Chapter 41

It had been almost ten months since the launch of the first Atlas rocket to Venus. Emily and Harold had been as happy as ever. Emily looked as if she had robbed a sporting goods store and taken the loot out under her shirt. She was very pregnant. It is hard to be sort of pregnant. It is easy to be starting to show, or so and so weeks pregnant. Emily was none of these, she was ready to burst and just fed up with the whole thing. It was about ten o'clock in the evening and Harold had given up on reading and was just about to fall asleep when she poked him in the ribs.

"Harold."

"Yes." He was a tad bit groggy.

"Harold, you know how I haven't been sleeping too well the last few days. Well I don't think tonight is going to get any better."

"Why not? Aren't you tired?"

"Not really, and I think that the pizza was either bad or we are at the end of a long journey." She was sitting up now and grimacing.

Harold was unusually dense this evening. "What kind of journey sweetie?" He looked at her and saw her grimace and then relax. "Oh?" Well I'll go get the bags and some junk food. He jumped up, drove one toe into the foot of the bed, grimaced as the sensation of partially crushed bone and skin made it to his brain and then hopped out of the bed room on one foot. Emily just sat there with her watch and her little sarcastic smile. A smile that well hid the major pain emanating from her nether regions. A pain that some fool, obviously a male fool, had described as a cramp-like sensation. Cramp, get real, this ain't no stinking cramp. A cramp is something you get when you walk a bit to far. This is a pain. It gets full credit as a pain. A pain that really should be described as a major internal organ being ripped from your body by wild animals, or maybe a wrecking ball, repeatedly and periodically over a day or two. She stood up and waddled to the closet. Dressed in a most attractive shirt and pants outfit that covered her dual career as a basketball smuggler poorly, she walked out the door of the bedroom toward the car.

Harold was scurrying around like a chicken with its head cut off. He had the video camera bag, he had her suit case, he had the cooler with lunch, he had the still camera bag, he jumped in the car. "Oops! Emily, We need Emily". Back into the house he scurryied. He helped Emily into the car. Then "Oops. Pants, I probably need pants". Back to the bedroom then back to the car. "Glasses and a coat". Back to the car. "Lock the house." Back to the car. He was running back and forth. Finally on the second to last trip to the car. Emily pointed at his unbuttoned shirt. That fixed, it was back to the house to check to see if it was locked. And then. The car starts and blammo a smashing sound from the rear of the car.

"Harold, why don't you open the garage door?"

"Details, details."

The streets were empty and that was a good thing. Harold was not at his best. Emily just sat there and hoped the old station wagon would make it. They made great time to the hospital. He dropped her at the door and left the car running. He took her inside to the registration desk and then remembered the car. He scurried out, parked the car, scurried back only to find the nurse filling out a bunch of stupid forms. He had seen it a million times before but it still irked him. Nine months to fill out all these forms and you have to do it tonight. Like they really need to know your social security number, your place of birth, and your mothers maiden name to provide medical care. They could have gotten this information months ago. They just want to test your patience, that's why they call them patients anyway. He could imagine a guy with ten bullet wounds in his chest, bleeding profusely, tilting toward that part in the movies where they cough up blood and choke out their last few words. In the modern scenario, a clerk would ask the dying hero for his social security number, place of birth, and mothers maiden name, his last gasp would allow him to blurt out not his love for the heroine, or his mother, but rather enough information to fully fill out the insurance form. They finally got on the elevator and were whisked up to the fifteenth floor. Another nurse, another round of forms. Social security number, place of birth, mother's maiden name. If you are going to charge a ridiculous amount of money for a woman to be allowed to perform a natural process, while a lot of tired doctors watch, you need to get her billing information before you let her get on with it. Then finally go to the waiting room. Like what were we doing in the last five rooms?

"What do you mean we have to decide if we are going to keep her? I married her, I am going to keep her. Oh, you mean in the hospital? Well they are two minutes apart. Oh, well you go ahead and check."

Emily was at five centimeters and the resident decided to keep her. They were shown a beautiful room with a view of San Francisco. One hundred and eighty degrees of view from fifteen stories up on top of a hill. You could see fifty kilometers. Well, Harold could. Emily was bent over double in pain. She could see about three inches in front of her face. They could have been in a Motel 6 just north of no where for all she cared. She tried the breathing crap. Each time one of those cramps from hell came, she panted just like a dog in the sun. By the time she was in her room, she looked at Harold with anger. It was as if a hideous psychotic creature had inhabited the body of his wife.

"Harold!" It was more a scream than a request. "Enough of this natural childbirth shit. I want drugs. Get rid of this pain or I will personally rip your testicles from your body with my bare hands."

"Epidural?"

"EPIDURAL NOW!"

"Yes dear." He walked out in the hall and found the anesthesia resident. It took about fifteen minutes. Emily was smiling, Harold still had his genitals, and the bupivacaine and fentanyl was marinating her epidural space. Suddenly the woman he had married was back and the discussion had changed to when to have the next one. She was laughing and back to baseline.

Harold knew it wasn't over but the tenseness had gone from his voice. They turned on Letterman and Harold checked the cooler he brought from home. By the time Letterman had gone through his stupid pet tricks and the late, late movie was over, the pain had returned. Emily was topped up at 9 centimeters. It was always amazing that you could measure something that accurately but the OB's always thought they could. They used the old micrometer fingers.

The nurse left the two of them alone. Harold kept watching the tocodynometer so the labor nurse only came in to make a few notes in the chart. By four am, it was pushing time. Lots of grunting. Lots of gooey, slippery yuck. Very little bonding. The nurse quickly realized that they were not the bonding types. Harold looked at the sweaty, tired beat-up lady he had brought in and realized it was not really woman's finest hour. He had lots of video footage of grunting when little Robert finally made his appearance. He looked like a cone head, startled by the light and sound but all was well. All was fine. Harold thought to himself but had the good sense not to mention that, it's good they make em slippery or they'd never come out. He almost asked Emily about skid marks but decided not to. She looked totally beat. They relaxed in the room with young Robert in her arms for a couple of hours before being shuttled to another room. Harold began the rounds of calling.

Chapter 42

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