Love You More(28)

A second later, he swaggered in with a bottle of Maker’s Mark and a proud grin.

“What’s going on in here?” he said, glancing at the pink streamers and paper fans. “Looks like a bottle of Pepto-Bismol exploded!”

Erin laughed too quickly. “Russ, it’s a shower—not a tailgate.”

“Okay, everyone!” Cara announced. “Time to open pressies!”

She pulled Erin onto the sofa beside her, a clipboard in hand.

Erin scanned the room, meeting my eyes. “Billie. Come sit here,” she said, patting the other side of her. I slipped into the spot she’d saved.

She started in on her pile of gifts, each tiny pink outfit and adorable stuffed animal earning a chorus of oohs and aahs.

She opened my gift last: a basket stocked with unglamorous essentials—a thermometer, nail clippers, diaper cream, and plain white onesies. My cheeks burned as I watched her pull out each embarrassingly practical item. Then Erin opened my big-ticket item—the latest and greatest breast pump. Her face lit up as she held it to her chest like it was gold.

“This is perfect,” she whispered to me.

Then she lifted her chin and grinned toward the room. “Dr. Billie Wright,” she said, gesturing my way. “Always on call for me.”





Chapter 16


About a month later, Erin’s ringtone sounded in my pocket. My hands froze midchart, and my chest tightened. It was happening. I could feel it.

I sped through the rest of my paperwork, then ducked into the hallway and called Erin.

“Oh my God, Billie! My water broke!” she shouted into the phone.

“Did you call your doctor?” My heart was hammering, but my voice came out clinical, calm, as if I were trying to convince us both.

“Yes. I’m on with her now.” She let out a nervous laugh.

“Well, you need to hang up and call your other doctor.”

“Not yet! Please. I need to stay on with you!”

I pivoted to the usual questions.

“Is the fluid clear?”

“Yes. It feels like pee, but I think it’s clear.”

“Are you feeling the baby move?”

“Yes. She just kicked.”

“Any contractions?”

“Not really. But it feels so tight.”

“Okay. That’s fine. But you need to go to the hospital now and have them assess you.”

“Assess me?”

“They’ll do a sterile speculum exam to confirm amniotic fluid, check your cervix, monitor the baby’s heart rate.”

“And then what?”

“Then we wait.”

“Wait for what?”

“Wait to see what this baby wants to do. Sometimes contractions kick in naturally. If not, they might start an induction to lower infection risk.”

There was a long pause. Then: “I’m scared.”

“That’s normal,” I said gently. “But you’re doing everything right.”

“What if something goes wrong?”

“It shouldn’t. But that’s why you need to be at the hospital.”

“Are you worried?”

“No,” I said firmly. “Not at all.”

“I wish you were here.”

“Me too,” I whispered.

In that moment, I knew exactly what I was going to do. I hung up, walked back into the clinic, and told my attending I had a family emergency and needed to go. I didn’t ask for permission. I didn’t second-guess myself.

I took a taxi home, told the driver to wait, ran upstairs and threw clothes into a duffel, then slid back into the cab where I booked the next flight to Milwaukee. For the first time in years, my body moved before my brain had the chance to weigh in.



* * *



— I arrived at the hospital just in time. Erin was in the delivery room, her hair in a tangled bun, her face dripping with sweat. When she looked up and saw me, I watched panic melt into relief.

“You’re here,” she said, breathless.

“I’m here,” I said.



* * *



— Labor felt more fragile with someone I loved. Time seemed to slow. I knew the anatomy and the protocols, but none of my knowledge shielded me from the scorch of her scream. Her nails dug into my arm, her eyes wild. She cried and cursed me between pushes—“Stop telling me what to do!”—but I stayed by her side, holding her hair back, pressing cool cloths to her forehead.

I’d delivered babies before, but never like this—never with my whole body drawn tight with love. In that room, I wasn’t a doctor. I was just her sister.

Then, in the quiet of the early morning—4:44 a.m.—Phoebe arrived. Tiny, pink, furious—with her mother’s mouth and lungs.

The nurse laid her on Erin’s chest, and Erin sobbed with a sound from somewhere deep.

“She’s here,” she said, her voice breaking. “She’s really here.”

I pressed my forehead to hers and nodded, both of us crying—not just for the baby, but for everything that came before. Everything we’d lost—and everything we’d kept.

A moment later, Joan slipped quietly into the room and held her child’s child. Three generations together.