"You've got this, Donna!"

I can feel her shake her head, but she doesn't say anything. She can't say anything.

"Breathe, Donna—don't forget to breathe."

She lets out a choked gasp; not enough to actually take in any air.

"Breathe, baby," I whisper in her ear, and she finally lets out a low, strangled moan. Her fingernails dig into my arm, surely drawing blood. I'm not going to complain. I have no place to complain. Compared to what she's going through, a little bloodshed on my end is nothing.

"Keep pushing, Donna!" the doctor exclaims, her voice muffled by the face mask.

"I can't," Donna whimpers, shaking her head again. I bury my face in her neck, trying to be strong for her. I don't think I'm succeeding. I don't know how to be strong for her like this. She's in agony, and I think I'm going to be the one to fall over. My wife is in labor and I don't think I'm going to survive it.

Hell, I can't even be with her the way a guy is supposed to be with the woman delivering his child. I tried—God knows I tried. I went to all the Lamaze classes with her and completed them successfully. I even managed to sit through several childbirth videos which were gross and horrifying in their own right, but I didn't get excessively squeamish.

However, in the delivery room at the hospital—even before that, when she started clutching her stomach and doubling over in pain—I found that I just couldn't watch it. I hate myself for it, too. All I want is to be there for her as she pushes our baby into the world and I feel like I'm failing miserably. I can't see her like that, though. I can't see her body practically tearing open and all the…stuff…that goes along with it. Every time she cries out, my vision gets fuzzy on the edges. I tried sitting behind her to do that whole supporting her thing so I could help her push, but I think I actually did pass out for a few seconds. Standing next to her wasn't much better because I could see all the clamps and scissors and syringes. Helping to hold one of her legs up was out of the question.

I hate myself. I'm not at all squeamish at the sight of blood or surgical instruments in general. My mental state wasn't spectacular at the time, but I had no trouble looking at and dressing my mangled hand after I put it through a window. I was able to watch the doctor give me stitches. As I was recovering from open heart surgery, I had no shortage of blood and ooze, both on me and on my dressings, and I never felt lightheaded. When it comes to Donna, though…all bets are off. Maybe it's because she's been so rarely injured that I haven't been able to develop coping techniques. More likely, it's because I love her so much that anything that so much as smells of her being hurt in anyway sends me into an emotional tailspin.

"Josh…" she moans, and I tighten my grip on her. I'm with her—of course I'm with her. I couldn't abandon her. Despite my body's very negative reaction to the whole process, I really do want to be here when our child is born. The only solution I had after everything else failed was to sit next to her on her bed and face the opposite direction. It's not ideal in the slightest but it keeps me in the room. I can't see any of the violent looking things happening to her body. The constant yelling and crying from Donna doesn't ease my mind much, but considering the reason she's yelling and crying, I'm doing my best to stay cognizant for her. I have my arm wrapped around her chest so she can bear down on me, and her hands have been clutching onto me almost the entire time.

"You can do this," I answer in her ear. "You're the strongest person in the world."

Her fingers dig into my arm again, another contraction sweeping through her. "I hate you," she gasps. Her entire body goes rigid. "You're never touching me again. I hate you."

I try not to take it personally. We were warned by a million different sources that women in labor tend to say some horrific things, and justifiably so. Donna swore up and down that she'd never say anything like that. I've always assumed she would. Still, that doesn't mean anything prepares you for your wife telling you she hates you, no matter how understandable the circumstances are.

"I love you so much," I answer, bracing myself so she can push against me. I turn my head slightly so I can see her, my insides clenching. Her face is dark red, her eyes screwed shut in pain. She's gritting her teeth so hard I'm surprised she hasn't broken them. All this to bring another person into the world? What the hell were we thinking?

What feels like an eternity later, the doctor tells Donna to relax and she collapses against me, panting. "If you really loved me," she says weakly, "you'd do this for me."

"You have no idea how much I wish I could," I answer sincerely. "You know I'd be terrible at it, though. I would have given up at the first bout of morning sickness." She chuckles quietly, her breathing still labored. "I know you can do this. You can do anything."

