Total pages in book: 197
Estimated words: 199143 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 996(@200wpm)___ 797(@250wpm)___ 664(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 199143 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 996(@200wpm)___ 797(@250wpm)___ 664(@300wpm)
So, here they were with a midwife, a doula, her mother, and the other women of their family with her for the birth. Something that would never be possible in a hospital considering they only seemed to allow two people maximum in the birthing suites. So, a home birth it was with all the bells and whistles Haven wanted.
Andino’s anxiety was through the roof.
What if something went wrong?
What if they needed help?
What if—
“Everything is looking fine in there,” said a familiar man as he stepped out the back door, and took the vacant chair next to Lucian.
Next to the midwife Haven wanted, Andino also got the doctor he wanted. However, the man was only allowed in the kitchen occasionally to check on the progression of things and make sure everything was fine. If something seemed off, or Haven changed her mind about this whole birth plan at any point in time, then they would take her to a hospital with the doctor en route.
Although, this was Haven’s first birth. According to the midwife, and the doctor, everything seemed fine. Haven wasn’t high risk—her pregnancy progressed entirely normal, and so did her labor thus far. Nothing screamed dangerous except for the fact that this wasn’t the norm ... or what he always considered the norm for a birth being they weren’t in the usual hospital setting. But lots of women gave birth at home, so it should be perfectly fine. Or, that’s what everyone kept telling him whenever he voiced his concerns.
That helped his anxiety.
Slightly.
“And she’s asked for you,” the man added. “You should hurry, she’s getting ready to push.”
Andino nodded. “Thanks.”
Pushing away from the banister, Andino felt his father’s hand land to his shoulder with a supportive pat. Inside the house, he followed the back hallway to the front, and then he lingered just beyond the doorway of the kitchen to appreciate the scene inside.
The women surrounding his wife.
The silence.
Leaning over the edge of the pool that had been set up in the middle of the kitchen floor where their island usually rested—it was now pushed to the far end of the kitchen, entirely out of the way—Haven’s doula nodded to whatever his wife had just said. The midwife, bent down to peer into the water grinned when she straightened up.
His mother smiled wide.
His cousins ... happy.
His aunts, waiting.
All these women ... all of them who had been through this very thing. Or experienced it in one way or another. And he kind of understood then, in Haven’s pain as she let out a hard breath, and reached for her mother’s outstretched hand, why she wanted this energy here.
Instead of a hospital, with beeping monitors, and doctors and nurses coming in and out whom she didn’t know and wouldn’t understand her ... he finally truly understood why this had been the energy in the room that she wanted when their daughter was born. The women in this room were—by far—some of the strongest he had ever known.
His mother, shamed and shunned by her own family, still came out on top.
His aunts—one who came from nothing, disabused and who had every reason to fail, survived and thrived; and his other aunt, who also came from nothing, was the definition of self-made, and who could rival her own husband for the most dangerous person in the room.
His cousins ... women who battled their own demons.
Haven’s mother, a cancer survivor.
These women were everything that strength encompassed. It was powerful. Women were powerful. And men were nothing without them.
Including him.
“There you are,” the midwife said, waving a hand to encourage Andino into the kitchen, “come look, and see how close we are.”
We.
Not just Haven.
Because she wasn’t doing it alone.
Birth was a process.
An experience.
And it was better shared.
For some.
Andino came into Haven’s view, and she was already reaching for him. Hair damp, and pushed back, gaze hazy from pain but still so clear with what was close and coming faster with every passing second. His hand found hers, and the two of them suddenly became the only people in the room when their stares met.
“Love you,” he told her.
Haven nodded, her throat jumping with a swallow. “So much, Andino.”
Lynn Marcello made her way into the world—into her father’s waiting hands—at three-oh-four in the afternoon on a Saturday. She was perfect. Her father cried.
And a whole army of women greeted her.
A whole legacy of women loved her.
Snaps the Reindeer
Clicking between the photos on the screen of his laptop, Andino surveyed the damage that had been bound to happen. The raid on Chinatown, an effort put forth by a task force meant to keep the sale of counterfeit goods at a minimum in New York, ended up putting a major dent into a good portion of John’s business on his side of the city. Of course, Andino had a guy with a crew in Chinatown distributing fake—and stolen, real goods—for sale but the main Marcello operation hadn’t taken nearly as bad of a hit as John had.