The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane(98)

“I’m just trying to see to your wife, sir,” the doctor says stiffly. “That kind of thing is not necessary.”

The contractions become more intense. Jin keeps saying, “Breathe, breathe, breathe,” because it’s something he’s seen in movies. I love him, but in the worst moments I rely on Deh-ja. She helps me into a squatting position. I feel very high on the bed. The doctor and nurses try to crowd in, but she elbows them out of the way.

“Remember what your a-ma said about the fish,” Deh-ja reminds me. “Just let your son slip out.”

One more push and wherp.

“Will you please let me see the baby?” the doctor begs. “I’d like to clear his airway.”

“Is it a boy?” I ask.

Jin answers, a big smile on his face. “Yes, it’s a boy.”

I edge away from the baby and ease myself back onto the mattress with my legs on either side of him. He’s covered with slime, of course, but he’s got a full head of black hair, his skin is pink and full of life, and between his legs are the three swollen things that will make me a grandmother one day. Deh-ja’s lips move as she silently counts: Ten toes, ten fingers, two arms . . .

“Will someone tell this woman to move?” the doctor demands.

Deh-ja doesn’t speak English, and Jin doesn’t know what must happen next.

“In a minute. Please,” I manage. “A baby is not truly born until it has cried three times.”

The doctor sighs and backs off a step.

With each of my baby’s strong wails, Deh-ja speaks the ritual words: “The first cry is for blessing. The second cry is for the soul. The third cry is for his life span.”

Then she motions for the doctor and nurse to come forward. He clips the umbilical cord and allows Jin to tie the string we brought below the clip. Then snip. A push and the friend-living-with-child comes out in an easy whoosh. Deh-ja hands me the heart-forget egg to eat, but already I’m forgetting the pains of childbirth. I feel tired but euphoric. The doctor takes my son to another table, where he and one of the nurses check his Apgar score. He’s perfect.

When I’m allowed to bring him to my breast, I whisper into his face. “The four great spirits are the sun, moon, sky, and earth, but you also must learn about the lesser spirits who guide the wind, lightning, waterfalls, lakes, and springs. Everything on earth has a soul, even a single rice kernel.”

Jin punches in the number for A-ba’s new cellphone and hands it to Deh-ja, who makes the announcement in Akha: “The family will have game to eat now,” meaning I’ve given birth to a son. A-ba’s hollers come all the way through the phone to my bed.

In the middle of the night, Jin goes down the hall to watch as our baby is circumcised by Dr. Katz, a pediatrician recommended to us because he sees lots of Chinese children. Two mornings later, we’re ready to be discharged, but we can’t leave the hospital until we’ve given a woman on staff a name to write on my baby’s birth certificate.

“Paul William Chang will be his American name,” Jin announces.

Baby Paul—wearing the cap I made—is tucked into his car seat, and we go home. Deh-ja follows us upstairs and into Jin’s and my room. He pulls back the covers and props up the pillows so I can rest on the bed with the baby. Deh-ja clucks and frets. But when Jin climbs on the bed next to me so we can gaze into our baby’s face together, she starts darting from one side of the room to the other in agitation.

“What’s wrong, Deh-ja?” Jin asks.

She refuses to look at Jin and sends her words to me in rapid Akha so he can’t possibly follow. “The rules say that a husband and wife may not sleep on the same mat together for ten cycles—one hundred and twenty days—because if you get pregnant again and another baby is born within a year, it will be considered . . .”

She’s so distraught she can’t finish the sentence. Remembering the taboo, I’m filled with sorrow for her. A baby born within a year of an older brother or sister is considered a twin.

“Deh-ja, come.” I pat the mattress, and she sits down reluctantly. “I understand your worry, but I’m not going to sleep apart from Jin.”

“What about the intercourse?” she whispers.

“I just had a baby!”

“Men are forbidden from trying to attempt the intercourse at this time for the reason you know and to give the wife time to recover in her parts,” she persists, “but a man is a man and ten cycles lasts a very long time . . .”

I smile. “Don’t worry. Jin and I will be fine.”

She finally relents . . . up to a point. She goes out for a walk and comes back with lengths of ivy ripped from Rosie’s yard. “I can’t find magic vine, so this will have to do.” She drapes the leafy strings on our front door and on the door to the nursery to bar baby-attacking spirits. After this, she shyly returns to my room. She pulls out from under her tunic a clear plastic bag with something red and squishy with a long eel-like thing floating inside.

“I took the friend-living-with-child when the man at the hospital wasn’t looking,” she practically crows.

“You stole my placenta?” I ask, which causes Jin to look up. My husband, who’s been brave throughout, goes as white as sand when she flops it carelessly on the bedside table.

“I’m going to bury it under the house, beneath where you keep the family altar. Your son can’t be separated from it! And don’t worry. I’ll take all the responsibility for watering it twice daily until it shrivels to nothing.”