"This is so hard."

"I know, honey. I know." I don't know—not really—but it's all I can offer her. I know how hard it looks, and if it looks that hard, I can only imagine what it's like on her end.

She's been so amazing throughout the entire pregnancy, though. She handled the first trimester with the morning sickness and exhaustion and weird cravings like a champ. She never shirked her duties at work even though I freely admit that I would have. There's no way I could have handled nearly four solid months of puking and falling asleep on my feet and still manage to do my job efficiently. I would have called out of work for nine months straight, and after watching my wife put her body through hell and still manage to function as a person on a daily basis, I'm even more inclined to find a way to fix our healthcare system so that women who want to just focus on being pregnant can have that option, without relying on someone else around to support her.

I know one thing for sure—there are not many things in this world more beautiful than a pregnant Donna Moss-Lyman. I think she's only going to be more beautiful when she's actually holding our baby in her arms. I'd never given much thought to pregnancy before it happened to us, and therefore it never occurred to me how much a woman's body can change during the process. It's truly astonishing, and not always in the good way. I mean, her hips and pelvis actually shifted. I can't even imagine how much that sort of thing hurts. She's had a living creature growing and moving inside of her for more than forty weeks at this point, not that most of the outside world knew about that for a while. She didn't start to show to the world at large until well into the fifth month—something about her height and the way the baby was positioned—and we kept it mostly to us up until then. First time parents and all that. Of course, our friends knew—we told them eventually, at least. It wasn't so much out of superstition that we kept quiet about it, but more that we just liked having it be our little secret. Helen was the first person to figure it out; she claims it was the way Donna was standing one day—back arched, hands pressed to her lower back—that made all the pieces fall into place. After that, we figured we ought to tell everyone else.

But even after the people closest to us knew, we made an effort to not let the general public know. The interest in us has died down quite a bit in the last couple of years, but that doesn't mean we don't have the occasional rogue reporter trying to storm the gates in an attempt to unearth some scandal in the Moss/Lyman household. The last thing we wanted was a large group of overzealous journalists harassing Donna when she was exhausted and, at times, near the point of collapse. I'd told her many times by that point that if anyone did anything to stress her out or in any way threaten our unborn child, I wouldn't be held accountable for my actions.

Suddenly, all those thinly veiled threats I've gotten from my father-in-law over the years started to make sense. Donna's dad is a generally nice guy, but he makes it known to all of his kids' mates that he won't tolerate anyone doing something to cause distress to his family. I had no idea what the gender was of our baby—still don't—but I don't really care. Anyone hurts it or my wife, I'll hurt them worse.

Of course, though, the media started to ask questions eventually. While Donna didn't look super pregnant, she definitely started to look different. She was doing that whole "glowing" thing. She claims it was from sweating constantly as she carried around a fetus, whether because of changes it causes in her body temperature or because of her constant nausea, but all I could see what some crazy, powerful light shining from within. Her body changed, even if she didn't immediately look pregnant—hell, she didn't even have to change a lot of her wardrobe at first. Mostly, she just wore slightly roomier shirts or more jackets. Still, a few people started catching on, and then started to make noise. I don't know why they cared so much, but it started to be a big deal that we were having a baby but not telling anyone. I don't even remember what event it was when a few reporters and photographers accosted my wife. She was wearing one of those dresses that seems to make everyone look knocked up, and someone finally demanded to know why she was hiding her pregnancy. Donna, bless her, just smiled beatifically and ran her hands over her belly, pulling the dress tight enough so that there wasn't a doubt in the world that she was lugging around a little Lyman, and said, "I'm not hiding anything." Then she just walked away. The upside was that from then on, I could put my hands all over her stomach in public, getting to feel the baby every time in kicked and moved. As predicted, it made a bit of a story for a few weeks, but no one could manage to create a scandal out of it. It turns out that two consenting, married adults having a child doesn't raise a lot of eyebrows.

