Chapter Thirty Two
Linda was sitting on the sofa with Frank when Jamie and Danny returned to the main house. "Hey, they all set?" Frank asked.
"Yep, just a few more things for Lila and Steven to touch up on and the cabinet she wants to do with Eddie," Jamie replied. "Speaking of, how is she?"
"She took a bath and she feels better now, she's in the kitchen."
"She's on her feet?" Jamie looked at Linda and hurried to the kitchen.
"He is so overprotective," Danny sighed sitting down on the couch with Linda. "He's in a bad mood, he had to just talk through the crib assembly, his hand just didn't cooperate.
"They usually don't," Frank piped up. "Eddie usually ties his tie, ties his shoes, does the other fine motor type stuff. She is his hands and a lot of times lately he's her legs. That medication and the problems with her kidneys, her knees and her back really ache."
Eddie was making a tray of tea and cookies when Jamie came in. She was in sweats and a light tee shirt with her hair up off her neck. Jamie stepped up behind her and kissed the soft spot below her ear, "Why are you up? You should be resting."
"I rested and the swelling is going down, it's good for me to move too. How did it go at Lila's?"
"Fine," Jamie replied. "Took a little time to get things set up, but it went fine. I'm glad you're feeling better."
Eddie turned and gave Jamie a hug, she could hear the traces of frustration in his voice. "I know," she whispered kissing his head. "I know, but it's over now and soon the babies will be here and you get to be the doting grandpa."
Jamie kissed Eddie's head once more, "I'll finish, please rest."
Eddie nodded and headed back to the living room, sitting down next to Frank to listen to Danny's stories of the big move in day.
Lila sat down in the glider rocker and opened the box closest to her. She kept a lot of the special baby items to put away herself." She pulled out some clothes, sat the small pile in what little lap she still had with her tummy the size it was, and began sorting it.
"I made up the bed, babe," Steven told her poking his head in after finishing their closet. "Sheets, blankets and all."
"Okay, thanks," she replied. "Here, can you hang these in the closet, please?' she asked him, handing him the clothes people had purchased for when the babies were a little bigger.
"Sure," he said, taking the clothes from her. "You look really tired, why don't you save the rest of this for tomorrow and I'll help you with it then?"
"Good idea," agreed Lila. She tossed the last few things that were in her lap back into the box, and started to get up from the glider.
"Ooohh," she said as she sat back down.
"What? What's wrong?" asked Steven.
"Nothing," answered Lila. "One baby just moved wrong is all, got me in the ribs again."
"You sure?" he asked.
"Yep, I'm sure," she said. She tried standing up again, and was successful the second time. "See? No problem."
"Okay, babe" said Steven. "What should I do while you nap, anything in particular?"
"You can work in the kitchen and finish it, if you want to, put the dishes wherever you want them?" she said.
"Okay," he agreed.
"I'll be up in a couple of hours, then we can watch TV and have some dinner," said Lila as she kissed Steven and headed for the bedroom. Steven made his way to the kitchen, chose a box and started unpacking it.
"We've got entirely too many dishes" he concluded as he pulled out seemingly every dish either of them had owned before they moved in together. He decided to keep the everyday basics in the most accessible cabinets, and stack the rest in the higher-up ones.
"Oh yeah" he remembered, "Better leave space for the baby bottles and all that stuff." He smiled as he thought about how there'd be baby things in his kitchen. He was lost in thought when…
"Steven, come here, please..." He heard Lila call to him from the bedroom. He immediately ran down the hall to see what she needed.
"What's wrong, babe?" he asked, the concern in his voice obvious.
"Could you run to the convenience store and get me some ginger ale, please?" she asked. "My lunch is sitting like a rock and I can't get comfortable enough to sleep."
"Sure," said Steven, "I'll be right back. Anything else you think you might need?"
"No, just the soda," said Lila.
"Okay," said Steven as he kissed her on the forehead before grabbing his keys and leaving for the store.
He returned about 10 minutes later with 2 bottles of ginger ale and a bag of ice, since they didn't have any ice made at the house yet. He took a cup from the cabinet, threw some ice in it and started off down the hallway with the cup in one hand and the soda in the other.
"Alright, here you go," he said as he walked through the doorway of the bedroom. "Lila! What's wrong?" She was curled up on top of the covers, crying, and squeezing his pillow in her fists as tight as she could.
"Lila! Babe, are you okay?" exclaimed Steven as he knelt down on the floor beside the bed and moved her hair off of her sweaty face.
