Despite the wait for the baby to want to come, the delivery was a swift one.
“I don’t understand,” Kalina said as her contractions started in earnest.
I carried her to the closest guest room, near where the doctor was staying. Because Kalina was overdue, we had the doctor here, on call, just in case.
“They all told me that first pregnancies would take a long time!” She cringed through another contraction as I set her in bed.
“Not necessarily,” the doctor said as she hurried into the room.
Raisa stayed with me as the doctor and a nurse set everything up. We’d had experience with deliveries here in the mansion, and equipment was on hand. Sadie had given birth to her second daughter, Josephine, just a couple of months back. I bet the doctor felt like this was her private practice.
“Every pregnancy is different,” the doctor said while hooking up monitors to her belly. The nurse moved with efficiency to getready for the birth. “And every delivery is different too,” the doctor quipped. “I’m just going to see how dilated—whoa.”
“What?” Kalina sat up more and furrowed her brow. “Whoa? What does that mean?”
“The baby’s crowning.” The doctor smiled, busy preparing. “Are yousureyou haven’t been having contractions?”
“I don’t know!” she cried loudly before bearing down for another contraction. Once it passed, and the doctor and nurse conferred and prepared between themselves, Kalina winced at me and held my hand tighter. “I don’t know how any of this works. I thought they were just cramps. Or gas. Or—” She gritted her teeth through another contraction.
“You’ve got this, Kalina. You are doing fine,” I coached her, unsure of what else to say. Elena had delivered Misha via a C-section, and I hadn’t gotten to the hospital quickly enough to be present for it.
“All right, I need a good, big push with that next contraction,” the doctor said.
A few more times, she asked her for another push. Right when Kalina grimaced and shook her head as if she wasn’t sure she could do it, I held her hand and gave my arm to grab and squeeze through the pain.
“Good job, Mama,” the doctor announced as the baby was born.
Our baby.
The one who’d helped us to come together in a love that would last forever.
“Oh, Alexsei…” Kalina laughed. Cried. Smiled. And cooed through the exhaustion. It was a mix of reactions, but once the doctor handed the baby to her so she could rest with the infant, she gave me the proudest smile. A deeply content one. “A boy,” she said in awe. “A beautiful baby boy.”
I leaned over to peer at the baby’s face, loving him with just that first look.
My son.
Another boy to love and raise.
Misha’s brother.
“I love you, sweetheart,” I told Kalina. Pressing a kiss to the top of her head, right on her sweaty hair, I closed my eyes and committed the pure joy of the occasion to memory. Tears slipped from my eyes at the miracle of this child, of this strong woman who’d completed me and my family.
“I love you, too,” she replied softly as she endured the rest of the delivery.
I held the baby once the doctor asked for her to focus on getting cleaned up, and Raisa held Kalina’s hand through the rest of it all. While I let the cousins have a moment, talking quietly with sweet smiles, I held my second son and grinned at his little face.
Admiring him, I let the thrill of this second chance at love consume me.
Nothing could beat this feeling of meeting a new member of the family, this new start of a whole new person and soul.
Gabriella led Misha in once we called out that the room was clear and that Kalina was ready to be visited. I planned to staggereveryone else from coming in and overwhelming her, but Misha had the right to meet his sibling first.
“Is that the baby?” he asked me as he walked in.
“Come meet your baby brother, Misha.” I sat down so he could see him.
“Oh, my God!” he whispered, full of awe as he came close. “He’s so pink!”
