Every 4th of July weekend my younger sister comes to visit from Atlanta. I guess she thinks Atlanta in July isn't hot enough. Anyway, she arrives shortly before I leave work. I have her and her husband meet me at my house. The mama Ali wants me to come straight to the hospital, but I give them a quick tour at my new job. Soon enough we arrive in Daytona for them to visit and for me to stay.
My younger sister has always felt uncomfortable in hospitals. When she's in the hospital she wants to leave. When others are in the hospital she tries so hard to act as if nothing is wrong. Today is a little different. She is full of questions. We are full of answers. It's nice to have visitors.
After they leave, we are alone again in the hospital. I have only spent one night in this room so far. I stay here to show support for my wife, but this place is not designed for my comfort. I have to move most of the furniture that isn't nailed down to make room for the air mattress. When the nurse come in to take vitals, I have to move out of the way. On top of that, the pregnant woman lying underneath all of the blankets gets to choose the thermostat setting. However, this is a good day. She has now been in the hospital since the previous Friday with no changes. She isn't dilated to any different level and I remind her that it is time to flip the page. We have one of those pregnancy books at home that covers pregnancies week by week. Even though we don't actually read the book since the hospital, we used to turn the page every Saturday. It's one of those books that has a brief paragraph mentioning that in some rare instances some mothers go into labor at this point ad spend months in the NICU - but that won't happen to the readers of the book. I need to write the publisher and get a refund. We have just finished 22 weeks of pregnancy and tomorrow will begin week 23. I don't know it at the time but there will be no week 24.
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