CHAPTER THIRTY

The Third Christian

When I got to Trinity’s townhouse, she was on the floor in the living room. Her phone was out of her reach. Suddenly, I was grateful that I’d sold myself as a person with a medical background.

“Sorry, Trinity. I know this is awkward, but I need to help you.” I checked her eyes, checked her pulse, pulled her skirt up, and pulled her panties down.

“Holly,” she groaned. “I… wasn’t expecting this.”

I checked out the situation between her legs. I was not a doctor, but I had read about the process (and many others) out of curiosity. She was already ten centimeters dilated and completely ready to give birth, but there wasn’t enough room. The pressure of the baby’s head was going to make her tear. If she tore badly… I needed to cut her in order to control the tear. If she bled too much… How much blood could she lose?

It looked terrible.

“I’ll get a knife,” I said, snapping my head up.

“A knife?” Trinity screamed.

I grabbed her hands in mine. She crushed them in hers. “Have you called an ambulance?”

She shook her head and screamed. “No!”

“We can’t wait for an ambulance. You need an episiotomy. Where’s your candle lighter?”

She pointed to the fake mantle and the box on top. I rushed to gather supplies, but when I dropped to my knees, she had already begun to tear and the amount of blood leaking from her took my breath away.

She’s going to die, I suddenly realized. How could I stop the bleeding and deliver the baby at the same time? I didn’t know. What I’d read on the subject wasn’t enough to cover this moment.

I stripped a pillowcase and even though I had practiced meditating with my eyes open, I had never dived into the Red Forest with my eyes wide open, but I had to try. Just like that, one half of me treated Trinity and the other half entered my Red Forest. Part of me stood at the door of Christian’s heart while another part soothed Trinity and blotted her blood.

King Christian stood in the doorway that led to the second chamber. Holding onto the top of the door frame, he said, “Call an ambulance.”

“There isn’t time!” I wailed.

“I can’t order her cells any more than you can. It’s not just that she’ll bleed to death, her baby could die too if you don’t get some help. You should have called one yourself while you were on your way over.”

“I should have,” I shouted back, “but I thought she would have already called. I thought it wouldn’t be this bad. I didn’t think at all!” I pushed past him. “Get out of my way!”

He stepped aside and I ran ahead to the chamber where Doctor Christian was strung up by his fist.

Trinity was screaming, her tear was ripping deeper.

I burnt the edge of the knife in my hand. Her baby wasn’t coming out without more room.

In the third room, Doctor Christian hung the way he always did, over the water with his fist tight around the rope. With my toes on the edge of the pool, I could reach him. I had tried prodding him before, but not like this. I was screaming too, I was shouting that I needed help, that Trinity needed him, that I needed him. Soon, he was swinging like Tarzan over the pool, but his eyes were still closed. When he got close enough to me, I grabbed his hand and tried to pull him down.

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Nothing was working: not my screams, not what I said, and not my pulling.

I jumped on him.

I nicked Trinity in three places as carefully as I could.

She screamed and cried like Death himself had arrived in the room. I muttered soothing things to her, while internally I screamed like I’d die at Doctor Christian, who couldn’t hear me.

The cuts weren’t enough. Her baby was not coming through. Had she stopped pushing?

Trinity’s cries faded as she fainted.

Finally, I did something I’d never tried before, I leaped onto Christian. I grabbed onto his waist, and keeping my toes just above the water in the pool, I climbed up onto his shoulders. With my legs wrapped around his head and all my weight bearing down on his shoulders, I could finally reach his fingers that held the rope.

I was through with panicking. I was through with screaming. I needed his help and I was going to get it. I was going to make him give me his help. What he wanted wasn’t important anymore. He couldn’t stay asleep and withhold his help from me any longer.

I reefed on his fingers and one by one, under the pressure of my will, they came loose.

Before I got the last one free, his eyes opened all white with no iris in them at all. He was blind.

And then we fell.

The baby cried.

We fell together into the pool. I hit the water and was thrown out of the Red Forest just as I had been when I delivered the sword.

The baby’s head was out. I grasped at it. Holding its neck and head as carefully as I could, I eased its shoulders out.

Trinity had stopped bleeding. I knew without a doubt that Doctor Christian had done it. The terrible tear and all the knicks I had made were healed.

I grabbed a throw blanket that was hanging over a chair and wrapped her baby in it. It was a girl. I set her down between Trinity’s legs, the umbilical cord still leading the way to the undelivered placenta, and checked Trinity’s pulse with my bloody fingers.

Everything was fine. All the hard parts were finished.

I put a hand over my mouth and tried to steady my breathing. I found my phone and called 911.

After I hung up the phone, I saw Trinity was awake—only just. “Beth?” she mumbled as she looked at me.

The pinched feeling had left my face, which meant I had forgotten to keep my face like Holly’s. I hadn’t even noticed. I had been so caught up in delivering her baby. Immediately, I pulled my face back into the shape of Holly’s.

“It’s a girl,” I said, refusing to answer her question. “Hang on. I’ll bring her up, so you can see her.”

Trinity didn’t ask any more questions about me, since I was placing her first-born daughter in her arms.

Luckily, Brighton made it home three minutes before the ambulance arrived. I spoke to the paramedics and saw Trinity and her baby bundled off in the ambulance before I went back to my townhouse and washed up.

My apricot dress was toast. I didn’t even think about ordering the matter to clean itself off me. Instead, I tied my hair up and got in the shower. After a good scrubbing, I changed into some comfortable clothes: jeans and a long-sleeved pullover. Putting on a coat and very sensible shoes, I prepared to go back to the hotel.

I was reeling from the night’s excitement. I had assisted in murdering someone and birthing someone on the same day. The word conflicted did not even begin to describe my feelings. I had wanted to go to the hospital with Trinity, but I could not as I had promised to return to the hotel and clean up the murder scene. I had forfeited my simple life as Trinity’s best friend. I knew Christian was pleased I got to have this grace period, living next to my best friend. I felt like I was being teased. Why couldn’t I have both?

An hour later, I crossed the hall of the hotel and pondered a way where Christian and I could continue living next to Trinity and Brighton… at least until they moved somewhere bigger. I would probably have a few years. They had a two-bedroom townhouse. Trinity wouldn’t have another baby for a few years at least, so they wouldn’t need a bigger place.

That was what I was thinking about when I opened the door to the hotel room and the bloody remains of Charles after they had dug my heart out of him.

No longer a little girl wondering who would live where. I closed the door behind me with a thwap.