The dispatcher asked questions Dana relayed to me.
How far along was I?
Thirty-four weeks.
Was there bleeding?
Not that I could see.
Had my water broken?
No.
How far apart were the pains?
I didn’t know.
Dana looked at her watch and started timing them.
Then she asked something the dispatcher apparently hadn’t.
“Was that your husband?”
I looked at her.
“What?”
“The man in the car.”
I nodded.
She went quiet.
She had seen him pull me out.
I realized that from her face.
The ambulance arrived within minutes.
At the hospital, everything happened quickly.
A nurse helped me out of my clothes.
Another attached monitors around my stomach.
Someone started an IV.
A doctor came in, then another.
My contractions were regular.
The baby’s heartbeat was strong, thank God, but they were concerned about early labor and possible placental complications because of the pain.
They gave me medication to try to slow the contractions.
They ordered bloodwork and imaging.
I kept asking whether my baby was okay.
“We’re watching both of you very closely,” the doctor said.
It was not the reassuring yes I wanted.
When the nurse asked who she should call, I gave her my sister Megan’s number from memory.
Megan arrived before noon.
She rushed through the door with her hair half pulled back and one shoe apparently tied tighter than the other.
“What happened?”
I started crying.
Not delicate tears.
The ugly kind.
I told her.
All of it.
When I got to the part where Eric drove away, Megan’s face changed.
Then she noticed my arm.
Five dark marks were beginning to form where his fingers had been.
“Claire.”
I looked down.
“Oh.”
“Did he do that?”
I didn’t answer immediately.
That hesitation told her everything.
Megan pulled out her phone.
