Coldplay: Don't Panic
A/N: hey everyone! I planned on publishing this yesterday but life had other plans. Yesterday morning, around 6:20 am, the entire city of Zagreb was waken up by a terrible and strong earthquake. It was a 5,5 magnitude by the Richter scale and I cannot even begin to explain how I felt as it was happening. I live on the fourteenth floor of a skyscraper and my entire building was swaying left to right and back and forth for about a minute. Things were falling, doors were banging, I thought I was going to die... I actually thought my building was collapsing. There were a couple more quakes during the morning and we were all pretty shaken up by it all. I ended up going to my parents' place, which is a two-story building and I don't know when I'll be able to go back to my flat. PTSD is strong with this one, I barely slept last night as any sound of the wind, the branches against the building or just my imagination woke me up and I began to shake instantly. We are safe now, as safe as we can be, obviously. Over twenty people have been injured and it's a tough crisis combined with the corona virus lockdown happening. I hope all of you are well and I hope you enjoy this chapter! (ALSO, 20k! Thank you guys so much!!)
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For two weeks I've been feeling my stomach tighten and then release, at all hours of the day (and night). I'd gotten used to the pain and discomfort and Harry learned to just let me be when Braxton Hicks attack. They were sort of a trial run for real contractions. If I was being honest, I was so sick of pregnancy. All of it – the constant peeing, the fact I couldn't sleep for more than three hours per night, the lack of interest I had for regular food, the 'are you okay, are you having your baby?' questions everyone seemed to ask as soon as I'd rest my hand on my huge stomach.
"Teacup, do we need anything from M&S? I'm off to see Mitch for a while and then I'll be back.", luckily, Harry took my threat to cut off his manhood if he continues to hover over me quite seriously, and he was getting out of the house at least once a day.
"Hm, get me mint chocolate chip and I'll love you forever and ever.", he leaned over to give me a kiss and ended up laughing at my silliness.
For an hour I'd been having more of those false labor contractions. I wasn't really sure. I mean, how do you tell when it's real versus when it's just Braxton Hicks? I knew only one person in the whole of UK I could call.
"Hey love, what's up?", Anne picked up after a few rings and I was very thankful for her habit of picking up right away.
"Not much. Listen, how do you tell apart false from real contractions?"
"That doesn't sound like 'not much'. Can you describe them to me?", she laughed. At least someone was nonchalant around me.
"Well the ones I've been having for almost two weeks have been like menstrual cramps with a slight tightening of my stomach. But going on an hour now I've been having these waves of pain that start low, rise up and then ebb away. They're seven to five minutes apart and I don't know whether to call Harry and go to the hospital or to stay home.", I could almost see her thinking face while I waited for a response.
"I assume your waters have not broken, because that's something you'd know for sure. Have you tried going to the loo? This is really awful but check for a bloody show. You'll know it when you see it, trust me. I'll get in the car and start the drive to London because I have a feeling if it's not happening now it will soon.", I did as she said and went to pee. There was a tiny bit of blood, which immediately freaked me out. 'Okay, deep breaths', I tried calming myself down. The midwife told me to wait for an hour and to come in if the contractions don't stop or if they become more frequent.
"I'm home.", Harry walked in at the worst possible moment, because I was kneeling on the living room floor with my hands stretched out and resting on the sofa. It must've terrified him.
"Teacup? Are you okay?", he dropped the ice cream on the kitchen counter and sat down beside me.
"I don't know. I've been having these awful pains for an hour and a half; your mom is driving down to London and the midwife said to come in if they continue.", catching a glimpse of his panicked look was enough to send me into a guilty fit of laughter.
"And you didn't think to call me?! Come on, teacup, let's get you into the shower. That's supposed to help.", he slowly lifted me up and led me to the downstairs bathroom. We got in the shower together and he rubbed my back while the warm water soothed the pain. During one of the contractions I squeezed his forearm so hard the poor man winced in pain, but he powered through.
"I think it's time we took you to the hospital. I'll grab the bags and you just sit here.", Harry lowered me onto the sofa and ran upstairs to get the hospital bags. Anne texted to let us know she still had two hours to go, but she'd meet us directly at the hospital.
