Doctor Holliday (Doctors of Eastport General)

Chapter 4

Thursday, December 7

Keaton

He alternated between hovering over the dark-haired doctor and laboring girl and stepping away both to give them privacy and to keep what he thought was his long-gone lunch down. Something about watching Alyssa deliver Ruby was a hell of a lot different than watching this young girl squirming in pain in his stockroom.

Keaton had found clean towels and entire packages full of new paper hand towels in lieu of the maxi-pads the doctor had asked for. Luckily, he had a bathroom in the stockroom, and since he was getting the store ready to open, there were still buckets scattered around—even a few unused and brand new. The doctor had demanded everything be sterilized. Keaton didn’t have a stove to boil the water, but he had let the sink run until the water was scalding hot. When the doctor asked him to get a kit from the back of her SUV, he had grabbed her keys and ran to the fancy little vehicle and popped open the hatch. He had found the black bag immediately and hurried back into the stockroom, careful to shut the door behind him.

The doctor had stood and walked a few steps away when he returned. He held his breath while she tied her hair up in a knot on the back of her neck and then slipped into the bathroom to wash her hands.

When she helped the girl— Logan —when she helped Logan get her jeans down and slipped them off the girl’s ankles, Keaton had turned his back. He heard the snap of sterile gloves, heard the doctor’s soft, calm voice announce that she had to check the girl, and heard the sharp intake of breath that indicated the doctor had indeed slipped her hand inside her to check her cervix. Keaton had squeezed his eyes closed, pushed away thoughts of what was happening behind him, pushed the memories of Ruby’s birth from his head, and mentally recited football stats.

“Have you had any prenatal care?”

“No.”

Keaton winced, feeling connected to the doctor when she muttered something that sounded helpless and frustrated.

“She’s a hundred percent effaced and fully dilated,” the doctor announced.

“What’s that mean?”

Keaton knew what it meant, but the girl’s innocent question enraged him. He would like to get his hands on the man who had messed with her. It was possible the girl had said yes to a boy her age, that she and a boy she thought she cared about had let things go too far and ended up creating a baby.

But it was possible, too, that she had been taken advantage of.

More than likely, in his opinion.

“It means you’re ready to have this baby,” the doctor said calmly.

“I don’t want…” The girl groaned. Even from where he stood several feet away, Keaton heard her snap her teeth together. “This baby!”

“I know.”

“Get it out of me!”

“I will,” the doctor promised. “But I need your help.”

Keaton glanced at her, relieved to see she had her eyes on Logan, not him.

“How old are you, Logan?”

“Fourteen.”

“Fuck.” Keaton clenched his jaw tight enough to turn coal to diamonds.

“Do you know what a contraction is?”

“No,” the girl wailed.

“It’s that pain you keep feeling.” Doctor Holliday’s voice was soothing. “That intense pain that gets bad and then eases for a minute.”

“I can’t do this.”

“You can do this,” the doctor assured her. “The next time that pain comes, you’re gonna push.”

“What do you mean?”

“Bear down and push really hard. Like when you have to go to the bathroom.”

“No.”

“Logan, sweetie.” Dr. Holliday leaned forward a bit on her knees to make eye contact with the girl. “I felt your baby’s head. This is happening. And it’s happening now.”

Sweat rolled down Keaton’s back. His neck and shoulders were so tense, they felt made of stone. The doctor looked intense but oddly relaxed.

“I need you.”

Keaton looked at the doctor with his heart in his throat. What the fuck did she need him for?

“What?” His voice came out scratchy and rough. He did not want to get involved in this. In fact, he wanted to run as fast as his blown knee and once broken ankle could carry him.

“I need you to hold her leg.” The stern command left no room for argument. “Normally, we’d have a nurse or two here. Maybe an intern. Lots of hands. Lots of help. A monitor for the contractions.”

“I’m not catching the baby.”

He would. If he had to, he would. Jesus, God, he was a compassionate person. He was a dad . He would do anything to help anyone, but he didn’t want to have to catch this little girl’s baby.

