This is Fiona Rose's birth as seen through the eyes of Audrey's friend Derek. So interesting to read what was going on inside someone else while I was so focused on what was going on with in myself. :
January 26, 2011. What a day. I woke up just like any normal day, because I had believed it was going to be another normal day. One special thing about it was that it was my mother’s birthday. Her 49th to be exact. So I told her to have a happy birthday, and I left for school. When I got there, I saw my best friend, Audrey, and asked her how her extremely pregnant mother was doing. Apparently she had been having some minor contractions the day before. So the time was getting close.
The day went on, and that baby inside Heather’s belly was all I could think about. Towards the end of the school day, I just decided the baby wasn’t going to come that day. But when I was dropping Audrey off at her seventh period (I didn’t have a seventh period), I received a phone call from Heather. My heart racing, I answered. She explained that the baby was coming and she called Audrey out of school so we could go experience this blessed miracle. I drove Audrey and myself to her house because that’s where Heather planned on having the baby. We got to there around the same time as her father, Mike.
As we got out of my car, I started to get extremely excited. But when we got into the house, I started to extremely anxious. Why? I don’t really know. Something about a new human being coming into my life was very special and big to me, and it just struck me somehow. I saw all of Audrey’s little brothers (she has four – Logan, Sagan, Caelan, and Rowan) and greeted them. I think most of them were pretty oblivious to the situation, except for Logan, so they weren’t as pumped as Audrey and I.
The first time I saw Heather, she looked like she was in immense pain. She reached for Audrey to hug her, which turned into another contraction. She just leaned there on her daughter for what seemed like a very long time. When the contraction ended, Mike asked me to do a big favor. He asked me to go drive to his mother’s house to bring her to the birth. I agreed to it, and Audrey and I looked up directions on the internet to her house. And we were off.
The directions we had written down seemed simple enough, but we got lost. Multiple times. We ended up in some kind of resort, in a ghetto, in the middle of nowhere, and in a few neighborhoods. We also almost crashed into another car, and we almost flipped over attempting to do a u-turn and riding up on the curb. Finally, after a few phone calls to Mike for accurate directions, we arrived at Ruth’s house to pick her up. And now that we knew how to get home, there was plenty of traffic. We weren’t going any faster than 30 mph on the highway. And finally, we got off at the exit we needed, but I didn’t know what way to turn. Audrey called Mike quickly and he told us to go east. I didn’t know where east was. But I used common knowledge. I screamed “THE SUN SETS IN THE WEST SO WE NEED TO GO THAT WAY!” We got home about ten minutes after that. A trip that should’ve taken us an hour took us almost two, but we were back in time. The baby was still in the belly.
Heather was now in her bedroom, and I could hear her screaming in pain. It frightened me. I didn’t know what to do. When no one was looking, I snuck into Audrey’s room and sat down at her desk to calm myself down. I literally felt like I was going to pass out. What if there was something wrong with the baby? What if it’s hurt? How much longer was this going to take? Was it going to be a boy or a girl? All of these questions were racing through my head. After I thought I would be able to handle it all, I made my way back into the kitchen, where Ruth was with all the kids. I sat down at the head of the kitchen table. Heather’s screams were getting louder and more intense. I felt like screaming too.
Audrey decided to go into the bedroom where the labor was happening to see how everything was going. Less than a minute later, she came running into the room, yelling “It’s a girl! It’s a girl! It’s a girl!” And while all of her brothers went running into the bedroom, I snapped up and grasped Audrey into one of the most intense hugs I had ever given. I don’t know why, but tears literally poured out of my eyes. I couldn’t help it. Audrey had her first sister out of her five siblings, and it was what she was hoping for for sixteen years. And in my eyes, I had a new baby sister in the same way that Audrey, Logan, Sagan, Caelan, and Rowan did. We stayed there, hugging like that for what felt like hours. Breaking our moment, Mike was calling “Audrey, Derek, come see the baby!” Still crying, he found us in the kitchen. “Come on!” he said. We slowly followed him, and he turned to me. “Are you okay?” he asked. I couldn’t speak, so I just nodded.
The three of us got into the bedroom, and there she was: Fiona Rose Hawkes. And even though it was a bloody naked mess, she was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. The family resemblance was incredible, and of course, I did some more crying. Eventually, the umbilical cord was cut, the placenta came out, Heather’s parents, Jim and Flo, were called to the house, we sang Fiona “Happy Birthday”, and we took pictures. And finally, the moment of truth came. I got to hold her in my arms.
She was so perfect. No crying. No fidgeting. She just remained perfectly still in my hands with her eyes closed, and there wasn’t a single thing that was imperfect. She was content. I was content. Nothing else in the world mattered.
I called my mother to tell her all about it. I told her it was a girl. I told her she was perfectly healthy. I told her we were all happy. And I was happy. And now January 26th contained two very special birthdays. It was getting late; it was a school night, after all. So I went back into the bedroom. Ruth, Jim, and Flo all gave me hugs. Mike gave me a hug. Heather gave me a hug. Audrey gave me a hug. And I gave Fiona one last kiss. At least one last kiss for that night.
Lying close to you feeling your heart beating
And I'm wondering what you're dreaming
Wondering if it's me you're seeing
Then I kiss your eyes and thank God we're together
I just wanna stay with you in this moment forever, forever and ever
1 comment:
That is beautiful. He made me cry
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