"Ready to push again?"

The doctor's voice pulls me out of my reverie and I look at Donna, trying to gauge her reaction. I know that it's really a rhetorical question—she doesn't have much choice in the matter. The baby is really in control at this point. I glance down at her bare stomach, somehow startled to see it moving and shifting, the skin and muscles tightening and flexing as our kid tries to make its way into the world.

"No," she answers weakly, shaking her head.

"Yes, you are," I whisper into her hair. "You can do this."

"Go to hell," she growls at me, practically transforming into the embodiment of fury before my eyes.

The doctor gives me an amused look and shrugs—I'm sure she's seen this before with all the babies she's delivered during her career. It's super fun.

Not that I'm faulting Donna's reaction to anything. I can't begin to imagine what this feels like for her—though she did paint the oh-so-lovely and graphic picture of shoving a watermelon out of a nostril. She's been freaking me out since we got to the hospital, though. Maybe I've seen too many movies, but I thought she'd get to her room and park in a bed until it was time for her to push, which would be maybe a couple of hours after we checked in. Oh, boy, was I wrong. She's been like a caged animal, constantly prowling around her room and the hospital corridors, pacing, grabbing onto railings as she tried breathe deeply while bent over, dropping into a squat suddenly as a contraction overtook her. She's been shifting between insane mama lion mode and back into the Donna I've always known, able to carry on normal conversations with me, the staff, and any of the other patients roaming the hospital corridors that stopped by early on. The doctors and nurses said it was completely fine and natural for her to want to move around or to be restless, and since she wasn't all the way dilated, it wasn't huge concern. Easy for them to say. They didn't have to watch her actually crawl on the floor as she moaned in agony.

And clothing! She's been refusing to wear much of anything. She started off in a hospital gown then stripped down to a tank top and her underwear. It wasn't long before she'd taken everything off, claiming to not give a damn because it felt like her body was ripping apart and she couldn't handle clothing. Eventually, she wound up wearing some band thing around her chest to support her breasts, which have been growing at an exponential rate over the last couple of months. I managed to talk her into wearing her gown in the hallway, but only barely. She told me that all the other people on our floor were going through the same thing and could give a damn what she was wearing. Even now, the only thing she has on is that little band. The medical staff just looked at me like I'd sprouted wings and a tail when I expressed concern, letting me know that her comfort was the most important part, and that it wasn't at all uncommon for women to give birth in nothing at all. I shouldn't be surprised that I'm excessively ignorant when it comes to birthing practices. I only learned today that some women give birth in pools or tubs. That just weirds me out.

"You have to push anyway," the doctor says, patting Donna's knee. "The baby's crowning."

Donna's eyes fly open, and even I stare at the doctor in shock. That means she can see the baby's head. Oh, my God…

Even though she's wearing a mask, I can see the doctor grin at me, winking. "Want to take a peek, Dad?"

I shake my head vigorously, but a second later I force myself to scoot down toward my wife's hips. I don't know why I'm compelled to do it. It's probably going to make me pass out. But I also don't think that I want to live with knowing I didn't at least try.

I angle my head, my eyes growing wide. This looks nothing like I'm used to. I'm thoroughly in love with my wife and have spent many hours exploring and studying her body, even during the pregnancy—at least when she'd let me—so I'm very familiar with what she usually looks like. But this…now…there's the actual top of a head coming out of her. Knowing this is what happens and seeing it happen are two entirely different things.

"Oh, my God, Donna, how are you doing this?" I ask, horrified. My brain can't wrap around it. How can a person have another person this size coming out of them? More to the point, how can either of them survive it? It looks so…so…traumatizing.

"Shut. Up," she groans, her body hunching forward as she pushes. I can see the baby's head shift. I hear a ringing in my ears. "Do not faint," Donna says, and I look up to find her staring at me beseechingly. "Get back up here. I'm not doing this alone."

"Donna…there's a person exiting you!"

