Daisy drank water and stared at the icy spicules sliding down the window glass. Around midmorning, the backache increased, working itself into a slow rhythm.
It dawned on her slowly that the baby was not waiting until November. By afternoon the backache was an encircling python, and she could do nothing but pant and whimper, the steady rattle of rain dampening her moaning call for assistance.
She wriggled out of her heavy dress and put on her oldest nightgown. The pain increased to waves of cramping agony that left her gasping for breath, and on and on, the day fading into night, the rain torn away by the wind, the dark choking hours eternal.
Another dawn came sticky with the return of heat, and still, her raw loins could not deliver the child on the fourth afternoon, voiceless from calling for Kelvin, from screaming imprecations Jessica and Kelvin.
