rare bird

My wife’s water broke on a Wednesday afternoon, right as I was getting off work. Perfect timing , I thought. My wife’s due date was the next day. She even does labor in a scheduled way . I had heard that if the water breaks, the baby has 24 hours to be born, after which she starts to lose oxygen. I had the image and sound of a ticking digital clock in my head as I walked down the long outside stairway of my employer's building, to my car. The sun was setting – it was a perfect moment. My wife’s bag was packed – we were ready. She was driving home from the auto dealership where she works. I would meet her there and we would go to the hospital together. It went according to plan. We arrived, they put us in a room, and hooked my wife up to a fetal monitor. It had an amber display, like an old IBM PC. The only graphic was a pulsating heart – keeping track of the baby’s heart rhythm was the machine’s main purpose. The room was cool inside – why are all hospital rooms that way? It must

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