MacKenzie Fire(41)

A loud moo in the center grabs my attention back. “She’s having a baby out here in the snow? In the mud?”

“Yep. Can’t stop Mother Nature.”

He starts to walk again.

“Are you sure we can go that close?” I’m holding onto both his hand and his arm with an iron grip. My purse bangs against my leg.

“Yep. She might need some help. She knows me, though. She’ll be fine.”

I start a whispered chant without really thinking about it. “Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god … this is crazy, this is crazy, this is crazy …” I slip a few times, but Ian’s as solid as a brick house. I just hang onto him for dear life, and before I know it, we’re standing just feet away from her, and my butt is still dry. It’s some kind of Christmas miracle.

The cow is standing too.

“Doesn’t she want to lie down?” I ask. Her sides are heaving and she looks really uncomfortable.

“Yeah, just watch.”

About a minute later, the cow moves down to her knees and then flops down onto her side. Something is sticking out of her back end. Something … gooey. And big.

“Oh, my … that’s gross.”

“Shhhhh, just wait.”

I’m not sure how much time passes, but however long it is, I spend the entire period feeling sorry for that cow. Andie was right. The only way to do this whole birth thing is in a warm hospital bed with nurses and doctors standing all over the place with blankets. I can’t feel my toes or my fingers anymore.

The cow stands when I think it couldn’t be possible because she has this giant thing hanging out of the back end of her, and then this big blob just slides out. The baby falls right out onto the ground, a white sheet of something I-don’t-want-to-know-what covering its face. It lies there in the snow not moving.

“Come on, come on…” Ian sounds worried.

“What’s wrong?” I look from his face to the cow. The baby still isn’t doing anything. In fact, if I hadn’t seen it come out of the mother cow, I wouldn’t even know it was a cow. It looks like a giant, gooey alien on the ground.

“Quick!” he says in a loud whisper. “Get the towels out of the back seat!” He takes off towards the cow and leaves me standing there.

I want to ask him a thousand questions, but I don’t. Instead, I go as fast as I can through the snow drifts back to the truck. I only fall once trying to get inside.

There’s a stack of old-looking towels neatly folded on the seat. Grabbing them, I struggle to turn around and find Ian again.

He’s kneeling next to the calf, wiping muck off its face. The mother cow is licking the baby’s back legs, but it’s not having any effect that I can see.

I think my heart has turned into a lump of iron, it feels so heavy in my chest. The baby definitely looks dead. “Oh my god,” I whisper as it settles into my brain that I could be witnessing the death of a newborn baby. “No, no, no, no, nooo!” I sound like I’m crying. I can’t get there fast enough. It’s like one of those nightmares where I have to run in deep water. “Ian! I’m coming!”

I face-plant into the snow, landing on the towels. Getting up as quickly as I can, I take them into my arms again, letting the bottom one drop a little so I can try and shake off the snow that’s clinging to it.

As I get closer to the cow it becomes easier to walk. The animals have trampled down the ground and turned it mostly to muck. But now I’m afraid there’s a bull around ready to hook me with his horns.

“Come on, stop dinking around!” Ian’s waving me over with his arm going in big circles.

“Where are the bulls?”

“There are no bulls out here, they’re all cows. Come on!”

I see some horns, but instead of arguing, I run over with tiny steps, trying to minimize my chances of biting the dust again. Ian grabs the top towel from my arms as soon as I’m close enough and starts rubbing the calf all over with it.

“Come on, do it,” he demands. “Rub!”

I drop the towels on the ground and take one, moving over to the other side of the baby cow. “Just rub?” I ask, moving closer.

“Rub. Stimulate her. Wake her up.”

I put the towel on her butt and start rubbing. Tears are sliding down my cheeks as I feel her lifeless body wiggle beneath my hands. “She’s a girl?” I ask. All I can think about is baby Sarah in the hospital.

“Yeah, she’s a girl, I think. Come on, girl, wake up. Wake up. Breathe, you can do it.”

I start rubbing with two hands. Her little body squishes around with our combined movements. “Come on, baby cow, wake up!” I say, trying to talk around my tears. “Don’t you dare die. No cows die on my watch, you hear me! No cows die!”

The mother lets out a moo that just breaks my heart. She leans down, takes one more lick of the baby, and then walks away.

“She’s leaving!” I cry, freaking out over the idea.

“Just keep rubbing,” Ian says, focusing on the baby.

I crawl in the mud and snow up to the calf’s head and rub around its ears and eyes and nose. “Come on baby, cow. Don’t you dare die.”

Then a flash of memory comes to me, and I pause as I consider it. There was this guy once on Youtube and this baby deer that needed resuscitation on the side of the road …