Rilla Ford
Ingleside, Morgan Rd,
Glen St Mary, PEI
Canada
April 10th 1916
Darling
It's April and I know time is nearing for you, and I can't help but realize that while you speak of our baby, you show me photos, you tell me how they move around like a fish, that we haven't spoken anything about names and not sure how or why this hasn't come up yet, but I hope you're not worried about names and opinions on them from others.
If you want a family name, please choose whatever you wish for one. I am sure Mother can give you details on our side if you don't find something on your side that you love.
As a scholar, am partial to literary names in a way, though I humbly ask no Jane's, Mary's, or Elizabeth's, even if Pride and Prejudice is a book you ladies swoon over.
If anything I wouldn't mind something out of the ordinary, I know your name is something special in its ways.
Beryl like the gemstone is interesting, or Daphne who I believe was a naiad? Melinda is pretty as well. I'm sure you look around in one of your mythology books, or Shakespeare you can find something pretty for girls, and rugged for a boy. I mean I suppose if we wanted to shock everyone we could name her Persephone.
Bleaker called his daughter Florence and boy Alden, or I suppose his wife did, he said he left it up to her as he had no idea. He says I'm lucky not to have to see you or hear you go through such a thing, but I don't think I am fortunate at all missing it all. Even if I'm banished from the room, I still won't get to hold our child, to see him or her with my own eyes directly, and that is what haunts me the most.
I have missed so much, and in these moments I don't know what was the right choice, though if I hadn't enlisted…if by chance they had rejected me for my ankle, would we still be waiting for this child? I want to say yes, but at the same time, I wonder if it would have taken longer.
As you can observe, even I have my moments of melancholia, so never apologize for your own.
Love always Ken
To Lieutenant Kenneth Ford
ID 163322
10th Battalion
CEF,
France
April 30th 1916
Dearest Ken
I find myself having nightmares more and more often, Father says hormones make my dreams worse, and my anxiety heightened. I wish you were here, but I know you have your duty. I just got your letter about names. People ask and I just smile at them. I suppose thinking about names makes it more real, and parts of me are still afraid that this will all be a dream, or something will happen.
I do like Beryl, it's a little like Bertha in a way, isn't it? I laughed a little at Persephone, because
I feel like Persephone, trapped in a world of darkness that I can't quite escape. Hades is raging on the surface. Everyone is trapped in this dungeon of war to which you going off to yourself or will be there soon enough.
Not that you are my Hades, you didn't plunge me into this darkness, that was another but you are my saviour, though Persephone did not have one. Still, you live in this darkness with me, so maybe you are my Hades?
Maybe I am reading too much, or maybe my imagination is running wild? Though much like Persephone I cannot deny eating the forbidden fruit. Maybe I should have known better after everything. I can feel our child move and that terrifies me. I remember the pain, I remember the relief but it wouldn't be the same time if that happened. I wish you were here, I wish you could feel it, I wish you were here to bring light into my life and calm my fears.
But I know you can't be…but one day you will be again.
I keep having practice contractions as my father calls them. He calls them Braxton hicks and says they are a 1/4 of what it will feel like when it comes my time. I am not ready for this, but I suppose I must learn to be.
Also thank you for letting me know you have the same moments, I try my best to write happy letters to my brothers but with you, it's different, it's nice to know I don't have to hide from you. I find it hard to believe that there is a possibility that the baby will be here by the time you receive this letter. Father says he'll send you a telegram when it does happen, that way you know as soon as humanly possible. Which I hope won't distract you, but I don't want you to have to wait three weeks.
Love you always, Rilla
May was overly warm for Rilla, but she was always warm as her body was stretched and not her own. The child kicked into her ribs and kept her up at night, sleep was as elusive as it ever was. Her dresses, made for such things sit funny on her and her wedding ring is now of a chain around her neck. Her head ached constantly, and her father was constantly telling her to keep calm and quiet and stay in bed.
"Please tell me it will be soon," she says in her father's office.
"It will happen when it happens," her Father tells her feeling around her stomach. "You've dropped though which is a good sign, not quite as high. Baby feels to be in the right position, head is down. Just a matter of time now and keeping you as we have," Father tells her while feeling her pulse and counting.
"That's what everyone says," Rilla sighs.
"Babies come when they come Rilla," Father chuckles. "How are the Braxton hicks?"
"Annoying?" Rilla tells him almost petulantly as the doorbell rings. "That's Minnie or should be?"
"Go on then, I will check on you as usual later. It's a nice day out you might as well enjoy it," Father tells her.
