Hi, this is the Ward. Is Mandy awake? I looked over at the closed curtain in my dark and silent cabin. Of course Mandy wasn't awake. It was four in the morning. I'll go get her.
An equally bleary-eyed Mandy was soon clutching the phone. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. I'll be right there. It was only after she had disappeared out the door towards the hospital that I remembered that Mandy is a midwife back in Australia. And one of the patients on B Ward, Emmanuel, was being cared for by his eight-months-pregnant mother.
When we woke up in the morning, Mandy's curtain was shut tight again and a note on our bathroom mirror told us the news.
We had a beautiful baby girl at 0445. Pink and perfect with curly black hair.
When I went down to the ward later on to meet with one of the disciplers, the baby was wrapped up in a blanket and lying (all four and a half pounds of her) in a laundry basket on the end of the bed. Her exhausted mother was curled up next to her, and big brother Emmanuel, the real patient, had been relegated to a mattress under the bed. Everything on the ward was business as usual, except for the fact that a brand-new life was sleeping quietly in the corner. I touched her mother on the shoulder. You have done well. She answered with a tired smile. What the baby name? I asked, as Emmanuel poked his head out from under the bed, proclaiming to anyone and no one, That my sista! I love her!
The mama smiled again.She will be called Mercy.