She grits her teeth, her face turning red as her body tenses and stomach tightens. I swear I can see the baby moving beneath her skin. Maybe I can. "Josh!" she groans. "I know what's happening to me if you don't shut up so help me God I will kill you where you stand now GET UP HERE!" I'm actually a little amazed that she said all that in one long breath as she was attempting to breathe through the pain, and I don't hesitate to do what she says, resuming my position by her side. I want to encourage her. I want to tell her that she's completely amazing and that she's actually a warrior and that I don't understand how anyone can see a woman do this and still consider them to be the weaker sex. I couldn't do this. I can barely be present for it. But I don't know how to say something that won't enrage her.

She clutches onto me, bearing down, her mouth open in a silent scream. I don't know if I've ever felt more helpless in my life. My wife is in excruciating pain and there is absolutely nothing I can do to share that burden.

"Breathe, Donna!" one of the nurses yells. "You have to breathe!"

Hoping she won't eviscerate me, I breathe softly in her ear, using the techniques we learned in Lamaze, quietly saying "inhale" and "exhale" when it's time. Fortunately, she only focuses on the actual breathing, finally taking deep breaths as the contraction starts to abate.

"I'm never doing this again," she mumbles, slumping against me. "Please…please…don't make me."

I shake my head vigorously. "That's fine. Anything you want. I promise. This is our only kid."

She sniffles, rubbing her face against my shoulder, and I feel my insides twist. Now she's crying. On top of all the other things happening to her right now, she's crying. I didn't think it'd ever be possible for me to regret sex with Donna, but right now, I'm having serious doubts.

"I feel like I'm splitting in two," she moans.

I rub her back. "That's normal," another nurse says, casually checking Donna's vitals. I glower at her over my wife's head, but it doesn't faze her.

"I can't push any more. I'm done. I'm not doing this. The baby can just stay in there." She cringes, and I can tell another contraction is on its way, but she just shakes her head. "No."

"I don't think it works like that, honey," I whisper, trying to work the tight muscles at the base of her spine. She just reels back, practically spitting at me.

"I don't care what you think! You did this to me!" She cringes again, one of her hands clutching her stomach as the skin bunches up again. "I hate you!" she half yells, half sobs. "I hate you, I hate you, I—"

"Donna!" the doctor exclaims sternly, standing up just a little from between her legs. "You can yell all you want to. I encourage it. It helps. But right now I need you to focus on getting this baby out of you. It's happening one way or another but it's going to be a hell of a lot easier if you stop fighting it. I need you to push. Stop being mean to Josh. You were an active participant in this blessed event so it's just as much your fault as his, but right now this baby doesn't care. The baby just wants to be born, so work with me."

Donna stares at the doctor, eyes wide and full of tears. "It hurts," she says weakly.

"I know it does," Dr. Koger answers not unsympathetically. "I know you're tired. This is the hardest part. You just have to stop fighting it." Donna nods, swallowing heavily. "And let Josh help. You've told me yourself how much he's done for you during all this—don't push him away now." Donna nods again, tightening her grip on my arm. "Okay—I need you to push. Push, Donna."

Donna grits her teeth again, sitting forward as much as she can. I put my other hand on her back, trying to help keep her up. "Breathe," I remind her, and for once, she doesn't threaten my life. She just lets out a long, slow breath that trails off into a low wail.

"Good girl," the doctor says, resuming her position. "Just a couple more big pushes, okay? The head's almost out and once the shoulders come out, it's all over." Donna pushes again with all her might, one hand holding onto my arm, the other gripping the railing of her bed.

"Stop," Dr. Koger demands. "Breathe again. Take a few seconds. Let the next contraction tell you what to do." What the hell? We're paying this woman for advice like this?

Donna leans against me again, and I push her damp hair off her sweaty forehead. Most of it is pulled up into a big knot on the top of her head, but considering she's been essentially running a marathon for the last ten hours, some of it has understandably escaped. One of the nurses hands me an ice bag and I press it against Donna's neck and back and face, hoping to help in some way.

"Thank you," she mumbles a few seconds before she makes a face. "Oh, God."

