“That means—” Mike sat down next to him, elbows on knees. “We gotta get there. Now.”
One of the firefighters shouted “Clear!” and Dylan knew from the response that he wasn’t needed; so many guys were here he’d just get in the way now.
“Yeah, we do. Can you drive?” A lump formed in Dylan’s throat at the simple request, so casual and assumed, like old times.
Mike looked down at his attire. It was November. “Can we stop by the apartment and let me grab something? Or—” Mike’s question carried so many layers of meaning. Four month’s worth.
Maybe a lifetime’s worth.
“Yeah. Sure. I’ll drive, then, and park the car at home.” They walked quietly toward the street until Mike grabbed Dylan’s arm. “Hey, Dyl?”
“What?” Exhaustion was creeping in. He didn’t have it in him to argue.
“I’m so sorry.” The embrace was the last thing he expected. And then—“Thank you for saving her.”
“Them.”
Mike pulled back, confused. His face cleared and he raked his hair, shaking his head. “Them. Right. Hoo boy.”
“Hoo boy? Hoo girl?” Dylan responded, the knee-jerk joke so inappropriate he cringed. Couldn’t turn it off, even in crisis.
Mike’s answer came as an afterthought as the two split to their respective vehicles, both running, seeming to communicate without words. “Who knows?” he shouted, the joke capturing Dylan’s heart and carrying him forward, hopeful, as they raced to their future.
Chapter Eight
A fireball was in her crotch, pushing hard, so hard, to come out. Laura couldn’t breathe, scratching at her neck, trying to claw open her trachea to get air, air, air. Oxygen was gone, her throat spasming as her vagina split open, divided in two, and out came an enormous, glowing-orange sphere, shooting across the surgical room and catching the wall on fire.
Screaming, she opened her eyes to find a nurse pushing buttons on some sort of box, a man in scrubs holding her arm down, and six very worried eyes watching her from a few feet away.
Eyes she knew.
She was on her left side and the nurse had her face in both hands, eyes boring into her. “Laura! Laura! I need you to breathe slowly, to focus. We can’t find the baby’s heartbeat— ”
Baby! Heartbeat!
“—and the more you panic, the harder it is to get the monitor hooked back up.”
Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale. The nurse took her through the motions, and Laura calmed down. Inhale— and she heard more breaths. Her eyes slowly focused and found Josie, Dylan and Mike standing in a line behind the nurse, all expanding their diaphragms when she inhaled, and whooshing out air when she exhaled.
It was kind of creepy.
Buh bum buh bum buh bum buh bum buh bum buh bum, the machines spat out, the sound of little horse hooves a huge relief to everyone in the room. “There she is!” the nurse crowed, reading the numbers. “One forty. Just where we want her.”
“Where am I?” Laura asked, her condition sinking in. Hospital? IV? Baby monitor? What had happened? Oh, God. The fire. Her apartment. Sitting up, hearing the alarms, people thumping and the rush of fear that made her just hide. She had just started to slide out from under the covers as Dylan shouted for her, mind remembering the baby and helping to override the bizarre panic she’d been stuck in.
Freezing, just like she had when her grandparents had died in the fire in their house the summer she lived with them—
“The fire!” she shouted, then coughed uncontrollably. The horse hooves ramped up suddenly, nurse frowning.
Dylan came to the end of the bed and rested a hand on her foot. “It’s OK. You’re safe now.”
She struggled to sit up, the nurse’s hands going to her shoulder and hip, pressing. “Please stay where you are, Laura. We’re still not sure why you lost consciousness and we need to make sure you rest on your left side.”
“Why?”
“Better blood flow throughout your body,” Josie piped up. One look of assurance from her was all Laura needed; Mike added his gentle touch to Dylan’s, taking the other foot, and the horse hooves went from a racing gallop to a steady canter.
“Much better,” the nurse said, soothing voice meant to praise. “You guys have a magic touch.”
Yes, they do, Laura thought, her belly tensing suddenly. “What’s that?” One of the monitors began beeping.
“A mild contraction,” the nurse answered. “You’ve had a handful since they brought you in a few hours ago.”
“Contraction!” she rasped. “I’m only nineteen weeks along! I can’t—” Why had she frozen? What kind of mother doesn’t get a fight or flight response the second her baby is in danger? Fear had kept her in hiding in her closet that night twenty years before, staying until it was too late for grandma and grandpa, a firefighter finding her and carrying her down a long ladder from her second-story window. Of all the nights to have a sleepover with them; her mother had never been the same and, in some ways, it had killed her, too, to lose her parents like that.