“I WILL NEVER UNSEE THIS,” JOSH SAYS, HIS FACE IS PALER THAN usual.

I bet he’s regretting those two lox bagels he ate on the way to class. I warned him, but did he listen? No. He presses his hand against his stomach and moans. “Look away,” I whisper.

We’re sitting next to each other on a maroon velvet floor cushion, facing a large flat screen television. He shakes his head, and a lock of black hair falls across his forehead. His eyes are wide, and a look of horror flickers across his face. “Can’t…can’t look away.”

I’d laugh, but I can’t look away either. Every time I try, my eyes are pulled back to the graphic scene. My hand rests on Josh’s thigh and I squeeze his leg.
It’s the last day of our birthing class and today we get to watch a full, explicit, should-be-rated-R close-up of a live birth.
Our instructor, Tillie Bloom, is a short, round woman in her sixties. She has a spray tan, wears dozens of plastic bangles on each arm, and likes lilac-colored lipstick.
Every Saturday morning for the last eight weeks, we’ve crowded into the patchouli-scented living room of her Brooklyn Heights townhouse with eight other expecting couples.
Tillie’s tastes run to the eclectic. She has beaded curtains, enough indoor plants to fill a greenhouse, and floor cushions instead of couches. Hannah recommended her because she teaches pain-free birthing using hypnosis and on a whim I signed up. Pain-free sounded good.
For eight weeks now I’ve practiced putting myself in a deep relaxed state so that not even a baby ripping my vagina will faze me. Speaking of, the video shows the baby’s head crowning, and yup, sure enough, there’s tearing.
Josh leans closer and grips my shoulder.
“Gemma. Do you remember that scene from Alien? The one you had to close your eyes for?”
I turn and Josh is so close our noses almost touch. His eyes are brimming with self-deprecating laughter at his own unmanly horror. I get it. It’s all that fluid, and blood, and that big, fat baby’s head.
“I remember,” I say.
His nose rubs against mine and I think he’s about to drop a kiss on my lips. But then he says, in a serious voice, “This. Scene. Is. Worse.”
A laugh spills out of me and Josh smiles in appreciation. He must realize this movie is freaking me out too (in six weeks this will be me!) and he’s trying to make it better.
See, this is why I love him.
I drop my head into the crook of Josh’s arm. He makes a happy noise and sets his free hand on my stomach. Then he starts a slow, rhythmic circle rubbing over my belly. The baby is lodged over on my right side, nearest Josh. When he shifts and pushes against me, I imagine he’s trying to get closer to Josh.
I know how he feels.”
I take a deep breath and draw in the comforting smell of ink and laundry soap. Josh was up early working and there are black ink blotches on his fingertips and staining his gray t-shirt. He’s hurrying to finish his latest installment before the baby’s born.
He has a month-long publicity tour coming up for the miniseries Grim, which is based on his web comic, our wedding and honeymoon, and then the baby. He wants to be finished with the latest episodes and the publicity tour before the baby’s born so that he can take a month off to be with him.
Or her.
Josh says her. I say him. We’ll find out soon.
We have six weeks to fit everything in.
Wedding, honeymoon, tour, then baby.
I sigh and lean further into Josh.
Tomorrow we’ll be married. I try to imagine what it’ll be like to be Mrs. Gemma Lewenthal. What it’ll be like to stand in my parents’ backyard, under the wedding gazebo that Josh, Dylan, and my dad built and say “I do.”
I even try to picture what Josh will do when he finally sees me in my wedding dress, walking down the aisle.
I lift my head up and peek at him.
He looks down at me, and when he sees my expression he lifts his eyebrows.
“What?” he mouths.
“Just thinking about tomorrow,” I whisper.
A slow smile spreads over his face and he pulls me closer until I’m resting against him.
Then he drops his lips next to my ear and whispers, “Tomorrow day, or tomorrow night?”
I elbow him and he lets out a whoosh of air.
“How can you say that while we’re watching this?” I nod my head at the television screen.
He chuckles and his laughter tickles my ear. “I’m compartmentalizing. It’s a skill.”
I grin at him.
The live birth is coming to its gory conclusion.
And it is not pretty. After the baby comes the placenta. Why didn’t I know you also have to push out the placenta? AKA, the afterbirth.
Tillie’s bracelets jangle as she claps her hands, “Isn’t it beautiful, class? Look at the miracle of life! Your body is miraculous. You too will expand and flow and stretch until your baby makes its way out. Your canal starts the width of a quarter and then expands to the width of a melon.”
She makes a small hole with her fingers and then makes a little whoooop noise as she expands her hands in front of her face. Then she pops her smiling head out of her finger hole, ending the whole scene with a smacking noise.
I flinch and Josh pats my shoulder reassuringly.
The video fades to black.
I’m not sure what everyone else thought about the movie. Josh and I have front row seats. The others, veterinarian Ramesh and his dog walking wife Angelie, surgeon Lee and her calligrapher boyfriend Carl, Type-A couple Vera and Tucker, and all the rest, have been quiet throughout.
There’s silence as Tillie walks to the front of the room and pulls the gold silk sheet back over the TV. The large flat screen doesn’t mesh with her beaded curtains, or potted plants and floor cushions, so she likes to keep it covered.
She takes a moment to smile at each one of us, her lilac-colored lipstick stretching across her face.
“Before we close our session,” she says in her soothing, hypnotic voice, “I want to remind all of you that you won’t be able to enjoy sexual relations for six to eight weeks after delivery. Your body needs time to heal.”
Josh’s hand stops moving on my belly. He blows out a long, woe-is-me breath. When I scowl at him, his eyes crinkle up in a smile.
“But that is the least of your worries,” Tillie says.
Then she opens her arms wide, gesturing at all of us, and her bracelets clatter. “Be aware, your relationship post-baby will change drastically. Dads, partners, you may feel left behind, unloved, possibly abandoned. Moms, you may feel overwhelmed, confused, exhausted, consumed by your new responsibilities. Many couples fall apart, or their love fades, all due to the strain of parenthood. It’s easy for relationships to play second fiddle to being a parent. I’d caution each of you—everything is about to change.”
She takes a moment to give each of us wobbly lilac-colored smile. “I hope it’s a good change, not a bad change. But it will be a change. Good luck.”
I stare at Tillie, shocked by her downer announcement. Up until today she’s been all “your body is a miracle, go into the relaxation of your mind, sink into the space where you feel no pain.” I wasn’t expecting her latest announcement. From the uncomfortable silence around the room, no one else was expecting it either.
Josh squeezes my arm. When I look over at him he lifts an eyebrow at me in question.
“Are things going to change between us?” I whisper.
He shakes his head, a look of pure confidence on his face. I love him for that confidence.
“Not a chance, Gem.” He points between us. “You and me. As long as there’s a sky above, we’ll keep on loving each other. Guarantee it.”
“That’s what I thought.”
Things may change for some. Love may fade for some. But not for us.
Josh pulls me in between his legs and settles his arms around me. While Tillie gives her closing speech, reminding us about the power of our cervixes, and our uteruses, and our minds, Josh leans close and whispers, “We’re getting married tomorrow.”
My smile stretches so wide across my face my cheeks ache. This is what happiness feels like.