"Breathe and push, Donna," the doctor commands. "Breathe and push. You're almost done."

Donna breathes, yelling out at every exhale—long, mournful wails, sounds I didn't know anyone could make. I focus on her profile, telling her to breathe, trying to will every bit of strength I have into her exhausted body.

"Head's out!" the doctor exclaims excitedly. "Keep pushing! Keep pushing!"

Donna leans forward more. Her body is so tense it feels like granite beneath my fingers. She yells louder than ever. I just want this to be over. I can't handle Donna in this kind of pain anymore. I don't—

"Stop pushing," the doctor says suddenly. I glance over my shoulder to see the doctor working busily between Donna's legs, but I'd swear she's grinning. "You two want to meet your baby?"

Without waiting for an answer, the doctor starts to lift her arms and time stops. Everything goes in slow motion. I can hear my heart thumping. A small, gooey mass appears, eyes shut, mouth open, looking like nothing I've ever seen. All I can do is stare.

"Oh, my God," I hear Donna whisper, jolting me back into regular time. "Josh…"

"Congratulations," Dr. Koger says, standing up. "It's a girl."

"A girl," I repeat, dumbfounded. "We have a daughter?"

The doctor just grins, putting the baby on Donna's chest, whose hands automatically come up to hold her in place. I quickly shift my position until I'm facing the same direction as my wife; all the better to stare at this tiny creature. For her part, Donna still looks shocked, as if she can't quite register what's happening. I know the feeling.

"You want to cut the cord, Dad?" someone asks softly, and scissors appear in my line of vision. I don't particularly—I want to stare at my daughter—but I grab them anyway, cutting through the spot the nurse indicates, only sort of registering the strange sensation and how much it should be freaking me out to be cutting a piece of my wife and child.

The baby twitches a little, her tiny face scrunching up just before she lets out a loud wail. It's the strangest sound in the world. It's not quite human, but I wouldn't begin to know how to describe it. That's all it takes, though, because Donna starts crying, too—weeping, really. She runs her fingers over our slimy, naked baby, checking all the fingers and toes, making sure that everything's in place.

"It's our baby, Josh!" she exclaims, looking at me in wonder for half a second before she goes back to the squalling baby. "It's okay. I know. Mommy's crying, too. It's been a big day."

As soon as Donna says "Mommy," I'm a goner. I press my face into her shoulder as tears of my own fill my eyes. I'm suddenly completely overwhelmed by a love I've never known for this tiny, beautiful, perfect creature in Donna's arms. I feel like I'm being punched from the inside out. I reach out and run my fingers over the baby's arm, amazed at how real she is. She's been such an abstract for me during the pregnancy. Of course, I've loved feeling her move and kick, and I talked and sang to Donna's belly as often as she'd let me, but I didn't realize until this point just how much I didn't know my child, how unreal she felt. Her tiny hands flail and I carefully push my index finger into her palm, falling apart all over again when her even tinier, delicate fingers closer around me.

I will do anything for this little person. Absolutely anything. There is no request too outlandish, no wish too impossible for my little girl.

"We need to get her cleaned up," one of the nurses says softly, her hands already gently lifting the baby from Donna's arms. I watch in distress as our tiny bundle gets bustled off to the other side of the room. Donna makes a noise next to me.

"She'll be back in a second," Dr. Koger reassures, repositioning herself between Donna's legs. "She just needs to be weighed and measured and wrapped up." Donna's stomach twitches a couple of times and the doctor stands up a moment later. I feel all the blood rush out of my head at the mass of…goo she's holding. "The placenta, Josh," she tells me in an exasperated voice. "You might want to look away."

I shudder and turn my head, pressing my lips to Donna's temple. "You're so amazing," I whisper. Hot tears still trickle down my cheeks as I feel a rush of absolute pride in my wife and her ability to produce life. Our daughter is still testing out her lungs, wailing indignantly as her small army of nurses checks her over to make sure she's all right.

