“Oh,” she said. “Oh.”
“Are you okay?”
“I guess I dozed off for a minute there. I’m just very tired, Raymond. It’s just been a very long day. It’s been years since I’ve tried to do this much in one day.”
“Yeah. That’s true, all right. But other than being tired, are you okay?”
“No.”
They rode in silence for a few seconds.
“We could just go home if you need to,” he said.
“Oh no. We can’t abandon Isabel. She’s having her baby. We said we would be there after court. And we’re going to be there, even if it’s the last thing I ever do.”
“Don’t say things like that.”
“It’s just an expression.”
Silence. He did not attempt to reply. Raymond was tired and upset, too. Maybe not as much as Mrs. G. But enough.
“I’m sorry, though,” she said. “It’s a hard time for both of us. I will try to speak in lighter terms. Besides . . . maybe I will get a second wind when I experience this beautiful little new life. What could be better for the spirit than a new life in the world?”
Halfway up the stairs from the subway to the street, Raymond knew they had a problem on their hands.
He stopped and waited with her. Let her catch her breath. He knew she would make it up the stairs if he gave her enough time. But she was clearly digging down into her last energy reserves.
It was a seven-block walk from the subway station to the hospital, as best Raymond could figure.
And then they had to get home.
He placed a hand behind her back and tried to give her something of a push. A lift. It seemed to work fairly well.
In time they stood on the street together, Mrs. G panting for breath, her head down. Raymond looked around and thought about hailing a cab. But he didn’t have much money on him, and he wasn’t sure if she did, either. It didn’t seem right to ask her for money, even at a time like this.
“It’s seven blocks to the hospital,” he said, finally gearing himself up to break the bad news.
“Oh, I don’t know, Raymond. That might be too much. I will try, but I don’t know if I can.”
“I don’t think I have enough money on me for a cab. Do you?”
“I might. I would have to look in my purse. But I really don’t know what cabs charge anymore. Do you?”
“Not exactly. My dad always pays.”
Raymond allowed himself to realize, for the first time, that he had led them into trouble. That this was a serious situation. They were far from home, and he had asked her to do more than she could do. It rose up over his head like a tsunami and swept him away. He had no idea how to fix what he had broken.
He looked up to see a cab pull over to the curb for a sharply dressed businessman carrying an expensive leather briefcase. Raymond looked into the man’s face, and the man looked back at him, and Raymond wasn’t sure why. He wasn’t sure what they had done to draw this man’s attention. But he was standing only a few steps away, and it struck Raymond that he might have overheard their conversation.
“Take this one,” the man said, opening the back door of the cab and pointing into its back seat.
“But we might not have—”
Before he could even say the word “money,” the man reached out his right hand as if to shake hands with Raymond. Raymond thought it was an odd gesture—an odd moment to conduct a meeting ritual. But he reached in return and shook the man’s hand.
As soon as he did, he felt the folded bill. Felt it silently, invisibly pressed into his palm.
“Thank you,” Raymond said.
But he wasn’t sure if the man had heard. He was already gone, trotting into the street with his hand up to hail another cab.
“Good news,” he told Mrs. G, steering her toward the back seat of the taxi. “We can take a cab.”
“Oh, thank goodness. Turns out you have enough money after all?”
“Yeah. Turns out I do.”
“I can pay you back some of it.”
“Don’t worry about it. I just came into a little more money, that’s all. It’s taken care of.”
Raymond stuck his head into the hospital room and saw Isabel looking back at him, exhausted—nearly wounded, as if she had just survived a war—but beaming. In her arms was a tiny newborn, mostly wrapped in a blanket.
“Oh, he’s here!” Raymond said.
He noticed Mrs. G quicken her step at the news.
They walked into the hospital room together.