“I think I would rather have this baby naked in a snowdrift than to have Estelle help deliver him. Let’s go before she comes out with a knife to cut the pain.” So A.J. went out to warm up the truck while John Robert helped her into her coat. Then they bundled her into her makeshift ambulance, and A.J. and Maggie set off into the storm. The truck bed was filled with a load of firewood cut the previous day, and A.J. was glad for the extra weight. Even so, he had to let most of the air out of the back tires before the vehicle would gain traction. As they pulled away, he saw in his mirror the forlorn sight of John Robert waving. Standing by him was a disappointed Estelle, steaming teakettle in one hand and butcher knife in the other.
The trip to Doc’s was surreal. The landscape was chiseled in snow and ice. Green lightning flashed, but there was no thunder. Trees were glazed and bent to the ground. A.J. heard the crack of a power pole as the ice brought it low. The Longstreets lived only three miles from town, but it took thirty minutes to cover this distance. They were off the road as much as on, and the truck added several dents and scrapes to its already impressive display. They were traveling backward when they entered the outskirts of town, with A.J. cursing softly as he tried to gain control. Luckily, the post office stopped their momentum. Maggie groaned involuntarily before pointing out in unkind terms he could expect to be short lived if he bounced her like that again.
“How are you doing?” A.J. asked as he attempted to get the truck off of Federal property. The tires spun and caught. His headache felt as if someone had driven a splitting wedge between his eyes.
“Better than you, looks like,” she panted as another pain hit. She dealt with the contraction, braced and rigid, and then continued. “We seem to have hit the post office just now.”
“We’re taxpayers. In reality, it is our post office. We can hit it if we want to.”
“We need to be hitting Doc’s house soon,” she replied.
They came to Doc’s long downhill drive almost as soon as she spoke. A.J. nosed it in and hoped for the best. They gained speed as they approached the carport and drifted counterclockwise with all four wheels locked. He wondered how he was going to stop but needn’t have worried. The good Lord was keeping an eye on the Longstreets that woolly night and sent a sign in the form of a beautifully restored Sedan Deville. The truck was perpendicular to the fins on the back of Doc’s old Cadillac when the two objects collided. A.J.’s door collapsed inward and knocked him over into Maggie’s lap. His new position seemed to add to her duress, so he quickly clambered out her door, where he promptly slipped and fell on the ice. When Doc emerged, he was greeted by the sight of A.J.’s truck impaled on the substantial fins of his Cadillac. Maggie was in the truck, trying not to push, and A.J. was on the ground, nursing a cracked rib from the truck door and a broken wrist from the hard concrete.
“What the hell…?” Doc began.
“Maggie’s having her baby,” A.J. informed him. Doc stepped back inside. He returned with a flashlight and a box of ice-cream salt. Doc scattered the salt, stepped gingerly to the truck, and made a brief examination of Maggie.
“The baby’s coming breech. Help me get her inside.” To Maggie he said, “Don’t push.”
“Easy for you to say,” she growled between gritted teeth. A.J. and Doc trundled her into the house and onto the spare bed, and thirty minutes later after much deft maneuvering by Doc and a great deal of waterfront cussing by Maggie, the Longstreets were parents again. A.J. and Minnie had assisted, with Minnie doing the skilled work while A.J. filled the position of tote-and-fetch boy. Maggie’s eyes shone in the lamplight as her fine baby boy was laid at her breast. A.J. and Doc shook hands, and it was difficult to tell who was prouder, the new father or the old physician, hopelessly out of date but still able to deliver a baby breech during a snowstorm in the dark.
“All these new boys would have been doing C-sections, getting excited and hollering stat. Whatever the hell that means,” Doc growled as he sipped the coffee Minnie had brewed on the gas grill. It had a slightly smoky taste.
“You did good, Doc,” A.J. said.
Maggie had worked hard, and it was late. Eventually, she drowsed. While she slept, Doc splinted A.J.’s wrist and taped his ribs. Then A.J. sat in a chair by the bed. After a time, Maggie stirred and awakened. She saw him and smiled.
“I dreamed you were gone,” she said sleepily.
“I was here the whole time,” he responded, taking her hand. Thus, the youngest member of the Longstreet clan came into the world on a blizzard’s coattails, and his difficult entrance set the tone for the life that was to follow.
“I swear he planned it,” Maggie said, back in the kitchen recounting the high points of Eudora’s wedding. “The minister had just finished saying that any objectors should speak now or forever hold their peace. The church was quiet. Then J.J. tugged on my dress and announced he had to pee. ‘Right now, Mama,’ was the way he put it. I thought Emily Charlotte was going to die on the spot.”
“Well, we told him to always let us know,” A.J. offered. J.J. had been tough to train. “I bet Carlisle loved the bathroom break.”
“He raised an eyebrow, but everyone was laughing by that time.”
“Well, the main thing is that Eudora has finally reeled Carlisle in,” A.J. said. “Now she can be truly fulfilled as a woman.” He grunted when Maggie kicked him under the table.
“Watch it,” she said. “I’m still in the mood to hit something.”
“Apparently,” he responded, rubbing his shin. “Husband beating is a serious deal. With the right lawyer, I could clean you out.”
“Save your money. I don’t have anything but the children, and you can have them.”
“Just forget it.” A.J. got up and poured them both coffee. “Let’s go to the porch.”
They sat in silence in the big rockers on the porch and enjoyed the twilight. The evening was serene. The slightest of breezes was blowing, bearing the hint of meat cooking on a grill. Estelle was burning yet another steak on her high-botch-ee.
“I missed you,” said Maggie. “Did you have fun being a bachelor while we were gone?”
“It was one party after another. I vacuumed about two truck-loads of blond stewardess-hair out of the carpet right before you got here. By the way, if you happen to find a pair of red panties somewhere in the house, they’re mine.”
“Red has always been your color,” she replied. “But I think you’re lying. I think you worked, went and saw Eugene, ate some fried Spam, and missed me.” She reached and took his hand. “But if you are messing around with a blond stewardess, you had better get in the habit of calling her a flight attendant, Plow Boy.”
“There are too many rules these days,” he responded forlornly. “Actually, you hit it pretty close, but you left out the part where I got fired.” She momentarily assimilated this data.
“Well, it’s not like we didn’t know it was coming,” she said finally. “Did you get the severance pay?”
“I got part of it. I still need to look up John McCord.”
“That’s it, then. I’m glad you’re out of there. I’ve never liked that place, and I’ve always believed you could do better. You rest for a few weeks. Then we’ll get busy finding you something else.” She sounded upbeat as she squeezed his hand.
“You know, I might not find something right off,” he cautioned. He did not want to dampen her optimism, but facts were facts.
“You have nearly a year’s pay in your pocket, counting what John McCord owes you,” she said. “You’ll find something before it runs out. I think you should start that remodeling business you’ve been talking about. There are enough old houses in bad shape in these mountains to keep you busy until you’re ninety.”