Within Arm's Reach - By Ann Napolitano Page 0,147

front of her and puts her hands on her sister’s knees. “Are you in pain?” she asks. “Has labor started? Gracie, open your eyes. Look at me.”

The two girls are still in that position for a long time. Lila almost on her knees, her hands on her sister, her eyes on her face. Gracie leaning toward her. I think of the framed picture that now lies on the floor by Gracie’s feet. I glance over at the couch to make sure my mother is still here, to make sure she is still within arm’s reach of my daughters.

In the same calm voice, Lila says, “Tell me where the pain is, Gracie. Tell me you’re all right.”

Gracie half-opens her eyes, like someone reluctantly waking from a deep sleep. She says, in a voice so soft it is almost a whisper, which seems meant only for Lila’s ears but which everyone present hears: “I think our baby is coming.”

After an intake of breath, the entire room erupts in pandemonium. Meggy makes a beeline for the front door. Angel starts weeping. Kelly runs into the kitchen, whether to boil water or use the phone I don’t know. Mary moves to the far side of the room, where she stands with her back to the wall. Grayson keeps saying, “Are you sure? It’s too soon.” Weber offers to use his beeper or cell phone or some special fireman’s device to call the paramedics. When no one answers him, he pulls a black box out of his pocket and speaks into it. He speaks in what must be code, because it sounds like he repeats over and over, “I love you, I love you.”

Lila stays on the floor in front of Gracie. Together the two girls start breathing oddly, in rhythm with each other. They sound like the old-time train Patrick and I took from St. Louis to New York after our wedding. The huge black train puffed and chanted as it climbed over hills, straining each time as if it would never make the top. The two girls, my grandaughters, chant, their young voices clear, “Hee hee hoo. Hee hee hoo.”

Noreen comes in and almost falls on me, her cheeks flushed and her eyes shining. At first I think she is there because she has something important to say. She has the look of a woman who has made a discovery. But then she pulls her stethoscope out of her purse and presses it to my chest. It is a full minute before I can make her understand that I am fine and that Gracie is the one who needs attention.

I don’t tell Noreen that I am terribly tired and unsure whether I can stand of my own accord. I want her to leave me be, and besides, those things don’t matter in this moment. In this moment I am seated in a miraculous room that is singing with the voices of the people I love. My babies cry out to greet the next infant, the one that will grab hold of life and this family and turn everything around. My husband is standing in the doorway beside Louis, both men helpless with relief. Noreen is now giving orders, and kindly allowing everyone something to do. Mary calls the hospital. Angel is in charge of Gracie’s purse. Meggy makes sure there are no appliances left on in the kitchen. Kelly finds a blanket in an upstairs closet so her daughter doesn’t have to lie under an itchy hospital-issued one.

My oldest child, my poor girl, gives a sharp cry of thirst from the back room. The twins seem to have disappeared, knowing that I will see them in a few short hours in the newborn’s dewy face. Lila and Gracie continue to breathe together, the only still figures amid all the chaos. I catch my mother’s eye across the room, and I wink. I have never winked before in my life, because it is not a ladylike thing to do. But there’s a first time for everything. For everyone. Besides, I want to reach across the space between my mother and me with some kind of gesture. If I were able, I would weave my way to the other side of the room and take her hand. The boundaries, the squabbles, and the resentments have dropped away. Time has dropped away. I am lucky enough to recognize this for what it is: one of those perfect, full-to-bursting moments you wait a lifetime for, when it

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