![]() ![]() Like storm clouds gathering, dark thoughts of what might be ahead filled her mind. Could she walk to the hallway door in this state? But she had an overwhelming urge to start pushing. The last time Rachel had checked Lovina’s progress, she’d barely dilated to five centimeters. Even the sharp ears of a midwife wouldn’t have heard that, especially not over the commotion of a kitchen fire. “Rachel?” Her usually strong voice came out as a mere whisper. She grabbed the rails of the birthing bed, panting and trembling as she squeezed the warm metal mercilessly. She didn’t understand.Īnother hard contraction engulfed her. This was her sixth baby, and each birth had been easier than the one before…until this time. Lovina’s head swam from exhaustion and the muddled thoughts of a woman who’d taken something for pain-although she couldn’t recall what. Perhaps she was down the hallway of the birthing center, delivering the other woman’s baby. Maybe Rachel never made it to the shanty. Isaac was trying to put out the kitchen fire, and Rachel was going to the phone shanty to call the fire department. Her husband and the midwife had left her about ten minutes ago. ![]() ![]() She eyed a door in the bedroom that led outside. Fear threatened to steal Lovina’s ability to obey her husband’s departing words to stay put. Gnarled fingers of smoke seeped under the closed door of the old house. ![]()
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