Rilla nods her head and lets him help her lower herself to the floor from the table. Nan was already talking to Minnie as she was gushing over how much Little Jims had grown. His little sailor suit and leather shoes with chubby cheek filled with freckles and a smile dotted with little white teeth.
"He is just so sweet, look at those little blonde curls," scooping him up in her arms. He looks to Rilla ready to cry at the stranger holding him.
"It's okay, it's just my sister," she tells him.
They settle outside in the garden, and Nan and Di keep Little Jims occupied with playing ball with him.
"What's it like? Like what does it feel like Minnie, Mother just says it's a bearable pain that seems unbearable and that once it's over I will forget it all. And the books, well they give information without much else. " Rilla says from the bench in the garden.
Minnie looks up from her knitting for a moment and laughs.
"I mean maybe some do after sixteen years, but little Jim's birth is still fresh in my head," Minnie tells her. "But your mother is right in a way, it's bearable and unbearable at the same time. It will feel like the worst thing alive, and then it doesn't. It may feel like you are splitting in half, you may feel like you want to be sick or shake from the power of it all. But we will all be with you and help you through it like all the women who have helped us as well."
"None of this sounds pleasant," Rilla says sighing.
"It's not, but it will be worth it in the end, you'll bleed for weeks afterwards, as you heal. Your father will most likely keep you in bed for the first week or two until it slows down. It doesn't exactly smell wonderful, you may find yourself smelling different as well like onions. Apparently, it's for the baby to find you when nursing."
"I never noticed that two years ago?" Rilla tells her friend.
"It might just be in our heads, but I swore you could smell it on me all the time," Minnie laughs lightly. "It's a highly emotional time, but you have plenty of people around you." She says as Mother comes with the tray of lemonade and biscuits.
"Refreshments," she says putting down the tray taking the little bank book out of her pocket and giving it to Rilla. "The matron at the desk hopes to see the little one when you are up and out this summer and sends her prayers as well."
Rilla nods her head. "Thank you for going for me."
"Anytime sweetheart," Mother tells her.
"Have you decided on a name yet?" Minnie asks curiously as Little Jims comes at the sight of cookies and climbs into Rilla's lap as best as he can. Nan and Di follow settling into the other wicker chairs.
"I'm not entirely sure yet, Ken brought it up on his own, gave his ideas or what he likes. I guess in a way I have been putting it off since he isn't here?" Rilla admits. "Mother and Father haven't asked really, they always kept any potential names a secret until we were born so they haven't asked for a while."
"It's a big business and I understand your hesitance," Minnie says agreeing.
The days wear on, and each day feels longer than the next and the days with leeches are her worst days. Father watches her even more closely than she thought was possible. Some days she lay in bed with headaches and flushed skin, other days she moved down to the living room and sat about. Narrowly avoiding the women who visited her mother.
The only thing that hadn't changed was how much she slept, it was the same as ever. She creeps about the house, as she usually does so nothing is entirely out of a place. Pain is pain, and Father is out on a call, and Mother is lying down as well. She looks at the clock on the wall, sighing. The constant waves of twitches of pain were different than the other ones she had felt over the weeks leading up to this.
She manages the stairs and stands at the door of her parent's room.
"What is it Rilla?" Her mother calls out.
"It feels different?" She says quietly as Rilla approaches the bed.
"Different how?" Mother asks reaching out to her daughter's round stomach.
"It just feels different, stronger and like they start in my spine?" Rilla tries to explain.
"I'll call your father to alert him." Mother says swiftly getting out of bed and going for the telephone. "For now, let's get you into something comfortable and old, and comfortable shall we?"
Rilla can only nod her head and when Father comes back he has the district nurse with him.
"I'll run over to the Fords," Shirley tells their Mother. "Uncle Owen offered me company, so I'll stay there until it's all finished."
Mother can only agree and kiss his cheek before he goes off in the night, and half an hour later Leslie Ford is with them, and over time it picks up and Mrs. Meredith and Minnie come in the morning when they hear the news. Mrs. Meredith wipes her brow, reminding her to breathe. Mother is holding her hands, father is calm and collected. Her body is shaking from the sheer force of the contractions that wrack her body. Moans slip from her lips as she tries to keep herself from screaming.
Aunt Leslie is also coming and going out of the room, having come when Mother rang her after calling the doctor. Uncle Owen stayed at the house of dreams, with Shirley who had come back for the weekend only to realize he was not going to sleep anytime that weekend. While her sisters pace the hallways neither of them had heard or seen an event as such, still wondering if they should go to the manse as Mrs. Meredith. Whenever they peek through the door they look concerned, by the sweat on her forehead and the rawness of her lips.
