Author's note: I didn't think I was going to write a second birth chapter but it kind of felt like I had too. There is a degree of dramatic licence with the birth process as I have never experienced a home birth myself! (two hospital births and epidurals!)Hope you like! Read, review and tweet me people! Lots of
"I...ummmm...what...how..." Owen stammered as he struggled to find his voice. All he could do was stand and stare agog at the fact that his wife was in actual labour in their actual living room.
"Shut up and be a trauma surgeon!" Cristina growled as a strong contraction gripped her tiny body in its fierce stranglehold. "Put Daniel in his room, get some gloves and deliver your baby!"
Grateful for the direct and straight forward orders, Major Owen Hunt immediately joined them in the room. He nodded and took control of the emergent situation that had presented itself on this otherwise usual Saturday morning.
"Danny let's go!" Gently pressing his hands onto his son's shoulders he turned him in the direction of the bedrooms and frogmarched him away from his mother who was shifting to find a marginally more comfortable position as the contractions upped the ante and took her body as their prisoner. Tears stung in her eyes as she had to consciously instruct herself to breathe and physically force the air into her lungs in order to ride the waves of pain she was currently trying to stay afloat within.
Owen grabbed a clean towel from the drawer of the dresser, threw it over the back of the chair and then dropped to his knees at the side of the bed, pulled out his green medical bag from underneath and frantically rifled through it looking for gloves, scissors to cut the cord and some swabs. As he did so the military trained trauma surgeon silently lamented the fact that he had not taken more of an interested in his obs and gynae rotation as a young resident. The, in his opinion, delicate specialty had not sat well with his action seeking, all guns blazing, quick and dirty trauma side and there had really been no call to deliver any babies on the battlefield. The weight of the responsibility facing him pressed on his chest and he, for a moment, closed his eyes, placed his hand on his heart and focused on his breathing to steady the beats.
"Daddy, what doing?" Daniel whispered nervously, as he hovered at the foot of his parents bed. When he had rushed into the bathroom to tell his father about the watery mess his mother had made on the hardwood floor he had not meant to cause trouble. He was worried he had been bad and was now going to be in trouble.
Hearing the fear in his son's fragile voice felt like being cut to the very core with a carbonised scalpel. As a father he never wanted his son to feel unsure or upset. Owen knew he needed to take a moment and explain to Daniel what he had just witnessed happening to his mother and prepare him for the fact that by the end of today they would have a new piece joining their family puzzle.
Walking round to the foot of the bed and scooping his tiny boy up into the safety of his muscular arms, Owen sat down on the bed and snuggled Daniel into his lap, as Daniel linked his arms round his daddy's neck. Owen began to find the words his son's ears needed to hear to settle his heart. "Do you remember when mummy and I talked to you about how a new baby would be coming to live here with us?" Owen waited a beat for Daniel to search his memory bank and recall the conversation.
"Baby in mummy tummy!" Daniel said proudly, gazing into his father's blue eyes waiting to be praised for his intelligence.
A small smile crept across Owen's face, only the son of Cristina Yang would remember the science part! "That's right buddy. Well, now the baby needs some help to get here and mummy needs Daddy to help too."
As he listened to his father's explanation, Daniel let his mind wander off into the realms of wondering what this new baby would be like... Will they be bossy like Zola, or a thinker like Sofia? Will they make me play fairy tea party with them like I have to when mummy takes me to play at Aunt Meredith's house? I hope they like playing trains like I do with Tuc. He is my grown up friend, he is nearly a whole 8 years old!
"So how about you go into your bedroom for a little while and make the baby a hello picture? And I will come and get you when they get here. Ok?" Not wanting to rush his son or for him to feel pushed out, Owen was aware of the urgent fact that he needed to get back to the side of his wife.
"I go draw!" Daniel excitedly squealed as he extricated himself from his father's embraced and dashed off to his room to find the marker pens his uncle Alex had bought hims when he had taken him to the hospital gift shop and Daniel had used all his wit and wiles to get his unsuspecting supervisor to buy them even though his mother had already vetoed the pens as too messy in the hands of the mischievous boy. Totally underwhelmed and unaffected by the fact that their lives were on the verge of great change, Daniel's mind was full of patterns and colour combinations to put in his picture.
"Owen...Owen...Owen". The desperate, pained cries of his wife cut across the stillness of the firehouse, travelling through the wall and stirred Owen into action. He jumped up from the bed, grabbed the towel and supplies and raced into the living room.