She didn't say anything, just looked at him and shook her head.
"I'm calling Dr. Mianni!" said Steven.
Lila nodded her head as Steven grabbed his cell phone and made the call.
"Yes, I need to speak with Dr. Mianni, please. This is Steven Tenney. My wife is one of Dr. Mianni's patients. Yes, Lila Tenney. She's almost 35 weeks pregnant and she thought she had indigestion, but now we're not so sure. She's laying in bed in terrible pain and I need to know what we need to do. Okay, yes, it's 555-2114, yes, thank you."
"They're going to page her and she'll call us right back, okay?" Steven said to Lila as he reached out to hold her hand. "It's going to be okay, I promise."
"What if… it's not?" cried Lila. "What if I have….the babies… today?" She cried even harder at that idea.
"Then we'll handle it and everything will be just fine, babe," said Steven, doing his best to reassure her but feeling like a failure, just like he did too many times before. Not a moment too soon, his cell phone rang.
"Hi, Dr. Mianni. Yes. Yeah, she went to take a nap and thought she had indigestion, so I went to get her some ginger ale and when I got home, I found her curled up on the bed crying in pain. Yeah. No. If you think that'd be best, certainly. Okay, thank you doctor. Bye."
"The doctor said that it's most likely nothing more than really bad indigestion," said Steven, "but since you're so far along and since you've got the blood pressure issue, she wants us to go in right now and she'll check you over, okay?"
"Okay," said Lila, still crying some. "You'll have to help me up, and call my Mom. I want my mom there incase."
"Of course I will," said Steven, putting his arms around her and slowly moving her into a sitting position. "We'll call if the doctor says you are in labor okay? Has the pain lessened at all?" he asked, once again trying to mask his concern so she wouldn't know how scared he was.
"It's a little better," she said. "At least I can move and speak now."
"See, that's good!" he said, seizing the opportunity to encourage her.
He helped her into her shoes and out to his vehicle, and they headed towards the doctor's office, unsure of what the remainder of the day held in store…
"I understand we're not having a good evening," said Dr. Mianni as she entered the exam room where Steven and Lila were waiting. She was just about to leave to go home when this page came in.
"We've had better," said Steven.
"How are you feeling right now, Lila?" she asked as she looked at the printout from the fetal monitor that the nurse had put on Lila as soon as she arrived.
"Better than I was an hour ago," replied Lila as she laid on her left side on the exam table. "But still not good."
"What specifically is bothering you right now?" asked Dr. Mianni, "still your stomach?"
"Yeah" said Lila, "and my back hurts a little."
"I see" replied the doctor. "Well, the readings from the fetal monitor aren't causing me too much concern, and your blood pressure has gone down a few points since you first arrived, which is good, but I want to do an internal exam and an ultrasound, just to be on the safe side."
"Okay," said Lila.
"I'll step out for a minute and let you get undressed," said the doctor. "Here's a sheet."
"Thanks," said Lila as she reached out for Steven's hand to pull herself up off the table.
"I'm glad she's not too worried about anything," said Steven as Lila slowly undressed from the waist down and covered up with the sheet.
"Me too" replied Lila, laying back down on the table. "I'm glad my pressures weren't too high. As much pain as I was in at the house, I was afraid they'd be off the charts and uncontrollable and we'd be spending this afternoon having a baby."
"Well, it doesn't look like that'll be the case" said Steven as he sat back down beside the exam table. "I've got a good feeling about everything, I really think it'll all be fine."
"Knock, knock," said Dr. Mianni as she opened the door a bit to see if Lila was ready.
"Come in, I'm ready," said Lila. The doctor entered and closed the door behind herself, grabbed a pair of gloves and a tube of water-based gel. She put the gloves on and squeezed a small amount of the gel onto the fingers of her right hand.
Lila held onto Steven's hand tightly.
"I'll be as gentle as possible, Lila" she said as she began the exam.
"Please do" replied Lila, staring straight up at the ceiling. She retained her grip on Steven's hand and made a conscious effort not to hold her breath.
"Ow, ow, ow" she said. "That hurt a little!"
"I'm sorry" replied the doctor. "I'm feeling your cervix to see if it's dilated at all, I know that can be really uncomfortable."
"I'd take it step further and say it just plain hurts!" replied Lila. Steven leaned down and kissed her forehead.
