The contractions woke her at two in the morning.
They were unlike anything she had felt before — not the gentle flutters of the baby moving, not the contractions that had come and gone over the past weeks. These were deep, powerful, rolling waves of pressure that started in her lower back and spread through her entire abdomen. They left her breathless.
She glanced at the clock on the nightstand. 2:07 AM.
She glanced at Franz, sleeping beside her, his face slack with exhaustion, his hand resting on her belly where he'd left it hours ago. He needed rest. He had barely slept in days.
She didn't wake him.
Instead, she sat up and reached for her phone. The contraction app was already open. She pressed the button as the current contraction peaked, then released it as the pain began to fade.
More than ten minutes apart.