By this time the contractions were one on top of another, with only a few moments in between to catch a breath or take any small comfort in the respite from the pain. Cristina was really trying to relax and hum pretty loudly to work through them, her eyes closed to concentrate.
"How far along is this? I need to push!" Her voice was full of panic and anxiety but as her brown eyes locked with her husband's sparkling blue ones she began to feel slightly more centred.
Owen positioned himself on the floor and pulled on the sterile gloves, "I am going to take a look, ok?" He automatically found himself adopting his consulting tone of voice as to all intense and purposes his wife was his patient.
At Daniel's birth Owen had been very much at the head end of the bed, Cristina feeling that for the sake of their sex life he did not need to see the birth process in its full glory. This time, her pain so strong and feeling totally exposed, she had no choice but to totally let her barriers down. Due to the unexpected nature of the occasion, she needed him to be the doctor not the birth partner, not the husband.
"It is not supposed to happen this way!" Without any fore shadow tears began to stream down Cristina's face as she choked the words through both the hormonal haze of overwhelming emotions and fierce physical pain. "I did it this way with Daniel...this time I am meant to be in the hospital, in maternity…...with drugs!"
"Honey, I know this is not how you planned it. But you are almost there, I promise." Owen's tone was full of love for and pride in his wife. In this moment he was completely in awe of her strength and her capacity to show him her vulnerability. "I can see the head!"
There is no going back. Cristina thought to herself as she gripped onto her knees and braced her feet against Owen's thighs to gain some traction for the pushing phase.Just trust your body, it knows what to do.
Sucking in the biggest breath her body could take she began to bear down as the contraction dipped into its temporary lull.
"Push, Cristina! You are doing great! Almost there!" Owen encouraged as he monitored the progress as the head began to slowly advance.
"Shut up!" Cristina found enough energy in the midst of the battle her body was fighting with her baby- one to eject and the other to hold fast, a battle of wills that could only end one way- to screech the command at her husband. "Oww! Owww! It is burning!"
She could not remember the pain being this bad when she delivered Daniel. It felt like her body was a furnace and the walls of the firehouse began spin and close in on her. The burning was reaching a fever pitch and Cristina instinctively began to pant, knowing from research more than experience, that the head was about to be delivered.
Owen rubbed the lower part of his wife's leg, wanting to show her he loved her, that he was there for her, that he would take all her pain away if he could.
Cristina groaned as another strong contraction held her hostage, she pushed down as hard as she could and "pop!" the head was out!
"Ok, you have done the hard part! I can see our baby's face!" Owen's voice cracked with emotion as he was transfixed by how beautiful his child looked, even in the middle of the natural processes of birth.
With something that sounded like a cross between a scream and a roar, Cristina, urged forward by the fact that Owen was seeing their child and she wasn't, pushed again from her core. The baby turned and one shoulder, followed by the other emerged into the world. With one final push the newest member of the hunt family slid graciously into the world.
This time there was no sterile room, none of the bright lights of the OR, no medicine. Their daughter had literally become the heart of their home. Born into the warmth of the firehouse that her mother had bought for the man who had changed the course of her life and the beats of her heart.
Owen immediately wrapped the tiny baby in the towel, cut the cord and pressing her into his chest began to rub vigorously to raise a sound from the tiny lungs. "Cristina we have a daughter! She is beautiful!"
"She hasn't made a sound yet. Is she ok?...Owen, talk to me….." Her exhausted voice was barely above a whisper and her eyes were shut tight, the fear of her child slipping away welding them closed off to the horrifying possibility. She couldn't catch a glimpse of her precious child and then see her slip away in front of her. She saw death and loss every day in the OR on the wards but here in her home, she would not, could not contemplate losing a part of her and her husband.
"She will..." Owen tried to sound calm but his own heart was racing as he began to silently plead and bargain with God and science- comeon,please..Please!
"Hic!" The tiny snuffling sound and the vibration of the small body against Owen's hardened one made his stomach flip, swiftly followed by relief flooding his system as the high pitched cry that only a newborn can produce danced its exquisite symphony across the air.
"Hi there little lady!" Owen cooed as he lifted his daughter up and placed her skin to skin on Cristina's chest.
As soon as mother and daughter made that first contact the baby fell into contented silence, she was back where she felt her safest.