"You are hilarious right now; did you know that?", he gave me the side eye, "You know you can drive like a normal human being? In fact, please do. This in between thing, 'do I drive like a maniac because my woman is about to give birth' or 'do I drive painfully slow because my woman is about to give birth' is getting to be too much.".
It took us only about fifteen minutes to get to Portland hospital, we got admitted and all the machines were hooked up to me in no time. Our doctor came in to check me and was very surprised to see I was already at a 7. The wait to 10 wouldn't be that long, according to her, and panic set in.
"Harry, I cannot do this. Is it too late to back out?", my hand grabbed his and refused to let go.
"Teacup, you've done so well! You can do this because at the end we get to take Kaya home.", he tried with positive reassurance.
"But it's too late for the drugs now and this is way too pain-", I didn't even get to finish my sentence when a new wave of pain crashed through me. Harry did the best he could, he held my hand and tried getting me to breathe like they taught us at those birthing classes. Unfortunately, not even a million birthing classes can prepare you for the moment you realize it's happening and you can't turn around and forget you were ever pregnant in the first place.
"Love, Chris told me to play you this song when it's showtime...", the sounds of Coldplay's 'Don't Panic' filled the room and the only thing left to do was laugh... that was until another contraction started.
"It's...hu-hu-hi-hi...very nice...hu-hu-hi-hi...of him...hu-hu-hi-hi...but it doesn't help.", the breathing exercises were making me sound like a complete moron, but they seemed to help at that time.
"Okay, it's time to push.", Angela, our doctor came into the room and after she told us this, everything started happening pretty quickly. Three more people turned up, Harry played Salt n Pepa's 'Push it', Anne appeared out of nowhere and took my hand into hers and Angela's head peeked from above my stomach telling me to take a deep breath and give it my all for ten seconds.
"You're doing amazingly. Rest for a bit and when I tell you you're going to do the exact same think, okay darling?", I nodded frantically, looking up at Harry who was beside himself. Anne shot him a stern look and his features immediately softened.
"This is it, a couple more times and she's here with us, you got this teacup!", hearing him cheer me on did help a bit, but the fact I could feel my daughter... down there, was enough to make me shake my head and mentally escape to another planet.
"I can't. No more. Yank her out of me if you have to but please don't make me push again.", Harry's hand was now pushing my thigh up at my stomach, per the doctor's orders, and I knew that she'd tell me to push 'just one more time' any second. It was a lie. She'd tell me to do it again in a minute. And it seemed endless.
"Okay Thea, I am not going to sugarcoat it. You've got one more and this one will hurt like nothing else you've felt before. It's her shoulders. After that I will pull her out myself, but you have to power through the last one, okay?", her honesty brought me a little bit of comfort so I took a deep breath and closed my eyes, pushing as hard as I thought humanly possible. I felt a lot of pressure and then it disappeared all of a sudden and Kaya's cry filled the room. She was here. Sunday, April 10th, 1:37 in the morning.
"Did I do it? Is she okay?", tears filled my eyes before they even handed her to me.
"You did, teacup. She's precious. Our daughter.", Anne's sniffles muffled Harry's cries, he kept planting kisses all over my face and wiping my tears away. Finally, the midwife placed a little bundle of limbs and sparse brown hairs onto my chest.
"Oh my god! Who are you? Where did you come from?", my mind was running a million miles a minute while Kaya squirmed on top of me. This moment truly was like no other, a feeling I could never describe to anyone... my heart could burst at the seams.
"Dad, would you like to do skin to skin?", Rebecca, the midwife, asked Harry after I attempted to breastfeed Kaya. We weren't really fully there yet, but everyone seemed optimistic. I just kept staring at her and asking where she came from. When they handed Kaya over to Harry and he held her little head with his long fingers I started crying all over again.
"I'd do this a million times over. All of it. Just to get to experience the love I feel right now, again.", truer words were never spoken. My mind kept flashing back to the day I met Harry and how I never, in a thousand years, would've thought I'd be here today... watching him hold our daughter for the first time.
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A/N: Kaya is finally here! Wow! We've all come a long way since watching Love Actually at the Christmas ball. I'm excited for the story to continue (you probably won't be happy with me, but we'll get there in the end), I don't know how many chapters I'll end up doing, tbh.
TPWK, always.
T.