“That’s handy.” Georgie took the heavy key chain and found the stainless steel light.
“It helps when I’m delivering pizzas at night, to get the credit card numbers—okay, it says here that pugs have complicated pregnancies, and we should be financially prepared for a C-section. . . .”
“Skip ahead,” Georgie said. Petunia was wet and splotched with blood. The thing in her mouth was moving. Oh, God, she’s eating it.
“She’s eating the puppies!” Heather shrieked. She was leaning behind Georgie holding a stack of towels and three bottled waters.
“She’s not eating it,” pizza girl said, putting her hand on Heather’s arm. She held up her phone so they both could see. “It’s in its sac. They’re born in sacs, and the mom chews them out. It’s a good sign that she’s chewing them free. It says that pugs are notoriously bad mothers. If she didn’t do it, we’d have to.”
“We’d have to chew them out?” Georgie asked.
The girl looked at Georgie like she was insane—but still managed to look patient. “We’d use a washcloth,” she explained.
“I brought washcloths!” Heather said.
The girl smiled at Heather. “Great job.”
“What else does it say?” Georgie asked.
Still-competent-but-clearly-distracted pizza girl looked back at her phone. “Um . . . okay, puppies—there can be one to seven.”
“Seven,” Georgie repeated.
“Sacs . . . ,” the girl said, “chewing . . . Oh, she’s supposed to chew the umbilical cord, too.”
“Great.”
“And placentas—there’s a placenta for each puppy. That’s important. You need to look for the placentas.”
“What do the placentas look like?”
“Do you want me to Google that?”
“No,” Georgie said, “keep reading.”
Petunia was still working on the wriggly thing with her teeth. “Good girl,” Georgie said. “Probably.”
She patted blindly around Petunia and recoiled when she felt something else soft and warm.
“What?” Heather asked, still half in a panic.
“I don’t know,” Georgie said, reaching back in. She found it again, warm and wet. Was it a puppy? Georgie held up what looked like a bag of blood, then dropped it. “Placenta.”
“That’s one,” the girl said enthusiastically.
“Aren’t you supposed to be reading?” Georgie reached back in.
“There’s nothing else. Make the dog comfortable. Make sure she helps the puppies get free. Count the placentas. Make sure they nurse . . . .”
Georgie felt something else wet under Petunia and grabbed it instinctively. “Jesus,” she said. “Another baby.” Still in its sac. It looked like a raw sausage. Georgie reached for one of Heather’s towels and started rubbing at the membrane. “Like this?”
Pizza girl looked up from her phone. “Harder, I think.”
Georgie scrubbed at the lump till the skin around it tore and she could see the grayish pink puppy inside.
“Is it alive?” Heather asked.
“I don’t know,” Georgie answered. The puppy was warm, but not warm as life. Georgie kept rubbing it clean, tears falling on her hand. Petunia whined, and Heather’s girl reached past Georgie into the dryer to pet her.
Heather knelt next to Georgie. “It is it alive?” She was crying, too.
“I don’t know.” The puppy twitched, and Georgie rubbed harder, massaging it with her hands.
“I think it’s breathing,” Heather said.
“It’s cold.” Georgie brought the puppy up to her chest and tucked it inside her sweatshirt, rubbing. The puppy shuddered and squeaked. “I think . . .”
Heather hugged Georgie. “Oh God.”
“Careful,” Georgie said.
Pizza girl sat back from the dryer cradling another puppy against her white shirt.
“Oh my God,” Heather said, and hugged her, too.
There were three puppies.
And three placentas.
Eventually Georgie thought to call her mom.
And then she called the vet, who talked them through cutting the last umbilical cord and making Petunia comfortable.
The puppies got a sponge bath. Georgie took charge of the one she was still holding inside her shirt. Then they all got tucked back into the dryer with clean towels. “It’s her little nest,” Heather said, patting the dryer like it had helped.
Georgie tried to put the Metallica shirt in the washer, but Heather grabbed onto it, making a disgusted face. “Georgie, no. This is an intervention.”
“Heather. That’s Neal’s shirt. From high school.”
“It gave its life for a good cause.”
Georgie let go. Heather handed the T-shirt to pizza girl, who was starting to clean up.
Pizza girl’s name was Alison, and Heather’s face followed her around the room like a sunflower chasing daylight.
“I still don’t like you,” Georgie said to Petunia, reaching in and stroking the dog’s slack stomach. “Look at you, nursing like a champ. Now who’s a notoriously bad mother?”
The puppies were clean, but Georgie and Heather and Alison were still sticky with blood and fetal juices—and pug vomit, Georgie was pretty sure.
Their mom looked horrified when she finally ran into the laundry room, kitten heels clicking on the stairs.
“It’s fine,” Georgie tried to assure her. “Everything is fine.”
“Where are my babies?” her mom asked, taking in the pile of bloody towels and the pile of bloody girls. Heather and Alison were sitting together in front of the dryer. Alison was cuddling Porky, who’d been stashed in the hall bathroom for most of the action. Her stained white T-shirt made her look like a butcher.
“They’re right here,” Heather said. “In the dryer.”
Georgie’s mom hurried over, and Alison quickly got up to make room. “My little mama,” Georgie’s mom said, “my little hero.”
Alison took a step back. “I guess . . . ,” she said, looking over at Heather.
Heather’s head was in the dryer.
“I guess I should go,” Alison said. After a few more seconds, she handed Porky to Georgie (who immediately handed him over to Kendrick), then wiped her hands on her jeans and started walking toward the door.
“Alison,” Georgie said, “thanks. You were a lifesaver. If I ever have another baby, I want you to deliver it.”
Alison waved her hand, like it was nothing, and kept walking.
“Who was that?” Kendrick asked as soon as she was out of sight.
“Pizza—,” Georgie said, but stopped when Heather’s head whipped up, her face full of dread. “Heather, can you help me with something in the kitchen?” Georgie leaned over and grabbed her sister’s sleeve, then pulled her up the steps and into the house, just as the front door was closing.
“What are you doing?” Georgie demanded.
“Nothing,” Heather said, jerking away. “What are you doing?”
“Making sure you don’t let that incredibly attractive, steady-handed girl walk away.”
“Georgie, I don’t want to talk about this.”
“Heather, that girl just helped us deliver babies.”
“Because she’s a nice person.”
“No. Because she’s willing to wade through blood and amniotic fluid just to impress you.”
Heather rolled her eyes.
“What is wrong with you?” Georgie asked. “You obviously want to kiss that girl. I kind of want to kiss that girl. So go do it. Or go, I don’t know, make progress in that general direction.”
“It’s not that easy, Georgie.”