Page 36 of Knocked Up in Alaska

This from Lou, who might qualify as the expert in the room, considering he was the oldest of seven siblings. Feeling unaccountably guilty, like Lou and he had both spied on her during a personal moment, he jerked his gaze back to her face. Their eyes met. Hers were still huge, but she told him, “I need to call Dr. Devan,” with an eerie calm.

“My office,” he said, lifted her into his arms, ignored her, “I can walk!” and carried her there as quickly as possible, careful not to bonk any part of her on a corner or a wall. His right elbow didn’t fare as well, but he barely felt the tingling pain radiate down his arm when he smacked it on the edge of the narrow doorframe on the way into his office. The office itself was little more than a cramped closet, with an old metal desk currently cluttered with his laptop and a bunch of paperwork. Behind the desk sat a cheap black swivel chair he’d ordered from Amazon late last year for fifty bucks. One of the old wooden chairs from the dining room was positioned in front of the desk, passing for a guest chair.

After a half second of consideration, he lowered her to the swivel chair, then retreated to the other side of the desk, turned away—in case she needed privacy to…labor—and pulled his phone out of his back pocket. He’d added the doc to his contacts but still managed to burn through precious time because he fumbled keying her name into the search bar. What was probably more like ten seconds felt like ten hours, and another ten passed while the phone rang…and rang…and rang. Sitting on the edge of the desk, he snuck a glance back at Lilah, only to find the chair where he’d put her empty. Mildly frantic, he twisted around and saw her standing by the wall a couple feet away, rubbing her lower back with one hand, resting the other atop her stomach, taking slow, deep breaths. He pointed at the chair. She shook her head. “I can talk to her.”

“You just sit down and try not to panic. I can handle—” The click of the call connecting forced him to let it go for the moment.

“Dr. Devan speaking.”

She was definitely on her cell and possibly on the road. He heard background sounds he feared indicated a moving vehicle. “Hey, it’s Ford. I think Lilah’s in labor. I mean, she thinks she’s in labor.”

“Okay. What’s driving that conclusion?”

Why the hell did everyone sound so fucking calm? “What’s driving that conclusion? Uh, her being pregnant and telling me the baby’s coming now.”

A sigh drifted over the line. “How far apart are the contractions?”

“Uh…”

“Has her water broken?”

“I think maybe—”

“Was the fluid clear and watery, or—?”

He pulled the phone away from his ear. “Uh…” He glanced at Lilah, then held the phone out. “She needs to talk to you.”

When she took it, he backed away, returned to sitting on the edge of his desk, contemplating the dark striations designed to mimic marble in the vinyl floor tiles and trying not to listen in on Lilah’s side of the conversation.

“Um, about ten minutes apart.”

Ten minutes? Was that fast? His heart stuttered. Should they boil water?

“Yes. It broke just now,” she said, and then, “No. Not a lot.”

He turned to look at her, but she had her back to him. How could she stand there so composed? Hell, how could she stand at all? Parts of him that were never going to birth a baby strongly protested the very concept, to the point his own legs felt unsteady. She suddenly looked over her shoulder and caught him watching her. “I don’t know,” she said into the phone. “I’d have to check.” With that, she bit her lip and stared at him.

An awkward silence stretched, and then it hit him. “Oh. I’ll just…step out.” He moved to the door, then hesitated over leaving her alone in her condition. “I’ll be right outside the door. Just holler if you need me.”

She nodded but fluttered her hand in a go motion. He went, pulling the door shut behind him. And waited. And waited. After an interminable five minutes, he raised his hand to knock on the door when it swung open.

Lilah looked up at him, a little flushed but otherwise reassuringly not seeming as if a small life was slowly attempting to push its way out of her body. While he took that in, his mouth proceeded on autopilot with a brisk, “What’s up?”

What’s up? Jesus Christ, you’ve lost your mind.

Incredibly, she laughed, proving beyond a shadow of a doubt that between the seasoned, Special Forces op trained to deal with do-or-die situations and the sheltered, twenty-one-year-old student and part-time waitress, she was the cooler under pressure. “You seem really nervous for someone whose been through this before.”

Been through this before? How had he been through this before? Oh. Mia. “Are you kidding? I didn’t even get called to the hospital until hours after Mia was born. This”—he gestured vaguely to her stomach—“is all new. So, what’s the plan?”

“Dr. Devan wants me to go over to the clinic.” While she spoke, Lilah handed him his phone. “She’s calling Beverly in to open up.”

“They’re not open?” He pocketed the phone and took a step back, turned right, then left—nowhere to go—and faced front again. “Why Beverly? Where’s the doc?” Stress sent his voice up in volume as he battered her with questions. Beverly Owatch manned the clinic’s front office, took vitals, administered vaccines to unenthusiastic kids, and could probably administer basic first aid. She was not an obstetrician.

Lilah raised a hand, palm up. “It’s Sunday.”

Right. Right. Of course, it would be. But Bev was around to open the clinic, so that problem was solvable. His mind circled back to the more nerve-wracking question. “Where’s Dr. Devan?”

“She’s…um…” Lilah bit her lip again. “Don’t freak out, all right?”

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