The Birthing

“What’s taking you so long, Lees?!”

“I’m coming! I just had to… Oh, lord! It’s coming already?”

“No, Leesa, it’s not coming. It’s here!”

She practically threw the horse blankets at Trey. “This is all I could find. Do we have any idea who she is yet? Or how she ended up here of all places?”

Kneeling into the straw Leesa gathered some and placed it into one of the unfolded blankets. Trey lifted the slippery mass of bloody and white gunk covered flesh out of the straw at the nameless woman’s ankles and placed it gently into the hastily prepared cocoon. “Not a clue, but I have an idea. Look at the inside of her thigh.”

“No! Don’t you think that’s a little too intimate?! She just gave birth!”

“No, no. There’s a mark…some kind of a symbol. I thought you might be able to tell me who she is, or at least where she came from. Switch me spots and take a look. I have to find something to cut this cord with.” He was looking around the stable with a half-crazed glaze lighting his eyes from behind the sockets. “I certainly hope this is not something I will ever have to walk in on in the dead of night again in this lifetime, or any other. I much prefer encountering laboring horses in barns to people.”

Leesa spotted the bale cutters and scrambled for them on her knees, holding the newborn in the crook of one arm. “These will have to do, I’m afraid, unless you want to try to navigate a sickle or – heaven forbid – that rusty pitchfork.” She slid them to Trey and slid into his abandoned spot in front of the half-conscious woman writhing in the straw. She tried to find the marking he had referred her to, but when she saw the obstruction she plopped the baby into his arms and rolled up her sleeves.

“Um, Trey, I don’t think she’s quite done yet. Toss me one of the other blankets.” Thirty minutes and two more slimy little packages later the new mother finally collapsed into a fitful sleep as Leesa and Trey stared wide-eyed and exhausted at the bundles they were both juggling. The mother hadn’t uttered one word the entire time. When they finally came out of their respective stupors Trey located the wheelbarrow in the middle of an empty stall and brought it round. He deposited all three occupied horses’ blankets onto a pile of clean straw in its bucket and leaned back into the wall, then tilted back on his heels in exhaustion. Leesa went outside to the well and drew a bucket of cold water. It would have to do. They hadn’t had time to run back to the house to heat water and retrieve any linens.

As she was cleaning off the mother’s nether regions with the remnants of her newest - and prettiest - apron she tried to remember where she’d seen that mark before. It wasn’t a brand, nor was it a tattoo. It was some sort of birthmark, but had a very distinct pattern to it – almost like a crest of some sort. She picked up more apron shreds and moved to the newest arrivals and gently bathed away the gunk. They didn’t seem to mind the cold water one bit. Two boys and a girl. One boy and the girl fair-haired, the other boy already had a jet-black shock of mane in the middle of his head looking like it was ready for a first haircut. Leesa noticed they all had the same types of markings as their mother on different parts of their scrawny bodies. The mother was still out cold, but at least she could see her chest gently rising and falling. Why hadn’t she spoken though? Not one word. Just whimpers as each child made their entrance.

Leesa figured the woman had been there for a while, as she had been literally chomping on a leather bridle when Trey had yelled for her to meet him at the stables immediately. She had just pulled the last loaf of bread from the oven and was on her way to retrieve a jar of preserves from the old root cellar for next morning’s breakfast. The ranch was in the middle of nowhere. They had fallen in love with it as soon as they’d set eyes on it. It had been an inheritance from Trey’s father. Leesa had settled into the pioneer ranch life like she was Laura Ingalls Wilder, incarnate. The prior morning the storm had knocked the telephone out, but they still had the generator, and now she was glad she’d insisted on Trey keeping the cast iron stove in the corner of the old kitchen as they'd remodeled and updated around it. This was her heaven. It gave her the privacy they needed away from questioning busybodies. No one liked a true gypsy, and she wasn’t accepted in town. The reception was icy, in fact. Word sure traveled fast in a small town when an ‘undesirable’ with natural gifts was forced into the fold of one of the most prominent families in Santee County by a wayward son. Her gifts had served her well, though. And like they say – you can’t help who you fall in love with.

The identity of the woman was still gnawing at her as she watched her steady breathing. She knew that crest. And all three of the babies having the same marking? She’d have to consult her family if she couldn’t figure it out on her own. In the meantime – enlist Trey to help get the mother and new charges safely into the house and get some nourishment into them all somehow. Contacting a doctor would have to wait ‘til morning. Trey abhorred cell phones, but there wouldn’t be reception here anyway, so they had forgone the unnecessary expense until technology was acknowledged in their corner of the world. She had her holistic training she could fall back on in the meantime. On top of it all, it was quite a brilliant full moon tonight. A strange and wild night failed to describe what they’d just ushered in, unbeknownst to them. Leesa felt an uneasiness along with her curiosity.