“
You were in second-stage labour for more than five hours?’
‘That’s not bad, for a first baby. I was lucky.’
‘Proper full-on contractions?’ I asked. ‘For all that time?’
Em nodded.
‘And it wasn’t that bad?’
She shook her head, smiling.
‘Dad?’ I asked suspiciously. ‘Is this true?’
‘Not having been the one doing it, I couldn’t tell you. But I must say it didn’t look like a whole lot of fun from where I was standing,’ said Dad.
‘I knew it!’
‘It’s just the price humans pay for walking on our hind legs and having large brains,’ said Dad. ‘Very poor design, really – mothers with narrow pelvises and babies with big heads. I read somewhere that childbirth used to kill about one woman in ten. The rate of stillborn babies would have been much higher again, of course.’
‘One in ten?’ Mark repeated faintly.
‘About that. Not really a problem if you’re thinking survival of the species, but pretty rough on the individual. Don’t worry, Helen, medicine’s come a long way in the last couple of hundred years.’
‘Dad, I’m not scared I’m going to die. I’m just scared it’s going to hurt a lot.’
‘And she’ll probably get torn from arsehole to breakfast,’ Caitlin put in, carefully pushing her green beans to the side of her plate.
Mark choked.
‘Pardon me?’ Em said.
‘Granny said it.’
‘Granny,’ said Em grimly, ‘is an old witch.
”
”