"She's amazing," Donna answers, staring at the baby. "Have you ever seen anything so perfect?"

"Only once," I confirm. "But that was a million years ago in a makeshift office in New Hampshire."

She turns her head to me quickly, a fresh set of tears welling up in her eyes even as she smiles. "I love you," she tells me, tilting her face toward mine.

That's certainly a far cry from the things she was shouting not five minutes ago, but I'm not about to look a gift horse in the mouth. "I love you more," I answer, pressing my lips to hers.

We part a few seconds later, pressing our foreheads together. "Thank you for giving me something so amazing."

I can only laugh a little before I press my lips to hers again. "I just contributed my DNA. You did the hard stuff."

The baby's crying gets louder suddenly and we look up before we can get into a one-up contest over who loves who more. The nurse smiles at us, passing the tiny bundle of blankets back to Donna, who cuddles our daughter to her chest once more. My heart actually clenches at the sight, choking me up. Donna was meant to be a mother. She was meant to be many things, really, and has succeeded in a lot of them, but she looks completely serene as she holds our child tenderly.

"Are you still upset, sweetheart?" she coos, rocking the baby ever-so-slightly. "I don't blame you. That was hard, wasn't it? It's okay. It's okay. Mommy's here. I'm not going to let anything hurt you." Amazingly, or maybe not, all things considered, the baby starts to calm down, her cries tapering off as Donna talks to her. I reach out and run my finger carefully over her tiny, soft cheek.

"Do we have a name?" the nurse asks, smiling at us gently. I look at Donna, tilting my head just a little as her eyes meet mine. We've talked about it, of course, and made a list of about a thousand different names, though nothing we could settle on completely. Part of it was because we decided to wait to find out the gender, and part of it was because we didn't want to get our hearts set on a name that might end up feeling wrong. Donna wisely pointed out that we could meet our baby and find that none of the names that we loved could work, so it might be better to wait.

"You pick," I tell her softly, not wanting to disturb my suddenly quiet daughter. It's only fair. She carried the baby around for all those months, and went through the hard part of giving birth. I'm sure if I absolutely hate the name she decides on, I can say something, but I think Donna's more than earned the right to name our child.

She smiles down at the baby, pulling her closer to place a gentle kiss on her forehead. "Rebecca," she finally says.

"Rebecca?" the nurse confirms, smiling at us. "That's beautiful." I just nod, because suddenly that's exactly who she is.

Donna nods, too, grinning from ear to ear. "Yeah; Rebecca. Rebecca Joan Lyman."

"Moss-Lyman," I immediately correct. We'd settled on giving our unborn child—and any future children—just my last name some time ago, but hearing Donna say it didn't feel right. The baby—Rebecca—is both of us, and she should have both of our names. Donna's choice of middle name hits me a few long seconds later. "Wait…Rebecca Joan?"

She sniffles a little, running her fingers carefully over Rebecca's tiny head. "Yeah. I want her to have a piece of her aunt with her at all times, and when she asks about her aunt Joanie, you can tell her all the wonderful things you remember about your big sister, and she can feel connected to her."

I can't help it—I actually sob for a few seconds, burying my face in Donna's neck. I wasn't prepared for that. Joan only came up as a name option once or twice months ago, and I truly hadn't put much thought into using it. Most of the time, I don't miss my sister in a real way. I've gotten so used to her being gone that it's just a part of me. Sometimes it's a very faint, very dull ache, and sometimes it's so sharp that it feels like she just died yesterday, but it's still not something I think about usually in anything other than an abstract way. It's been too many years. Donna definitely never had the chance to meet her; hell, Donna wasn't even born yet when Joanie died. It means everything to me that Donna wants to pass my sister on to our daughter in this small way.

"Rebecca Joan Moss-Lyman?" the nurse repeats, and we both nod. "Perfect. What a sweet name. Now, what do you say we get you settled in to your room so you can get some rest?"

This one has a second chapter that will posted within the next few days. This was just one of those ideas I couldn't get away from. Hope everyone likes schlock.