She stares down at the paper—with markings of high hills and drastic dips—rolling out of the printer. Baritone beats thump with an occasional note dropped. She’s making decisions about our fate that very second.
“It’s not good, right?” I ask to be polite, but I already know the answer.
Dr. Sun keeps her eyes on the tracing monitor. “There’s been decels for too long, and you’ve been in labor for twenty-four hours.” She turns to me, “So we probably need to do a c-section, like right now.”
I wanted to tell her it had been precisely twenty-six, not twenty-four hours since my labor started, and I’ve been awake for every minute of it. My cervix had barely nudged when the elderly partner of Dr. Sun started me on a small dose of Pitocin and told me to “just get some sleep and relax, dearie.” The heart monitor is strapped across my belly so tight that it leaves a mark like I’m branded beef cattle. Fetal heartbeats pound through the room’s sound system. Oh God, how did I get here?
Nurses file into my tiny room and hurriedly push my bed towards the slaughterhouse. I have two capable legs, but I’m not allowed to walk.
“You feel ok?” Dr. Sun glances at me while scribbling orders into my chart.
If you mean I’m ok with getting chopped up like steak tartare? Then yeah, I’m feeling swell.
“At least you don’t have to push!” she smiles. The smooth skin of her face is fresh and clean. Her cheeks are pink from running back to Labor and Delivery from the cafeteria, and I can smell roasted almonds on her breath. Her tummy is flat, and she sparkles like a cheerleader.
I’m not in control of anything.
After I’m wheeled into the operating room, the anesthesiologist sits to the left of my head and adjusts bags of saline and pain medicine. My empty stomach is greasy, and I can’t remember when I last ate. I can’t remember a time when I had no choice. The drugs kick in; I dream of sliced ham at the grocery deli counter. Silver scalpels. Oysters on ice. Wide retractors. Buttery fat oozing from layers under my belly button.
I lean over and vomit a tsunami of bile over my shoulder, missing the anesthesiologist by a foot. He turns his bald head towards me and looks startled—thin vomit drips down my grinning cheeks. I provide the anesthesiologist with a second vomit, and soon, Dr. Sun pulls a baby out of my innards like a celebratory pot roast from a burning oven.
A nurse swaddles the baby tight in a pink blanket. Swaddle your baby like a burrito, the parenting books preach… but the books don’t teach you everything. Her small face is compressed as a clam, and her curly black hair peeks out from under a cotton cap. Then, suddenly, she squeezes her eyes shut, and the bleating sound of a thousand sheep comes out of her mouth.
Lordy, please find me a book that will tell me what to do next.