Her eyes filled.
“She kept saying, ‘It’s so pretty. It’s so pretty.’ Over and over. Between the contractions. Like she was holding on to that tree to keep from drowning.”
“The baby was born at 4:17 in the morning,” Dr. Hale said quietly. “A healthy boy. Seven pounds, two ounces.”
My father. My father was born at 4:17 in the morning.
“The agency woman was supposed to take him right away,” Grandma said. “She was waiting in the hallway with a car seat. But she’d fallen asleep in a chair out there. It was four in the morning. And Ruth was crying and crying and begging, ‘Please. Just let me see him. Just once. Just for one minute.’”
Grandma looked down at her hands.
“And I broke the rules.”
“What did you do?” I whispered.
“I picked him up off the scale,” she said. “I wrapped him in a blanket. And I put him in his mother’s arms.”