“Nope,” the doctor shook her head, “you’re not. That’s what I’m here for. I just need you to hold her leg.”

Keaton squeezed his eyes closed and dragged his hands over his head again. He had never seen a fourteen-year-old girl’s naked bottom half spread eagle. Wasn’t something he ever wanted to see. But he had to help.

“Wash your hands, please,” the doctor said with a quick glance in his direction.

Glad for the tiny reprieve, he ducked into the bathroom and scrubbed his hands until they were beet red. Once dried, he chucked the used paper towels in the garbage and hung his head.

He hadn’t graced the inside of a church since last year at Christmas, when he and Ruby went to mass. But he said a quick, silent prayer that the girl in his stockroom would deliver her baby safely and that she would be safe when it was over—whatever that meant.

Logan wailed in pain again as he hurried to the back of the room to help. The doctor nodded at him as he lowered himself from a squat to kneel beside them. He knew what to do. Ruby might have been ten, but this wasn’t rocket science. He hadn’t forgotten how he and a nurse had stood beside Alyssa and held her legs as she pushed to deliver the baby.

“Logan,” the doctor said calmly. “Don’t yell. Just focus. Bear down.”

“I can’t.”

“You can. Your body is made to do this.”

“It hurts.”

“Yes, it does, I know.”

Doing his best to keep his gaze off the girl’s lower body, Keaton found himself looking at her face. Her cheeks still had a tiny bit of baby fat, though the rest of her was thin to the point of sickness. He wondered again who had done this. A fourteen-year-old girl couldn’t give consent. Someone had raped her, whether it was a boy or man old enough to know better or another dumb, snotnosed kid.

The doctor leaned forward to press her hand on Logan’s belly.

“Are you having a contraction?” she asked. When Logan nodded, the doctor continued, “Breathe. And push.”

Keaton slid his left hand under the girl’s bony thigh to hold her leg up and took her hand in his.

“Squeeze as tight as you can, kid.”

Again, the doctor nodded her approval.

“Relax,” Dr. Holliday said softly. “That was good. You’re crowning. Do you know what that means?”

“No.”

“I can see your baby’s head, Logan.”

“I don’t care.”

“We’re gonna do it again, okay? On the next contraction, we’re gonna bear down and push.”

“You’re not doing it.”

Keaton marveled at the kid’s sharp tongue. Scared, but feisty.

“I’m helping you,” Dr. Holliday told her. “I’m gonna help you get this baby out. I’ve done this hundreds of times.”

“Ain’t your pussy all stuck and hurtin’,” the girl sneered.

“Nope, but I’ve given birth myself, so I know what you’re feeling.”

“I don’t want this baby.”

“Okay.”

Keaton met the doctor’s eyes. His body was frigid with fury—over how this fourteen-year-old girl had come to be lying in his stockroom, legs spread wide, with a baby on the way out of her body. The doctor, on the other hand, seemed completely chill. He understood that she wouldn’t let nerves or stress get to her, but how in the hell could she not want to kill whoever had gotten this kid pregnant?

“You don’t have to keep the baby,” Dr. Holliday said in that soothing, melodic voice. “But we do have to deliver it, okay? I just need you to help me, Logan.”

“Can’t you just get rid of it?”

Keaton wanted to vomit. Was she talking about abortion? He couldn’t wait to get out of there. Couldn’t wait to?—

What?

He didn’t know this girl. Didn’t know who had done this to her. Wasn’t like he had a target to kick the shit out of.

“Nope.” Dr. Holliday shook her head slightly. “We are too far along to do anything but deliver this child.”

Even if Dr. Holliday did a late term abortion, Logan would still have to go through the delivery process—the physical, and Keaton assumed, emotional and mental pain of labor.

“Keaton.”

He snapped his gaze back to the doctor’s.

“I need you to call 911. We’re gonna have to get Logan and the baby to Eastport as soon as this baby is born.”

“But—”

“I’ll be right there with you, Logan,” Dr. Holliday promised Logan. “Okay? I won’t leave you.”