The Two-Family House(20)

“Shh, shh.” Helen was next to Rose, patting her back, trying to calm her, but it had the opposite effect. Rose didn’t want to be comforted. She didn’t want to be brave. She wanted to pound her fists on the floor and scream at the world. And after that she wanted to ride in a shiny white ambulance to the hospital. She pushed herself up off the chair and left the bedroom again. “I’m calling the hospital myself,” she hissed.

“I’m telling you, I already called.”

“I don’t care what you already did!” Rose no longer recognized her own voice, but she couldn’t make herself stop screaming. Something she couldn’t name or control was fueling her fury, pushing her wrath past every boundary she had ever set for herself. When she got to the kitchen, the phone had no dial tone. She hung it up and tried again, jiggling the receiver frantically. Again and again she tried, but it was no use.

Helen and Judith came running after her, but Rose could only stare past them, stony and unblinking. “The phone is dead. I’m going to have to walk.”

Judith was aghast. “You can’t walk to the hospital. It’s almost two miles away!”

“It’s not that far.”

Helen tried to reason with her. “There’s a blizzard outside—the wind would knock you over, and the snow is up to your waist!” Helen took her by the arm and led her to the window. “Look at it out there. Rose, look. You can’t walk for two miles in that! You could get frostbite, you could fall down, you could collapse!”

Rose wouldn’t believe Helen or Judith. She wouldn’t. She had to stay focused. She had to get to the hospital to have the baby. If she had him at home and something went wrong, Mort would never speak to her again. If something happened to the baby, Mort would never, ever forgive her.

“I can do it. I’ll just bundle up.”

“Listen to me,” Helen pleaded. “Before the phone went dead I spoke to Dr. Blauner’s nurse. I’ve been trying to tell you. There’s a midwife they know. The nurse said she’s excellent. She delivered a baby this afternoon a few doors down from here, and she stayed there because of the storm. The nurse gave her our address. She’s going to try to get here, she’s going to try to come soon.”

Rose shook her head no. How could she make Helen understand? She had to get to the hospital. She had to have this baby in a place that smelled like antiseptic and bleach, a place that was safe and clean, with official forms to fill out and nurses in uniform. She wanted the comfort of cold metal stethoscopes pressed against her back and hospital beds with stiffly starched sheets. She needed to see doctors in white coats walking the long linoleum hallways. Nothing else would be acceptable.

“I’ve decided,” she told Helen. “I’m walking to the hospital. And you’re coming with me.”

“I can’t, Rose. I can’t.” Rose didn’t know if it was from anger or exhaustion, but suddenly the color went out of Helen’s face. A grimace passed over Helen’s lips and she reached backward for the wall to steady herself. For reasons Rose couldn’t comprehend in that moment, a puddle seemed to be collecting around her sister-in-law’s feet. Everything Rose knew of women and childbirth was gone from her head, and in her grief and her fear she stared, incredulous, at the wet patch on the floor. “What is that?” she wondered aloud.

Helen answered her back in as gentle a voice as she could muster under the circumstances. “Rosie,” she said, “my water just broke.”





Chapter 16





JUDITH


It always bothered Judith that she never learned the midwife’s name. When she thought about that night, whether it was a few months, ten years or twenty years later, the details were always uncertain. She should have found out the woman’s name. If she had, maybe the other features of that evening would have stayed with her more sharply. If she had, she might have been able to track the midwife down to ask what really happened. But she hadn’t.

In contrast to the time she spent in the midwife’s company, Judith remembered the hours leading up to her arrival with perfect clarity. She had a vivid mental picture of her mother, hysterical and angry, screaming about hospitals and taxis. She remembered packing pajamas and dolls for Mimi and Dinah, and bringing them upstairs so the girls would have what they needed for the sleepover with their cousins. Harry had been so unpleasant that night, speaking to her in his condescending way about how he was the one who should stay with their mothers and she was the one who should be baby-sitting. “But your mother said I have to stay with them,” she told him.

“You’re lying!” Harry screamed at her, pushing past her and rushing down the steps because he had to hear with his own ears the reason he hadn’t been chosen. If Harry had stayed, maybe he would have found out the midwife’s name, Judith thought. Maybe he would have paid more attention.

He returned a few minutes later, humbled, but still trying to act like he was in control. “My mother says I should baby-sit the others because I’m the oldest and the most responsible,” he muttered. “You can go back down now.” He waved his hand to dismiss her. It was maddening, but Judith still felt sorry for him. She knew he was as worried as she was, so she hadn’t told him about the little speech Aunt Helen had given her just half an hour earlier. “He can’t be here, Judith. This is no place for any man, let alone a thirteen-year-old boy. Men can’t handle this sort of thing. Believe me, I’ve had four children. They’re too squeamish to be helpful. They either get in everyone’s way or wind up in a corner somewhere sitting with their head between their knees. We don’t need that kind of aggravation.”