sit down."

"You can't... I'm too big!"

"If I can't, who can?" Hoss didn't let his eyes away from her disturbed face. "Come here. Sit down."

She came, and she was heavy, but he held her still on his arms like he had been able to hold her since the first time he ever tried. "I done forgot, too", he said, and only looked gently over the familiar features of her fair face. "You done nothing wrong."

"Yes, I've done, I've done so many things so wrong that even the angels lost count", she said, and held her arm around his neck. "But I was lucky to get a husband to forgive it all."

The glimmer of her gray eyes had poked some distant memories in his mind, and he nearly got lost in thoughts while looking at the curls that had escaped the crown braid, surrounding the pointy expressions of her cheekbones and her nose, that were now diluted with the softness given by the pregnancy.

Hoss could have stayed there for hours. Until she grunted quietly. Elin's grunt was followed by a slight hunch and a pull of her hand to go over her belly, and her gaze ran away from Hoss to the future. "Here it comes... Hoss, Erik, I think in a day or a two you'll hold me in two."

Hoss couldn't move. He was staring at Elin, with sheer horror in his panicked eyes that stared all blue and all wide at her.

"Ah, shucks, Hoss, let me down. I need to move."

Hoss only squeezed her shoulders harder.

"Hoss, let me go."

What had she said?

"Hoss, close your mouth and breathe! I said it's a day or a two, now let me go."

Hoss' fingers and feet got all cold and he could feel his face turn white.

"Hoss, I said it might take a day or two to start proper. A week if you don't release me right now."

Did his arms shake? Oh, no. He should not drop Elin, not now.

"Let go of me or I'll keep it where it stands and that's final!" Elin pushed herself out from his grip and started to walk around the table, feeling her body and listening to what it tried to say.

She was going into labor.

Dad burn labor.

Dear God.

Sigrid took Rebecka with her on the buckboard, when Hoss sent them to get Pa. Ben had promised to come and stay over with the children, if the birth was delayed. Tor was sent for Mrs. Sanders with another cart, another horse tied to the back of it to help to fetch Mrs. Sanders very quickly.

"Should I send for the doctor, too?" Hoss asked, worriedly.

Elin frowned. "He saw me just recently and suspected everything would be just fine. He'll have more job saving the lives of the other..." A contraction interrupted Elin's sentence, and Hoss hunched, and tried to jump to all four directions at once. He waved his hands helplessly, and ran his fingers through his hair.

"What can I do, Ailynn?"

Elin leaned herself against the door frame, and breathed, while the effort was oozing away to the background. "Be useful. Stop fussing. Anything." She held out her hand, and as Hoss came closer, she pulled him down from the chest of his shirt, getting his face very close to her own while she was still a bit bent down. "I don't need an outraged deer, Hoss, I need somebody solid as a rock. Can you do it?"

Hoss swallowed, and nodded, even though his blue eyes were an image of shock and apprehension, even a bit of reluctance to let time pass by in fear of what would follow. "Sure", he said, and never before had his squeak sounded so much like Joe's, being all whimpering and high and coming from very high up in his throat.

Elin straightened up, and put her both hands on his shoulders. "Are you, I mean, sure?" She looked at him very gravely. "You don't have to come."

Her comment made Hoss swallow once more, but he shook his head. "No ma'am, I mean, Ailynn, I ain't done shrunk from baby birth before, what makes you think I'd do so now?"

Elin started to breathe heavily, anticipating, but not yet feeling another contraction. "They were not your babies, before." She turned and walked a bit, holding her belly and eyeing the ceiling, or the sky behind it.

Hoss felt very little and pointless in the world.

The thuds of the horses' hooves sounded very familiar, and Hoss was grateful to see his Pa come riding first. He saw the familiar buckboard carrying Rebecka and Sigrid, too, but when Ben saw him strolling to and fro in the yard, he spurred Buck to a gallop and rushed to him, stepping down and ground-tying the nervous horse. His eyes were deep and reflective, when he took Hoss' arm and held it in his hands. "Did it start already?"

Hoss looked down, and returned his blue eyes to his father's face. "No, not yet. I sent Thor for Mrs. Sanders, and Elin is getting ready." He followed the figures of his two girls, fixing his thoughts to the easy familiar things he knew he could understand and comprehend, maybe even control, but the buckboard couldn't keep his attention nailed for long.

