Her sleep that night was restless, and as the pains became more frequent and strong, she found she could no longer stay in bed. So she rose, despite the fact it was barely five o'clock and the city outside was still ensconced in darkness.
She walked the flat, only stopping when the contractions hit, leaning against the wall or counter until they passed. After some time she could no longer walk for very long, the pains bending her in half, pulling her down to her knees, leaving her unable to think or even breathe. In between them she began to get her supplies ready, boiling the scissors and string and placing them atop the pile of towels.
She breathed through the worst of them, rocking her pelvis, moaning quietly. She couldn't tell how much time passed and was shocked to look up and see that the sun had risen, the rainclouds that had covered the sky the day before now just a thin mist.
She stood at the window watching as the colours changed and the sky brightened, the beautiful display helping her to keep her mind off the lengthening contractions, which had become closer together, allowing her very little time to recover.
A particularly strong one hit her as she stood there and she had to clamp her hand over her mouth to keep from crying out. She bent over, struggling to keep breathing as the strong muscles constricted.
When it was over she opened her eyes to discover her legs and the carpet beneath her were sodden—her waters had broken. She looked at the dark spot for a few seconds, breathing deeply, and turned, grabbing the towels and supplies off the counter and making her way to the bathroom.
She ran herself a bath, another contraction hitting her as the bathtub filled, and was all too happy to slip into the warmth of the water, the heat calming her.
The buoyancy was exactly what she needed, allowing her to bend and flex her hips, and she soon found that she could not resist bearing down when the pain hit, pulling her knees up on either side of her and pushing hard.
From that point on she remembered little, the increasingly strong and closely-spaced contractions clouding her vision and mind. The instinct to push was so strong she could concentrate on nothing else as she felt her child moving down through her body. Time ceased to matter, her body seemingly acting of its own accord.
After a time, a burning pain registered and she looked down to see the baby's head crowning, shock momentarily bringing her out of the daze. She reached down to feel the top of its skull, the little dusting of wet dark hair soft beneath her fingers. Her first contact with her child filled her with relief and wonder, and she took a second to rejoice that this was almost over.
She pulled herself up onto her knees just before another contraction began and she could only push through the burning pain, moaning as her child's head exited her body. She reached down as she pushed, supporting the baby's head as it turned to the side, its shoulders following, albeit stubbornly.
She gave another hard push and watched as her child's shoulders cleared, and the baby turned face-up, now out to its waist. She felt all breath leave her when she saw its face for the first time, his face, for seconds later she reached down without thinking and grasped the baby beneath the arms, pulling firmly but evenly, and she felt as though everything dropped out of her as her son entered the world.
Her son was born, his arms and legs moving vigorously in the water, a gush of brownish fluid following him out of the birth canal. And as she held him, stunned, he opened his eyes under the water, and she saw that they were blue, like hers and like James's.
She lifted him out, cradling him to her chest, and as his lungs breathed air for the first time he let out a wail, slightly wet but strong and loud, and she found herself laughing and sobbing at the same time.
Ω
She could have sat there all day, clutching her son to her, calming his cries, the two of them touching for the first time. But soon the water began to cool and she knew she must get out of the bath, placing her son on the soft white towel she'd lain out for him, wiping the sticky white vernix off his pinkening skin. She quickly tied off the surprisingly tough purplish white umbilical cord, cutting it, and like that they were separated.
She wrapped the towel around his tiny body, picking him up and cradling him to her as she sat down on the edge of the bathtub. She could not take her eyes off his tiny face, his dark blue eyes now closed, secure and warm in his mother's arms. She barely registered the delivery of the placenta, pulling the massive purple organ out and placing it in the plastic bowl she'd taken out of the cupboard.
She looked at it curiously for a few seconds, the network of dark arteries that webbed out over it, that had nourished her son for all these months, and left the bathroom. She was bleeding now, and would, she knew, for the next few weeks as the wound the placenta had left on the inside of her womb slowly healed itself.
When she had clothed her bottom half, she settled on the bed with her son, placing him on a pillow in her lap. She brushed his cheek softly and his head turned toward her breast, and with startling strength for someone so small and new, he quickly latched on and began taking his first meal.
She watched him in awe, caressing the soft hair on his head that, now dry, had lightened considerably. She smiled at his flaxen head, in complete disbelief that he had come from her, had only mere hours ago been happily enveloped in her womb, and now lay before her, a little person who breathed and moved.
He was no longer the genderless foetus that moved inside her, he was her son, and she thanked the fates for the ease of his birth, for his health and vigour and hearty appetite. It had been a perfect entry into the world, negated only by the absence of his father, which, as she fell more and more in love with this new life, she thought of less and less.
James was not here, no, but as her son finished his meal and she sat him up in front of her, patting his tiny terry-clad back, she found that it did not hurt as she thought it would. His absence would always be palpable, but with her son to focus on, it was less profound.
Soon she would have to clothe him in the tiny garments and the nappies that she'd bought, clean the stump of cord that still hung out of his navel, tied off with string. But as she laid him down beside her on the soft sheets, reclining so that her face was inches from his, watching him as he fell very softly to sleep, she thought very little of the future.
It was nearing noon now, and the exertion of the morning began to catch up with her, the hormones that had been released filling her with a calm like no other. She drifted off, her son's tiny face the last thing she saw before sleep took her.