23. Brett

Chapter 23

Brett

I grabbed the cart and headed straight to the produce department. Today, I was on a mission. I wanted watermelon. Now. And I didn't just want watermelon—I needed it. A lot of it. I was craving watermelon so badly that it was even in my dreams. Sure, in my dreams, it was less about eating watermelon and more about remembering an old comedian who used to smash them, but still—watermelons had all my attention.

When I got to the cooler with the shelf that always had the chunked-up watermelon, the entire section was empty. All of it—the watermelon, the cantaloupe, the grapes, all of the fresh-cut fruit—gone. Sitting there was a little stand that said, "Sorry for your inconvenience. Our shipment did not come in."

This was not an inconvenience. It was the destruction of dreams. And yes, I was being melodramatic, but I was pregnant and couldn't help it.

My gut reaction was to cry out, but while my hormones might've been raging, I could still pull it together—or at least, that's what I told myself as I started wandering through the rest of the produce section, looking for a whole watermelon. There were none. Absolutely none. Not even the ones with the seeds that tended to be the last men standing.

I found someone with a badge that said they worked here. "I'm looking for watermelon," I said, trying to keep the desperation out of my voice.

"You're gonna have to check again in a couple of days. We're all out. Sorry."

I told him it was no big deal, and he went back to work. But as I stood there, my eyes started to fill up with tears.

Pregnancy was wild—the way everything felt so big. Like, in my head, I knew that not having watermelon didn't matter—not even close—but right then, it felt like the end of the world.

When an older gentleman came up to me and asked if I was okay, I sucked back my snot and told him, "There's no watermelon," expecting him to judge. He didn't.

"That's okay, honey, I've got you." He walked away, and when he came back, he had a bottle of fresh watermelon juice with him. "It's not quite the same, but it might hit that craving of yours."

"Thanks," I said, taking the bottle from him. "I don't know what's come over me. No, that's not true. I do, but I don't know how to control it."

"If the goddess wanted us to control it, she wouldn't have given us these hormones. Just know that the reason they're high and making you feel all this way is because your body's doing exactly what it needs to do for your little one." His words calmed me. "When are you due?"

"Last week," I put my hand on my belly.

I'd been foolish enough to think that I was going to have my baby on my due date. I worked in the hospital; I knew better. But in my head, they were coming that day. That did not happen. I was officially one week past due. That one week felt like a year. Not gonna lie.

"Well, guess they'll be coming soon, then," he said.

I thanked him again, and he went on his way.

I started wandering through the aisles, my Braxton Hicks acting up. They weren't awful, but they were a nuisance.

I grabbed easy-to-fix items that I thought might hit the spot after the child was born and tossed them in the cart. I knew I wasn't going to want to cook once the baby came, and probably neither would my mate. We were going to be spending time with our little one, and they weren't exactly known for sleeping well. We were going to be tired.

I could hardly wait.

The dog aisle had become one of my favorites, and I grabbed a bunch of new treats to bring home. I didn't want Choccie to think his place in the house was being taken over by a little one, so some spoiling was in order. Thankfully, I loved to spoil him. So did Anders. The dog wasn't lacking spoiling, that was sure.

As I turned the corner, someone else did the same, and our carts crashed into one another, causing me to fall backward and land on my ass. It hurt. It really hurt. How I didn't cry out in pain was a miracle.

The other person felt awful, rushing to my side as I assured them I was fine. But as I got up and nearly slipped, I realized I wasn't fine—because I wasn't slipping on just any random paper on the floor. Nope. The floor was wet thanks to me—my water had broken.

I felt guilty telling the staff that they had to clean up my mess, but they felt equally bad about me falling and insisted that I seek medical treatment. It was over the top—absolutely—but I agreed, calling my mate and letting him know that an ambulance was on the way. How embarrassing.

Taking an ambulance trip to the place where you work was a weird experience. I knew everyone there and exactly where we were going, and I also knew how ridiculous it was that they insisted on the ambulance. It was funny how people would do anything to avoid a lawsuit.

When I got to the hospital, they brought me into the ER. The nurse took one look at me and said, "You in labor?"

"No," I assured her, because I was an idiot and hadn't figured out that I was yet.

"Then why are you here?"

"I fell, and my water broke."

To her credit, she didn't laugh at me. "I'll have you go to triage. I'll call up for you."

They brought me up, and sure enough, everybody was waiting for me. It was one of the benefits of working in the hospital—you knew everyone. They had me in a room, hooked up to monitors, talking about whether I needed any sort of tests to see if I hurt my back or not, as if I wasn't there. That's when I found out my Braxton Hicks weren't Braxton Hicks—they were full-on contractions.

The doctor wasn't loving how weak the contractions were, and being a fox shifter himself, he knew what to give me to kick the labor into a far more productive state. I was already pacing the room in my hospital gown, staving off new contractions, when my mate came in.

"I'm so sorry I let you go to the grocery store," he said.

I stopped dead in my tracks. "You let me?"

"I didn't mean it like that. I just meant I wish I was with you."

"Well, you are now, when it counts." I had a monitor on, which limited where I could go. There'd be no hall walking for me. Not that anything in my birth plan had worked out so far.

A few minutes later, the doctor came in to look at the readings from the monitor and talk about whether I needed to get any kind of scans. He wasn't liking what he was seeing. I could tell before he even said one word.

"You're not going to want to hear this," he said.

"Is my baby okay?" That was all that mattered.

"Yes, your baby is fine. But I think he needs more help getting out than just what you've already had." He started to point out different things on the printout to me. Paternity wasn't my strong suit, but even I could see the concerning increases and decreases in our child's heartbeat during contractions.

"Okay, yes. But we need to get him out, and quickly."

"By quickly you mean C-section?"

He nodded. And my birth plan was officially trash. There had been a time when I thought that would matter to me. But now that I was here, facing the decision, the only thing I cared about was the safety of our baby.

My mate stayed by my side like a boss, keeping his beast at bay even when they curtained off part of my body so he couldn't see what they were doing. That might have bugged him, but it was for the best—no one wanted to see their mate sliced open and a human being pulled out of them.

The doctors were swift and cautious, and soon, our son Andri was placed on my chest, having his first snuggle. I still wasn't completely sewn up yet, my arms were still pinned down, but he was there—my mate, holding him to me. He was perfect.

They did sutures and used glue to close me up, not realizing that all I was going to do was shift when I got home to take care of it. Then they wheeled me to recovery, where it was just my small family and a nurse who did her best to stay out of our way. Paternity nurses were a special breed—able to help protect your most precious cargo while being like wallflowers, so you could enjoy those first few days of bonding.

"He's beautiful," I said, relieved to finally be able to wrap him in my arms.

"He really is," Anders said, kissing the top of my head. "And he's beautiful because he looks just like you, Papa Bear."

"That's funny. I was thinking he looked just like you."