Chapter 3 - NO TURNING BACK
Rachel’s hands locked around the steering wheel.
“Okay. New plan.”
“There is no new plan.”
“Yes, there absolutely is.”
She grabbed her phone.
“I’m finding the nearest hospital.”
“No Columbus.”
“We are sixty miles outside Columbus.”
“Then keep driving.”
“Megan, listen to yourself.”
“I am listening.”
“You’re shaking.”
“I’m in labor.”
“You could be minutes away from delivering.”
“I’m not.”
“How do you know?”
“I don’t.”
Rachel shot me a look.
“Fantastic.”
The pain was getting stronger.
Every few minutes, my entire body turned into one clenched muscle.
I tried counting.
Breathing.
Swearing.
Mostly swearing.
Derek kept calling.
I finally switched off my phone.
The silence afterward felt unreal.
For years, he had been inside every room even when he wasn’t physically there.
His rules.
His opinions.
His irritation.
His permission.
Turning off that phone felt like closing a steel door.
At 9:47, Rachel pulled into the emergency entrance of a small regional hospital just west of the Pennsylvania line.
A nurse met us with a wheelchair.
“How far apart?”
“Three minutes,” Rachel said.
The nurse’s eyebrows jumped.
“How long has her water been broken?”
“Forty-five minutes.”
“Megan, first baby?”
“Yes.”
“Any complications?”
“No.”
“Father coming?”
The question hit me harder than expected.
“No.”
Rachel put a hand on my shoulder.
“She has me.”
The nurse smiled once.
“Then she has somebody.”
Everything moved quickly after that.
Lights.
Forms.
Monitors.
A blood pressure cuff tightening around my arm.
A young doctor with tired eyes checking me and saying, “Eight centimeters.”
Rachel blinked.
“Is that… far?”
The doctor looked at her.
“She’s having this baby tonight.”
I laughed and cried at the same time.
By midnight, I couldn’t tell where one contraction ended and the next began.
I begged for drugs.
Then said I didn’t want drugs.
Then asked why nobody had invented a way to teleport babies out of women.
Rachel wiped sweat from my forehead.
“You’re doing great.”
“I hate you.”
“I know.”
“You said we could make Pittsburgh.”
“I was trying to be supportive.”
“You’re a liar.”
“Push.”
“I hate everybody.”
At 3:41 in the morning, my daughter entered the world screaming like she had arrived furious about the whole situation.
The sound broke something open inside me.
“Is she okay?”
“She’s perfect,” the doctor said.
Perfect.
They placed her on my chest.
Tiny.
Warm.
Red-faced.
Her fingers opened and closed against my skin.
I looked at Rachel.
She was crying so hard she couldn’t speak.
I whispered, “Emily.”
Rachel smiled through her tears.
“Emily Rose?”
I nodded.
Our mother’s middle name.
My daughter made a tiny squeaking sound.
I pressed my lips against her forehead.
And that was when I finally cried.
Not for Derek.
Not for the marriage.
For myself.
For the woman who had spent years shrinking so somebody else could feel big.
Rachel squeezed my hand.
“You’re free.”
I wanted to believe her.
Then, at 7:12 that morning, someone knocked on my hospital room door.
A police officer stepped inside.
“Mrs. Hale?”
My entire body went cold.
“Yes?”
He glanced at Emily.
Then at me.
May you like
“Your husband reported you missing.”
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