Chapter 3 - THE BIRTHDAY AND THE BLACKOUT
Yara answered my call on the first ring, but her voice was strained and breathless. She was already supporting another client through advanced, transition-stage labor across town. “I can’t leave her room, Imagin,” Yara apologized. “I’m so sorry.”
“I know. It’s okay,” I panted through a wave of pain.
“Text Sunny immediately. Just write now.”
I tapped out a quick text to Sunny. She answered within ten seconds: Deck B. I’m waiting at the sliding doors with a wheelchair. Breathe out longer than you breathe in, Emmy.
As I drove across the James River bridge, my phone lit up with a banner notification.
Mom: Don’t be dramatic. Call us when it’s real.
I flicked my thumb, swiped the notification away, and left it unanswered.
Twenty-eight minutes after leaving my parents’ driveway, I parked in the hospital parking deck. Sunny was standing right where she promised, holding a hospital wheelchair steady. She whisked me through triage without asking a single administrative question about my unsupportive family.
When the intake nurse clipped the plastic identification band around my wrist and asked for my emergency contact person, I didn't hesitate.
“Yara Quintanilla.”
“Is family on their way?” the nurse asked politely.
I looked up at Sunny standing beside my bed. “This is my family.”
Sunny firmly tightened the blood-pressure cuff around my upper arm, smiling fiercely. “Damn right she is.”
By ten o’clock that night, Yara had finished assisting her other client and rushed straight to my hospital room, bags under her eyes but a triumphant grin on her face. Sunny stayed past her scheduled shift, holding my hand and coaching me through the grueling hours of dilation.
At 5:48 AM on a crisp Monday morning, my daughter arrived into the world—loud, furious at the universe, and weighing a healthy seven pounds.
Dr. Ravenel lifted the squalling infant and laid her directly against my bare chest. “She’s absolute perfection, Imagin.”
I looked down at her tiny, crumpled red face, tracing her rosebud lips. “Matilda.”
Sunny picked up a black dry-erase marker at the hospital whiteboard. “Tilly what?”
I looked down at the hospital security band wrapped securely around my wrist. “Torrance.”
Sunny grinned broadly and wrote it down in bold letters.
My phone buzzed against the bedside table. Four missed calls from Raquel. A text message beneath them flashed on the screen: Mom says, “Are you actually at the hospital or playing games?”
Yara leaned over my shoulder, reading the text, her jaw tightening. “Do you want to answer them?”
May you like
I looked down at Matilda sleeping soundly and peacefully on my chest, her tiny chest rising and falling.
“Not today.”