Behind the girls, a chestnut horse and a pinto came following with their riders, who pulled the horses to a halt and dismounted slowly. The other one took his black hat off and pressed the hat against his chest; the other one leaned his hands on his hips and swung his light weight on the balls of his feet.

Adam stepped forward and held his hand out, to rest it upon Hoss' shoulder. "You didn't think we'd stay away from such an important event?" he asked, his face a bit stiff but his eyes revealing to Hoss all the buried emotion that was hidden under his calm mask.

Joe came out on his other side, and slapped his arm and his back - a bit too hard, maybe - and flashed an unreserved smile that split his face in two. "Heck, no, brother!" he said, and his face looked mighty proud even though he was watching Hoss' eyes filling with tears from very close.

Ben did something he had not done for a long time; he grabbed Hoss from the scruff of his neck and smiled, no, laughed, with his whole face creasing from the fortunate memories that ran behind his eyes. "Just wait, Hoss", he said, and chuckled. "Just wait." Hoss couldn't help a silly grin to come to his face, to fight with the nervous frown of anxiety in turns.

Ben released his hold and turned around, and held his arms out for Sigrid, who let him lift her up on his arms. The jealous Rebecka searched the arms of Adam, and Joe just kept slapping Hoss' his back, grinning like a bobcat that had lost his mind. "You're gonna be a Pa, Hoss", he said, and a giggle came out of his throat. "If we weren't so close to the mother and the kids, I'd for sure scream out loud my doggone worst 'yahoo'!"

Hoss grinned at him, trying to adapt. "Ain't that just somethin', Joe?" His twinkling eyes turned to watch inside himself. "I'm gonna be a Pa."

Elin was waiting in the bath house. The sound of the other horse alerted Hoss and got him springing out from the little steam house, and running to the female passenger as if his life depended on her. "I sure am glad to see you, Mrs. Eulalia San..." he began, but the lady cut in curtly.

"Maud." She looked at him so sternly that the worst piercing stare of Elin meant nothing compared to her. "Plain Maud. And God thank us if you'll have time to say even that, when you really need me the most." She hopped down from the buggy and left Hoss gaping for a moment, before she inquired him the direction of the mother.

Finally Hoss was able to move. "This way, ma'am", he said, and lead her to where Elin was waiting, starting to fold down to lean on the floor.

"Maud", she said, and raised her black, straight eyebrows. "If you still remember I have a name, when the time seems too fast." She stepped in with him, and they both heard a shout that made the logs shiver and Hoss' ears ring.

"Good", said Maud. "If she has so much strength to shout, she should have plenty to push."

Hoss held Elin's head on his arm. Never again.

He would never ask Elin to go through so much.

She turned her head wearily, and the sweat curled the front locks around her face when she looked at him with a seed of a smile upon her tired face. "I'd do it a hundred times if I'd only live long enough."

Maud patted the baby with soft flannel and towels, and hummed silently and off-tune, while she kept the little one warm by turning folds of cloth around the small body. An occasional cry of the baby jolted Hoss' ears, but he kept silent, seeing Maud and Elin so silent.

He thought it had lasted an eternity.

"A good thing it lasted only so little", Maud said, and for the first time that night, she smiled. "Fine job, Eelyn, you've been real picture of a perfect birth."

Hoss tried to move his fingers, which had been very hurt during one of Elin's pushes while she had clung to him for her dear life. A horse had trodden over his fingers once, but she had done more damage to him than the animal. Hoss couldn't be sure if his ears were stunned from the howls he had heard, or if the world was really silent, but either way, it made him feel himself surrounded in clouds of cotton.

"I feel so tired", Elin said, and pressed closer against Hoss' arm. "Just attach the baby here..." she motioned below her neck, "and wake me up in a day... or two." A tired giggle came out of her mouth, and her face was wrinkled in an expression of half a laughter and half a sob. Hoss stroked her hair away from her face, when Maud brought the baby by and set the bundle on Elin's arms.

Hoss held his breath.