It was Di, who brought her some lip balm to help soothe the bitten lips, still wide-eyed at what her little sister was going through, and it was Nan who brought her milky tea, nervously but trying to be helpful.
"Jerry once said he wanted a handful of children…I think after this I am vetoing that handful," Nan whispers to her twin.
Di can only nod her head, her sister's body had been a shock when they came home from Redmond, but under her dresses, it didn't seem as pronounced, but in the shadows of the lamp from her sweat-damp shifts, it looked stretched and taunt like otherworldly in many ways as she stands with the help of their mother and Mrs. Meredith.
Hades, is torturing her tonight, the forbidden fruit she ate that created this child? Sweat down her forehead, down her back. Her waters have yet to break fully, though every time the child moves she feels a trickle of water down her thighs.
Her father isn't worried, but eventually, if it does not break on its own, he will have to do it for them. Though at this moment progress seems good and he promises to never speak of this to anyone or her ever again the first time he checks her after the nurse has to leave for another call she is too far into it to care.
He's more worried about her blood pressure to be worried about something trivial as water membranes. In his uncertainty, he gives her a shot, magnesium sulphate, keeping another handy if her labour goes longer than twelve hours. District nurse helping him as needed, he had one too many close calls with his wife to trust this process with his daughter. Dr. Parker at the tips of his fingers if needed, but seemed calm and collected.
Pain radiated through her body, enough as she begged for any sort of relief as she cried. How long had it been? Was the sun down already? Either way, it was too late for that, it's too close to the end.
Everything is hazy but clear at the same time.
Why couldn't he be here? She cried for him, lord let him survive if she could survive this?
It's a flurry of commotion at that point, little to no relief, little to no rest for anyone in the house who can hear her cries.
Support is given, half on her side until she can't stand it anymore
Mother, Mrs. Meredith, Ken's mothers, and Father all encouraging her, another push, another breath, big ones, you got this Rilla.
Suddenly it's over with, the immense pain gone only to be replaced by relief. She shakes the ringing in her ears, the baby is on her chest. Shocked to be out in the world, still holding the cord that gave her life from her body. The breathless mother was helped into a semi-lying down, held up by some pillow position, her knees knocking together.
Mrs. Meredith is rubbing down the baby, father is suctioning its nose and mouth when she feels as if she should panic it suddenly cries out. Mother Leslie…is just watching in awe.
"Took you a moment there didn't it Miss," her father says with a grin.
"What?" She breathes, head
"You have a little girl Rilla-my-Rilla," he says, the baby is already rooting about, and her father is still very much in doctor mode, but its mother who opens her nightgown and helps the child finds its first source of nourishment. She can barely focus, she can barely decide on what her mind wants to do a strange mix of tears, fears, and lingering cheers from people around her. Father says something to her, but she can barely hear him she is too focused on the baby in her arms and the blind pounding deep in her head. Something about the after-birth needing help?
"Rilla talks to me," Father says to her. "Tell me what you're feeling."
"Ken someone needs…" Rilla says hazily, groaning. "Hades, my head hurts." Father looks up from the end of the bed. Bloody hands reaching for the needle that was waiting for him before jabbing it in her thigh and someone is taking the baby away from her. She can't help but yelp in the process, light flashing in her sight as she drowns in her agony.
Someone is pressing on her stomach through a foggy daze.
The room smells of copper and she feels weak. She cries out weekly as she feels another attack on her stomach—the baby, not the baby.
No, the baby was crying over in a corner.
Another push to her stomach and she feels her insides react to it this time. Pain rips through her and she lets out a cry. Various perfumes filter through her nose to her brain.
"Rilla, Rilla, stay awake, it helps us. I know it hurts but stay with us,"
Another working of her stomach, another cramp and another gush of warmth down underneath her.
She was bleeding.
"Keep massaging. It's slowly it down and cutting off the hemorrhage." Her father says she groans as they keep doing what they are doing.
The smell is enough to make her sick, so much copper and something she can't describe. Someone holds a bowl and makes sure she doesn't choke on the vomit that is in her mouth her head hurts less now.
"Rilla, can you hear me," She hears her father say.
"Ken?" she says hoarsely. "Baby?"
"We'll tell him," Father says gently, pulling up blankets around her. "Sleep, I'll watch over you both."