"Okay, all finished with that" said Dr. Mianni. "Your cervix isn't dilated at all, which is good since you're not due for a little bit yet."
"So the pains I was having weren't contractions?" asked Lila.
"I'm 99 percent certain they weren't" replied the doctor. "Since you've been on the monitor here, you've had a couple of mild ones, and you may have had similar ones at home, but even if you did they wouldn't account for the kind of pain you described. They would have gotten your attention for sure, but they wouldn't have incapacitated you."
"What are we looking for in the ultrasound?" asked Steven.
"I just want to take a quick look and make sure nothing's out of the ordinary" said the doctor. "Since the internal exam didn't reveal anything wrong and the fetal monitor readings and mother's blood pressure are okay we could skip the ultrasound if you wanted to, but somehow I think you'd like to do it."
"You know us well, doctor!" said Lila, slightly smiling for the first time since the pains began. The doctor hit a few keys on the ultrasound keyboard, brought up the proper screen and entered Lila's name.
"Steven, would you get the lights, please?" she asked. He reached around and flipped the switch, and the room was illuminated only by the machine. The doctor squeezed the ultrasound gel onto Lila's tummy, and moved it around with the wand until she got a good view of the babies.
"These little ones are growing well" said the doctor. "Still don't want to know the sexes, huh?"
"NO!" they both said at the same time.
Dr. Mianni laughed. "Just kidding, just kidding! I've never told parents the sex against their will, and I don't plan to start with you two."
"That's good," chuckled Steven. "Because we've made it this far without knowing, and we're really looking forward to the surprise."
The doctor smiled as she continued looking at the babies on the screen. She turned a dial on the machine and the babies heartbeats echoed against the walls. Steven and Lila looked into one another's eyes and smiled, as they did each time they got to hear that breathtaking sound.
"Well," said the doctor as she put the wand down and reached for a towel to dry Lila's tummy off. "Everything looks fantastic. I feel confident that what happened was indeed a nasty bout of indigestion, so I'm going to let you go home and get some rest."
Lila let out an audible sigh of relief. "I guess I need to lay off the burritos, huh?" she said with a laugh.
"That'd probably be wise," agreed the doctor. "At least until after you deliver."
"Anything else we should steer clear of, doc?" asked Steven.
"Not specifically," she replied. "Anything you've eaten to this point is fine as long as it still agrees with you, Lila."
"Okay," said Lila. "Well, I'm sorry to have caused such trouble, but I'm glad we know what happened and how to hopefully not have it happen again."
"It's no trouble," said the doctor. "I'm glad you called and I'm glad I had you come in - some things just aren't worth taking chances on."
"Definitely not," agreed Steven.
"Here's a picture from today, and unless you have any problems between now and next Thursday," said the doctor, "I'll see you at your next appointment, okay?"
"Sounds great," said Lila as she took the picture and looked at it lovingly. "Thank you so much." With that, Dr. Mianni left the room, and Lila carefully got dressed.
"See, babe," said Steven. "Everything is just fine."
"Yeah" she said, "And I'm glad we didn't call my folks and get everyone upset. I feel stupid for getting so worked up over indigestion."
"Hey, nothing you did was stupid," said Steven in as reassuring a voice as he had. "This is all totally new to us, completely uncharted territory, and when something has you hurting so badly you can't move or even speak, having it checked is anything but stupid!"
"I know," said Lila. "I'm just so tired of all these scares and near-misses. I just want the babies to be here so we can hold them and know that they're alright, you know?"
"I know, my love," he said. "It'll happen soon. I know for you it must seem like September will never get here, but it will and we're going to have these babies and it's going to be the best thing that's ever happened to us."
"Well, second best maybe," said Lila.
Steven looked at her quizzically. "The best has to be the day we got together," said Lila. "Without that, there'd be no babies, so I think we have to give recognition where it's called for."
Steven took Lila's face in his hands and kissed her lips tenderly.
"I love you more than you could ever know, Lila."
"I think I know" she replied. "I really think I know."
A/N: Close one for Lila and the tiny Reagans inside of her but a burrito was the culprit. I think Jamie would have to tie Eddie down to keep her away from Lila during the birth. At least she's doing better so that might not be necessary. I wanted to extend a great big thanks to all that are still reading this and those who plan to keep up with the series. Nine more stories to go in the series but eight left in this story. I think it's three more until show time.
Next Update – June 14th – Lila is discouraged with lack of progress near her due date, the cracks in a Reagan marriage begin to show.
