Stirred

• • •

“Come on, Jack, don’t you quit on me. You’re almost there!”

Almost there.

Almost there.

How many times had he said that?

Was he doing something to me? Something that kept the baby from coming out?

• • •

I gathered up every last molecule of air I could force into my lungs and pushed. Pushed like my life depended upon it, because it did. I couldn’t take another contraction. I had reached the end of my endurance. I would lie there and die after this.

And then it came—the ring of fire.

So perfectly named.

Ten seconds of agonizing, world-ending pain, Luther shouting, “She’s crowning! She’s crowning!” and then—

Release.

The sound of a baby crying.

I raised my head, and I stared down at Luther, holding in his arms a purple, squirming thing covered in white paste.

It looked hideous—

—and absolutely beautiful.

My baby.

Mine.

“Give her to me,” I gasped.

He released my wrist restraints, said, “Open your jacket.”

My fingers trembled as I found the zipper and tugged it down. I sat up and pulled my arms out of the windbreaker.

“Cut my bra off,” I said. He came around behind me, and I felt the knife slice through the fabric. He pulled the sports bra away and laid my child on my chest.

The pain had vanished.

I was flooded with a rush of what could have been pure heroin it felt so good.

Joy bursting.

Eyes flooding.

“I’ll give you both a minute,” Luther said.

I didn’t watch him leave, because I couldn’t take my eyes off this perfect, precious angel in my arms. She stared up at me, red-faced, crying, mad, helpless, completely out of sorts.

“Hi, little thing,” I said in a tone that sounded too high-pitched and saccharine to be mine.

She stopped crying and opened her eyes.

Phin’s bright blue eyes.

Unbelievable.

My voice had calmed her. She recognized it.

I brought her to my breast, and it took her a moment, but she finally glommed onto my nipple.

“Are you getting anything?” I asked, cradling her tiny head.

She began to suck.

“Oh my, you’re very good at that, aren’t you? Yes you are.”

I reached over and grabbed the windbreaker and covered her with it.

She stared up at me while she nursed.

The endorphin blast intensified.

Like nothing I had ever experienced.

Euphoria.

She nursed, and I stared and stroked her face with my finger.

“I’m your mother,” I said. “But I bet you already know that, don’t you?”

It occurred to me as I held her that even if we somehow escaped this, if I returned to Chicago with her and Phin, nothing would ever be the same again. And it wasn’t the terror of the last day that was changing everything. It was her. In five minutes, this little thing had come into my life and stared into my eyes and turned me into a different woman. What had I feared? The loss of identity? My time? How stupid and selfish, because holding my child, watching her suckle, every doubt and fear I had about her vanished.

I fell, instantly, irreversibly, in love.

McGlade was chipping away at the concrete wall using the metal chair leg, giving it all he had, but Phin really wished he would step away for a minute.

Harry’s wet pants were making Phin’s eyes water.

“I got it from here, Harry.”

“You sure? We’re almost through.”

“I’ll finish. You go rest for a minute.” Phin casually pointed to the other side of the hall. “Have a seat on the stairs back there. You’ve earned it.”

“Thanks, buddy.”

McGlade began to walk away, but then stopped and turned. “This isn’t because I smell like piss, is it?”

Phin quickly shook his head. “No. Of course not. I can’t smell anything.”

“You sure? Even my socks are soaked.”

“You’re fine,” Phin lied, turning away quickly so he didn’t taste the air.

Harry walked off, and Phin noted with each step McGlade made a squishing sound. Finally able to breathe, Phin attacked the door with renewed fervor. Thirty seconds later he’d broken away the masonry around the deadbolt. One swift kick, and the door groaned open.

“You can wash leather shoes, right?” McGlade said. “These are Bruno Maglis.”

“Bruno Maglis? I thought they were yours.”

“Fu

“Let’s try to stop talking about piss for five minutes, okay?”

“Sorry,” Harry said. “Didn’t mean to piss you off.”

Phin took the lead, heading through the doorway and into an unlit corridor. His head was still smarting from the fall down the stairs, and his right knee was begi

Well, no sounds except for McGlade’s squishy footsteps.

Phin sniffed the air, crinkling his nose. He smelled sewage.

“That wasn’t me,” Harry said. “I only went number one.”

Phin guessed they were underground, either in or near the sewer. But his guess proved wrong when they came to another door, which opened up into a room filled with brownish, foul-smelling water. It stretched out for maybe twenty meters, a faint orange glow at the other side.

“Luther needs to clean his pool,” Harry said.

“There’s a light there.”

“You’re not thinking of going in that shit, are you? I already smell bad enough.”

But Phin was already wading in. This wasn’t the sewer line, or a cesspool. Phin knew this was created by Luther, for some deranged reason.

The water was cold, and Phin held up his hand and felt the circulating air. He listened for a moment, caught the hum of a large air-conditioner.

What the hell was this place for?

“I’m so sorry, Bruno,” Harry wailed, trudging in after Phin.

The duo stuck to the perimeter. It took longer but wasn’t as deep, not going higher than the thigh.

McGlade kept Phin company with a constant barrage of complaints.

“Ugh, you smell that?” McGlade said. “How many diseases you think are floating around in this slop, looking for hosts?

“It’s a hot zone in here…

“A goddamn hot zone…

“…I can’t remember if I’m up to date on all my vaccinations…

“…yuck, something solid just bumped me…

“…I think it was a snake…

“…a long, brown, stinky snake…

“…it was either that, or feces…

“…I really hope it was a snake…

“…ugh, it was feces…

“…or the snake was covered with corn…

“…I hate feces…

“…I really hate feces…

“…can you smell all the feces, Phin?”

“Harry, please, can you just be quiet for a few minutes? Please?”

“It’s clinging to me, like I’m some giant shit magnet.”

“McGlade…”

“Is it clinging to you, too?”

“McGlade!”

“Okay, I’ll shut up.”

It lasted all of twenty seconds before Harry said, “I think some splashed in my mouth.”

But Phin was focused on the platform ahead of him.

A platform with a body on it.

He increased his speed, making it over to the concrete slab, to the dead man.

Harry said, “This guy was apparently late for something.”

“Late?” Phin said, staring at the dismembered corpse.

“Yeah. He had to split.”

“Sometimes I wonder how your brain works, Harry.”

“I had to go out on a limb for that one.”