"Hello beautiful girl." Cristina whispered against the fuzzy brown hair that covered her daughters head, relief, pride and pure love flooding her system that had previousl been occupied by pain, fear and doubt. "Welcome home."
The tiny rosebud mouth furrowed against her mother's chest seeking a source of comfort. Cristina was amazed at how she knew exactly how to latch on and she stroked her silky soft cheek as she began to fill herself up from her mother's breast.
Owen dispensed with the after birth, cleaned Cristina up a little and pulled off his gloves before crawling up next to his wife and daughter to wrap them in his arms.
"She is perfect! You did so great!" Owen took his wife's face in his hand and laid a gentle, deep kiss on her lips, physically telling her his heart. His gaze fell onto his daughter. Mydaughter! The love he had for his children was the same and in these moments straight after the birth he was feeling the same pride, the same joy and the same anxieties he had felt in the moments after Daniel's birth. But yet it was different- when his son was born his first thoughts had been how do we raise a great man? But now looking at his daughter he mused on how now he was going to be raising a strong, independent women for a great man. He wished for his daughter a heart like her mothers- loyal and not given away easily, but once you had earned her love she bestowed it upon you so openly that it made you feel rich. For him, being loved by Cristina Yang had bought him more than money, career or status ever could. He could live without those things but he could not exist without his wife or their children.
"I love you." Cristina murmurred against his beard. Yet again she was overwhelmed by her husband's capacity to be exaclty the man she needed him to be in whatever situation they found themselves in. Today he had proved that he really was by her side every step of the way. She had to admit that if she had not been in so much pain she would have found it hysterical that her big, burly solider of a husband had today been a midwife!
Looking her man sqaure in the eyes, she jokingly teased, "But don't ever give up trauma for OB!"
Owen laughed out loud and shook his head. "I am going to get Daniel to meet his sister!"
Owen stood for a moment at the entrance to his son's bedroom before he called him over. He was happily sitting on the floor playing with his train track and Owen felt almost guilty disturbing him. "Daniel there is someone here for you to meet."
"The baby! The baby!" Daniel excitedly jumped up, picked up a piece of paper from the floor and launched himself into his father's open arms.
When they arrived back in the living room, Cristina and the now slumbering baby, had moved themselves to a sitting postioin on the couch.
Daniel climbed up onto the sofa and pressed himself into his mother's side, just like he did every day they spent together in the firehouse. Cristina wrapped her free arm around her son and connected him into the moment. Owen sat on the arm of the couch, a little higher than his family, like a bird of prey casting their eyes around protecting his own from potential danger.
"Well, Daniel this is your baby sister." Cristina smiled at her son, as he looked intently at the tiny person pursing her lips and wiggling her fingers in his mother's arms.
"It's my baby!" Daniel informed his parents matter-of-factly. He bent over and lightly kissed the back of his sister's head. He did not understand the sweetness of the gesture but it was not lost on his parent's whose hearts both swelled with pride at how their son was growing into a caring and considerate little boy.
"Yes she is!" But we need to give her a name." Cristina informed both Owen and Daniel.
"Any ideas?" Owen moved round, to sit where Daniel was, moving the little boy into his lap.
"I was meant to have 4 more days to think about it! But someone was in too much of a hurry to get here!" Cristina shifted her little girl around so she was lying with her head on her chest.
"What about Ella?" Owen tentatively put the suggestion for a Christian name on the table. They had already agreed during the pregnancy that if the baby was a girl her middle name would be Susan, after his own mother.
"Hmm, Ella…Ella…hmm" Cristina tried the name on for size and looked at her daughter from various angles to see if it suited her. "Do you know what it means?"
Pulling his phone out of his pocket, Owen quickly googled it. "Ella means bright light."
Looking down at the tiny woman in her arms, Cristina knew her daughter by name. "Welcome to the family Ella Susan Hunt."
Bright light. There had been a lot of darkness in the lives of both parents of this child, both together and apart. But throught the darkness somehow there was always just enough light, however dim at times for them to see each other. They had adjusted their vision and adapted, allowing the darkness to be a part of their journey. As Richard Webber had told Daniel as a baby, you have to sit in the dark, so when you get back to the light you can see all the colours. Now the colours in the Hunt family were vivid. There was nothing but colour. The light, in the forms of a son and a daughter, had flooded in and bathed its parents in it warming and sustaining glow.