Maude by Donna Mabry Page A

came home from the store, I was
rocking on the porch. I told him, “I been getting
cramps all afternoon. I think the baby’s coming.”
James’s face went white, and his mouth fell open, “I’ll
run get Dr. Wilson right now.”
    I laughed at him. “We don’t need to hurry. It’ll
probably be tomorrow before it happens. Go tell him
it’s started and tell your mom. She’ll want to help us.”
    He said, “Mom’s still up in Union City nursing
her sister. Dad thought she might get home today or
tomorrow, but we don’t know for sure.”
    “Well, go let Dr. Wilson know. He’ll tell you
when to come get him. Like I said, it’ll probably be
tomorrow. Maybe your Mom will be home by then. I
know she wouldn’t want to miss it. Give me your
watch.”
    We didn’t have a clock in the cabin, and I’d been
guessing the timing of the pains. He pulled his watch
out of his pocket and handed it to me, then he turned
and took off down the path. I smiled after him as he
ran full speed toward the doctor’s house.
    After a few minutes, he came running back.
“Doc Wilson’s out at the Miller farm. Sister Miller’s
having her baby today, too. Sister Wilson said he ought
to be back soon ‘cause it’s the Miller’s fifth baby, and
she has an easy time of it.”
    He looked terrified. I wasn’t at all afraid. I
reached out and took his hand. I knew that giving him
work to do would help him not to worry, so I said,
“Doctor Wilson will want lots of water to clean up, hot
water, and clean towels and blankets. Why don’t you
make the fire higher and start drawing the water?”
    I could tell James was relieved to be able to do
something. He ran in the cabin, got the water bucket,
and made trips back and forth to the well. The first trip,
he went so fast that half the water splashed out of the
bucket. After that, he slowed to a normal walk. He
filled the kettle that hung on the hook in the fireplace
first and stoked up the logs to get them burning. After
that, he went up to the main house for extra linens and
piled them up on the little bedside table. Then he filled
all of the pots we had and brought more from his
mom’s house. It tickled me to watch him, and when he
gathered considerably more than I thought we would
need, I finally stopped him. By then it was growing
dark.
    I’d still been having cramps about a half-hour
apart, but they were growing stronger. I stood and
stretched. “I think we should go in now, the night air
is coming down.”
    James wrapped one arm around me and led me
inside as if he thought I couldn’t walk by myself. “Is
there anything else we need?”
    I thought it over. It would help him to stay busy,
but I didn’t know of anything else he could do. “I guess
now we just have to wait. Let’s have some supper and
get some sleep.”
    “I’ll fix it. You sit down and rest.”
“I’m all right,” I said. I laid the watch on the bed
table and started dinner. I’d had James kill a chicken
that morning, fried it for the noon meal, and left it
covered on the table. I pulled the cloth off and got out
some cornbread. We had that with a mess of greens left
warming in a pot next to the fire, and even though I
wasn’t hungry, I made an act of eating so James
wouldn’t notice and miss his meal. I tried not to show
it when the pains came, now a little closer together and
harder. I didn’t want to worry him.
After we’d eaten, I cleaned up and changed into
a nightgown, not one of my best, just something that
would do.
“Leave the lamp burning low,” I told him, “just
enough so I can see the watch.”
I folded a blanket and placed it under my hips so
if my water broke during the night the mattress
wouldn’t get wet, then we went to bed. In only a few
minutes, James’s breathing told me he’d fallen asleep,
so when the next few cramps came I pulled my knees
up and kept quiet. They were worse than before, but I
was still able to doze off between them.
About two in the morning I woke with a pain