me,” Trina said, her contraction easing. “Please just get it over with. Where’s the doctor?”
“He’s coming,” the nurse said.
“I don’t believe it,” Trina said. “He’s eating donuts. Or banging someone in the closet,” she added. “Men are pigs,” she muttered, imagining what Walker Gordon was doing right now—drinking wine in some French bistro with a thin French woman or eating a croissant and delicious coffee for breakfast with a thin French woman. Depending on the time zone. Trina didn’t even know what time zone she was in right now.
“Miss Roberts,” a man said cheerfully as he swept into the room. “I’m Dr. Hanson. We met during one of your monthly office visits. Let me check your progress.”
Trina vaguely remembered the man. After two shift changes, they were all starting to look the same. He was happy, she noticed as every muscle in her body began to tighten in another contraction. For a fleeting second before the pain gripped her, she wondered if he’d been eating donuts or getting laid. The pain took her breath again and she grasped at his arm. “I need an epidural,” she begged. “Knock me out. Shoot me. Something,” she said.
“Really, darling,” her mother said in a chastising voice. “Where is your dignity?”
“Get her out of here,” Trina told the nurse in a voice that sounded as if she was possessed. Where had that voice come from? She felt her fingers pried loose from the doctor’s arm.
The doctor moved to check her. “You’re ready to push,” he said.
“What about my epidural?”
“It’s time for you to push. You don’t need an epidural.”
“Says who?” Trina asked, panic cutting through her. “I want an epidural. She promised me an epidural,” Trina said, pointing to the nurse.
“I promised that the doctor would be here soon,” she said.
The doctor flipped through her chart. “Did this patient take prepared childbirth classes?”
“Yes, but I didn’t practice the breathing because I knew I would get an epidural,” she said, her abdomen tightening again.
“Lean forward and push,” the nurse said, supporting Trina’s shoulders.
Trina did as she was instructed. She would do anything to get out of pain. It wasn’t labor. It was hell.
She continued to push for what had to be days. At some point, her mother was thrown out. Trina vaguely recalled a derogatory comment about how her hair looked.
Nurse Hatchett coached, “Just one more push.”
Big fat lie. One more meant a million more.
“I can’t do this much longer,” Trina said, out of breath and nearly out of energy.
“Sure you can. You’re almost there.”
“Are you sure it’s a baby?” Trina asked, wanting whatever it was to just get out of her. “Maybe the ultrasound was wrong and it’s a mule. Maybe it’s a beast. Or an alien. Or—”
Another contraction hit and she gave a scream as she pushed for all she was worth.
“Good girl,” the nurse said.
“The baby is crowning,” the doctor said.
“It’s human?” Trina asked, caught between delirium and excitement.
“Sure is,” the doctor said with a chuckle. “Give me another good push.”
“One or two more,” the nurse said. “And I really mean it this time. Watch the mirror.”
Trina pushed again, and had the odd sensation that she was going to split apart. She pushed through the sensation.
“Head’s out. Look at that hair,” the nurse said.
Trina glanced at the mirror and felt disconnected from the image of her body and the baby’s head. Still not completely birthed, the baby began to cry.
Trina watched in awe. “It’s crying.”
“Let me get the shoulders,” the doctor said and seconds later, he held her screaming baby in his hands. “It’s a girl.”
Relief and elation rushed through her. She couldn’t take her eyes off the baby. “It’s a girl. My baby’s a girl. She’s okay, isn’t she?”
The nurse weighed the baby, wiped her off, put a little socklike cap on her head, wrapped her in a blanket and handed her to Trina. “Eight pounds and eleven ounces.”
Trina’s heart overflowed at the sight of her baby, the weight of her in her arms. “You’re gorgeous,” she said. “You’re a sweetie pie and I’m going to make your life as happy as I possibly can and I won’t make you go to private girls’ school if you don’t want.”
She glanced up at the doctor and the nurse, who, she was sure, were angels in disguise. “Thank you so much,” she said, her eyes filling with tears. “Thank you.”
“My pleasure,” Nurse Beamer said.
“But I was a pain.”
“No more than most,” the nurse said with a smile. “I couldn’t wait to see you with your baby in your arms.”
Trina looked down at her baby and touched those tiny, tiny fingers. “I’m so glad I have you,” she whispered to her daughter. “But I never want to do this again, so I’m never ever going to have sex again.”
CHAPTER THREE
ONCE UPON A TIME Trina had been in control of her life. She’d successfully distanced herself from her overbearing mother and managed her romantic life so that she enjoyed casual dates, but nothing that interfered with her plan to remain single and free of domestic responsibility. Yes, there’s been a blip in keeping her love life under control by the name of Stan Roch when she’d been nineteen, but she’d taken care of that and put it behind her.
Once upon a time, although she normally kept her apartment neat and clean, she’d only been in charge of her own laundry and she only bought food she needed, which she could eat on her own schedule.
Once upon a time, she’d been on the fast track to her second promotion at the designer shoe company, Bellagio, Inc. She’d been someone management knew they could depend on to be prompt, levelheaded, poised and always ready with a brilliant idea.
All that had changed as a result of her temporary insanity fifteen months ago. As she rushed into her office late brushing food particles from her suit, she prayed no surprises would greet her.
“Good morning, Dora,” she said to the PR group’s assistant. “How are you? Any pressing messages?”
Dora, who Trina was convinced was determined to replace her, took a casual sip from her latte. “Yup. There’s a meeting with marketing for
