In the Heart of the Canyon - By Elisabeth Hyde Page 0,96

hand and pulled off the glove and placed it on top of her shorts.

“You said you’ve been having stomachaches?”

“They weren’t that bad,” she said.

“For how long?”

“I don’t know. Maybe a week.”

“Nausea? Diarrhea?”

“A little.”

“Back pain?”

“Some.”

Don stood up and squeezed her knee. “I’ll be right back,” he said, and he motioned to Susan, and they both ducked out from under the tarp. Amy watched as they went over to where JT and Jill were standing together. He said something to them, and her mother made a sudden movement in the direction of the tent, but Don took hold of her arm and held her back.

I’m dying, she thought. They all know it, and they’re wondering how to tell me.

I should have drowned in Lava.

The next contraction came without warning, while she was still alone. One moment there was a twinge of tightening, and before she could call for help, her stomach had frozen into an alien, rock-hard dome. Heavy machinery began scouring her insides. The pain was worse than before, something she wouldn’t have thought possible. Someone shrieked, and immediately people were kneeling beside her. Somebody cradled her head, and she turned and vomited all over somebody else’s knees, the stench hanging heavily in the air. She was afraid she was going to lose control of her bowels. She felt something cool on her cheek and grabbed whatever it was and bit down hard and pounded the ground with her fists. All this with a cork plugging her windpipe.

Then all the heavy machinery went still, and she was able to breathe. When she opened her eyes, her mother, Jill, Don, and Peter were all kneeling around her. Peter gently extricated the bandanna from between her teeth, and her mother held a cup of cool water to her lips.

“Go ahead, tell me,” she said flatly. “I’m dying, aren’t I.”

“No, you’re not dying,” Don said. “As it turns out, you’re about nine centimeters dilated. Which means your baby is pretty eager to make its entry into the world. I didn’t expect to find you so far along. But I think you’ve been in the beginning stages of labor for a day, maybe even a few days. That back pain? The stomachaches that came and went? I’m actually surprised you stood it so well.”

“I’m not pregnant,” Amy said. “I have a cyst.”

Don leaned forward. “It’s not a cyst, Amy,” he said. “You’re one hundred and ten percent pregnant. And you’re about to have the baby.”

“No,” said Amy. “No, I am not!”

Her mother’s face appeared. “Yes, you are, honey,” she said. “We’re going to walk you through it.”

“No,” said Amy, feeling the panic rise up. “You guys don’t understand! I’m not pregnant!” She refused to give in on this. It simply couldn’t be. She was not going to try to remember anything—not when or who or where. And she wasn’t going to give in to the humiliation that would come if she had to admit something like this. Because for a girl to go nine months without knowing she was pregnant seemed like the ultimate in cluelessness. And she was a smart girl. She’d scored 2400 on her SATs. She was going to be applying to good colleges this fall. She was going to be that skinny college girl, biking across campus to meet her boyfriend.

“Amy, listen,” and now Don’s face appeared in her circle of vision, and he looked directly into her eyes. “You are going to have a baby. Soon. It’s already on its way. There’s no other way out. It’s like going down a rapid. Once you’re in the tongue, you’re committed.”

Amy shook her head.

“You can do it,” said Don, “because you have to do it. Try and rest because there will be another contraction coming.”

“No,” Amy sobbed.

“Don’t cry!” Don said sharply. “You can’t cry right now. When we get this baby out you can cry all you want, but right now, you can’t cry.”

Her mother squeezed her hand. “He’s right. Save your strength. This is the worst part. Make it through this, and you can make it through anything.”

“How do you know?” Amy snapped.

Her mother laid a freshly dampened bandanna across Amy’s forehead. “Because I’ve been there. Once you get to ten centimeters, then you can start to push, and it’ll hurt too but not like this. This part is hell. The contractions are long and intense and come one right after another.”

Indeed, another one was starting—the tightening, the choking sensation, the deep imploding pain. She felt like she was being disemboweled.