Elin took the covers away and pressed the baby against her skin, breathing smoothly and examining the silhouette of the thick black hair and the folds of the skin on the little arms and the legs with her fingers. Hoss saw her eyelashes resting upon her cheeks while she looked down and ran her fingers over the little spine and the cheeks and the ears and took hold of the little hands.

"Hoss... Erik." Hoss curled his hand around her and the baby, and his big hands closed her smooth and accustomed hands around the newborn child. He couldn't take his eyes off of the tiny creature, and from the corner of his eye he saw Elin looking at him and smiling at him behind tears. "You've got a boy, Hoss."

They had a son.

It was already very dark, or it could have been getting lighter again, Hoss couldn't tell. He himself had been born under the stars, had his father told, and read out from the journal how he had seen the daylight on the hard trail towards the West.

Hoss came out to the yard with a little bundle in his arms, his face shining from the glimmer of the blue eyes, and his hair pointing in all directions like rays of an odd earthly sun. His tall figure wasn't hunched at all, even though he held the wraps of the cloth protected from the outside air with his large chest and his thick arms. Ben jumped up from the chair where he had been waiting and shouted indoors. "It's Hoss!"

As Hoss came closer to the porch, Ben took a few leaping steps towards him, and leaned against his middle son to get a good look at the baby. His face melted into a radiant smile, and he lifted his gaze to see Hoss'. Hoss looked at his Pa straight in the eyes, feeling the happiness that carried through to him from the hand Ben held against his own large figure. They both knew how it was. Hoss pressed his lips together to form a proud smile. "You've got a fine grandson, Pa."

Ben just laughed, without any words, and blinked his eyes to hide the dew. "How is she?" he asked, the smile creasing his face so that it was a little wonder how his brown eyes could shine so much from the shadows of the wrinkles. Hoss smiled.

"I reckon she's a miracle, Pa." He wiped his own forehead and grinned still, feeling tears in his eyes but caring none of it. "She went through a lot but she'll pull through. She'll be just fine, Pa."

Ben looked down at the baby and held his hands out to set his fingers below his head and his little body, and Hoss gave the newborn son in his arms and watched the new Grandpa take look at his grandchild. His gray hair, the dark eyes and the strong figure had made him feared among men who faced him as an opponent, but Hoss had seen the tender side himself, and could now see it again in the ways his Pa carefully held the baby and studied his face.

Joe and Adam came out with the children, and all five of them stood still, staring, until Joe made a move and came to look at the boy in his father's arms. Ben eyed at his youngest son, and then took a better hold of the baby, to hand him over to Joe. Hoss remembered, how surprised and glad Joe had been once, when they had helped a Paiute woman to deliver her child, and after it all Joe had had the baby in his hands. He was smiling, and very silent laughter came out of his lips when he traveled back to his own dreams again.

Adam strolled to them, too, and looked over Joe's shoulder. Joe passed the baby on to his arms, and Adam took him very gently on his lean fingers, resting the tiny weight in the curl of his arm and pursing his lips to the baby's red face. Adam had held both Hoss and Joe similarly, but now his duty was replaced from big brother to Uncle. His dark eyelashes hid his eyes from his father and his brothers, and saved the message all undiluted for the baby. "So, you're the new Cartwright", he said softly, and stroked the little frail cheeks with his finger gently.

Hoss looked at them, feeling very proud, and his heart felt a bit too tight to work properly, when Adam took the baby to the children by the porch and showed him to them. "Here, here is your new baby brother", he said, and showed the wrinkly face that was surrounded by spiky dark hair to his siblings. All of the children leaned closer, and Adam put the baby in the arms of Sigrid. "Hold very tight, but carefully", he instructed, and helped Sigrid find a secure hold.

Hoss just looked at his family, and swiped his eye gently as a thought, before he strolled to his kids and pressed his arms around them all. The smiles and the glinting eyes of his first three were emphasized with delighted little screams that were muffled, to respect the sacred nature of a baby birth. When the baby traveled from the hands of Sigrid to the hands of Rebecka and Tor, Hoss stole a moment to look at his Pa, at Adam, and finally at Joe, before he returned his attention to his new son and the little hands around him that held him very close. He took the baby in his arms and sat down, and the rest of them gathered around him, just to look.

His family.

Wasn't it just somethin'.