Vanya Blue

At her final ultrasound appointment, and heavily pregnant, Mrs. Blue’s heartbeat quickened when she spotted the lump on her baby’s head. She gasped, panicked, placed one hand across her chest and one stretched out to her skinny husband, who struggled under the force of his wife’s grasp. Both hyperventilated, producing steam from their ears and noses. The weak husband quickly fainted, but the stronger Mrs. Blue held on for a moment more, until the doctor glanced worriedly at the monitor, then at her, then pulled on his collar nervously before turning back to the monitor. She couldn’t resist anymore, Mrs. Blue, so she fainted on the hospital bed, her unconscious husband at her side on the floor.

The doctor stood up slowly and inched away from the inert couple, opening the door slowly, taking one peek back, then ran out of the room with elation; he didn’t have to tell them the troublesome news. The timid nurse, first week out of school, remained in the room, hands and feet tightly together. She glanced from the husband, to the wife, to the door left ajar, from which she could hear yips of joy descending down the hall. Mustering up the ounce of courage, she shook her shoulders, and tapped the woman on the bed shyly until she awoke, bleary eyed and dangerous.

“Yes, yes, what happened now? Where’s the doctor?” Mrs. Blue muttered.

“Mrs. Blue, the doctor has uh… gone on break. In the meantime, I’ll finish up this appointment,” squeaked the nurse.

“Oh, right. I remember,” Mrs. Blue said, her face paling.

She gazed down at her husband, coiled up on the floor and drooling, then back up at the nurse beside the monitor.

“So, uh, what’s with the baby? Is it okay?” asked Mrs. Blue, clutching the back of her own head.

“Well, to be honest, ma’am, I am concerned about the baby. We’ll need to see the doctor. A lump like that could be a number of things; a tumor, an abnormally shaped skull, an incomplete…”

As the nurse went on listing diseases she’d never heard of before, life-threatening deficiencies and malignancies, Mrs. Blue couldn’t hold swooning like she had before. 

Left alone once more with the comatose couple, the nurse flipped between the monitor and the woman on the bed. Tip-toeing to the telephone, she rang for assistance, for a corps of nurses and doctors. The little nurse paced back and forth, sobbing intermittently until a knock came to the door. She opened it, peered meekly through the slit, and found one geriatric doctor and his pretty nurse.

“I’m scared,” she blubbered through the slit. “I’ve never seen anything like this.”

The gray doctor barely acknowledged her, pushing a hand through the door and limping inside with his young nurse. 

“Let’s see what we’ve gots here,” he gruffed, shakily adjusting his glasses and clipboard before sitting on a creaky stool.

He leaned forward until his nose touched the monitor, focused silently for a moment, then nodded to himself and tapped the screen twice.

“Yep, no good.”

He turned raggedly to the two nurses.

“Call the oncologist. We’ll gets a biopsy.”

The timid nurse tip-toed once more to the telephone and rang for the oncologist. Then all three paced back and forth, with the timid nurse blubbering again, waiting for the arrival of the next doctor. A knock came to the door, and the pretty nurse stood to answer it.

A young man with a thick black mustache stood armed with a tray full of equipment. He walked in confidently, nodded at the old doctor and two nurses, then sat beside the monitor.

“Odd,” he murmured, stroking his naked chin.

“What do you think?” cried the leaky nurse. “I hope it’s not a tumor…”

“No way to be sure yet,” announced the doctor, “but we’ll know soon enough.”

He pulled out his loaded tray and placed it in the arms of the crying nurse. He pulled out a syringe, the nurse turned away, and the oncologist took a specimen from the baby’s lump in Mrs. Blue’s womb.

“Well, folks,” he smiled sadly, “I’ll see you soon.” Then he walked out of the room.

The nurses and old doctor sat in quiet unison as they looked at the monitor.

“Gah!” screamed Mrs. Blue, shooting up from unconsciousness. She glared at the members in the room, then at her sleeping husband, then screamed even louder.

“Whats is it? What's wrong, woman?” yelled the old doctor.

Mrs. Blue squirmed, then looked down at the wet bed below her.

“I’m in labor!” she screamed. “Wake up, Jerry, your kid’s coming!” she pulled at her husband until he recoiled and shot up.

“Ah! What is it, Tabitha? What now?” he yelled.

“The baby’s coming!”

Mr. Blue swung back and forth, side to side, then murmured incoherently and fell back to the ground. Mrs. Blue huffed in equally-spaced gasps of air, pumping in and out quickly.

“Get.. uh.. The… uh… doctor!” she puffed.

The meek nurse ran around in circles, hyperventilating more than Mrs. Blue.

“Oh, sits down,” roared the gray doctor, limping towards Mrs. Blue. “Let’s see.”

He checked the monitor once more, then muttered to himself, running imaginary calculations in his head.

“Should fit,” he concluded.

Then he inched away to the phone and rang for a labor and delivery nurse. He stood patiently by the door, slowly tapping his foot until the chubby nurse arrived.

“Let’s see the baby!” she boomed, running towards Mrs. Blue.

She took her position at the foot of the bed, arms spread wide open as if to catch a flying football.

“Push!” she urged.

A panicked Mrs. Blue glanced unconvincingly at the doctor and nurses.

“What about the bump on its head? What if I need surgery because of it?”

“Unimportant,” the fat nurse assured. “Just get a-pushing!”

Countless hours into the agonizing labor, the oncologist returned to the room. He walked in confidently, then at the sight of the laboring Mrs. Blue, he fainted immediately.

“Moves him from the doorway,” the old doctor instructed the pretty nurse, who went over and swept the oncologist into a chair in one swift move. She bent over, picked up the paper he had dropped upon entering, then rejoined the crowd.

“Ah, the results of the biopsy,” he huffed. 

Silence fell upon the room, broken only by the grunting from the hospital bed. The doctor’s wrinkled, shaky fingers slowly tore the paper open. Then, adjusting his large-frame glasses, he found the results. 

“Biopsy reveals no sign of cancer,” he said.

Relief washed over, and Mrs. Blue yelled, “Well, what is it?”

“We…don’t know,” concluded the doctor.

Mrs. Blue, crying and laboring and screaming, finally stopped.

“Congratulations,” smiled the chubby nurse at the foot of the bed, holding a little baby in her big arms. “It’s a girl.”

The room crowded around the baby girl. Mrs. Blue held her unconscious husband by the collar, the nurses leaned forward, and the doctor stood beside Mrs. Blue.

The little baby girl had the longest golden hair, knotted in a spherical bun at the back of her head.

“How’d that happen,” murmured the chubby nurse, bringing her fingers up to comb through the girl’s hair.

The knot fell apart and her blonde locks fell gracefully around her small face.

Mrs. Blue grinned, then giggled, then cried tears of joy. The rest of the room smiled in sympathy.

“Welcome to the world, little Vanya Blue,” whispered Mrs. Blue, “The girl born with a golden knot in her pretty hair.”