Speeding to the Hospital

The temperature outside was about ten degrees. With the wind-chill factor, it was below zero. But inside it was warm and snug. Liz was eight months pregnant. She lugged her swollen belly into the living room. Her husband, Tony, was reclining on the couch, swigging straight from a bottle of bottom-shelf whisky and smacking his lips.
“For God's sake, Tony,” Liz said. “It's only eleven in the morning.”
“It's Saturday,” Tony said. “I don't have to teach today. Might as well start drinking early.”
He lit a Marlboro, took a deep drag, and closed his eyes.
“Tony, please, not in the house.”
Tony coughed and spat phlegm into his ashtray. “Fuck we buy a house for if I can't smoke in it?”
“The baby's breathing the second-hand smoke.”
“He doesn't even breathe yet. He's swimming around in you like a fish. He's got gills or something.”
“He gets it through me. We share blood. Whatever I breathe, he breathes.”
Tony lifted a butt cheek and let out a long slow fart, like air released from a tire.
“Breathe that,” he said.
“You're disgusting,” Liz said.
She opened a window and a gust of snow blew in. Tony drew on his cigarette.
“Close the window,” he said. “It's fucking freezing.”
“Really?” she said. “I feel fine. Nice and toasty, like roasting chestnuts.” She tried not to shiver.
“You've got insulation,” Tony said. “I'm not a fatass like you.”
“I'm eight months pregnant.”
“You're pregnant in your ass? You got a pair of twins growing in your thighs?”
Angry blood pulsed to Liz's temples. “At least we know your dick's not pregnant, Mr. Three-Inch.”
“You're letting out the heat,” Tony said. Heat costs money—money I have to work for. I guess you don't care since you don't have to work.”
“I'm on maternity leave!”
“Is that what you call it? I call it being a lazy fatass.” He was slurring his speech now.
“I worked in that god damn mail room till my third trimester! And I made thirty cents more than you.”
Tony took a swig of whisky. “Shut your fucking mouth and shut the fucking window.”
“Fuck you!”
Tony flicked his cigarette. It landed in her hair, stuck in her curly tangles.
“Motherfucker!” she screamed, swatting through her hair.
Tony laughed, coughing fresh phlegm into his throat. He hocked it up to his mouth and spat in the ashtray. Liz knocked the cigarette to the ground, where it scorched a small hole on the white carpet. She stomped it out. Then she sucked on her burned fingers. They tasted like cigarettes.
“You son of a bitch.”
“Easy does it, Liz.”
He pulled out a fresh Marlboro and lit it—he had smoked the other one only halfway before flicking it.
Liz charged at Tony. He jumped back, almost dropping his whisky. Liz swatted the ashtray to the floor. A wet brown sludge with cigarette butts soaked the carpet.
“You better clean that up,” Tony said. “Or are you on maternity leave from cleaning the house too?”
“Fuck you!”
He flicked his new cigarette at her. It flew wide of the target, several inches to the left of her head.
“Fucker!” she screamed.
She grabbed for the whisky bottle. He slapped her across the face. She tried to scratch his eyes, but he grabbed her arms. They fell to the ground, wrestling and cursing at each other.
“I'll kill you!” Liz screamed. “I'll pretend to make up with you. Then when you're asleep, I'll chop off your dick!”
She bit him on the shoulder. He screamed and kneed her in the gut. She gasped. A sharp pain seized her belly. Hot wetness flooded her pants.
Tony smirked. “Did you piss yourself?”
“No.”
“I'd say you pissed yourself.”
“My water broke. That's amniotic fluid, not pee.”
“Oh, fuck!”
Tony jumped up. He tried to help Liz to her feet, but she slapped his hand away.
“Get your shoes,” Tony said. “I gotta get you to the hospital.”
“I'll take a cab!”
“You will not.”
“You're too drunk to drive.”
“It's only a five-minute drive.”
“It's at least fifteen.”
“Not the way I'll be driving.”
“I'm not going anywhere with you, wife beater!”
“You were hysterical. Hitting a hysterical woman doesn't count as wife beating.”
Her belly screamed in pain. She needed to get to the hospital and she didn't care how she got there. A minute later she buckled herself into the passenger seat of Tony's rusty old Ford pickup truck. Tony tried to squeeze his whisky bottle in the cup holder, but it didn't fit.
“A square peg in a round hole” he laughed.
He held the bottle between his legs and started the Ford. They crunched over salt and fresh snow. Tony pressed the accelerator. Liz gripped her seat.
“Slow down,” she said. “The roads are slippery.”
“If you really want to piss me off, keep telling me how to drive.”
She glanced at the speedometer. He was doing 50 in a 35.
“You're gonna get pulled over,” she said.
Tony laughed. “The cop'll just escort us to the hospital, lights flashing, siren blaring. I'm allowed to speed. I'm driving to the hospital with my wife who's in labor.”
“I'm not in labor. This is something else, something unnatural.”
“If you want the cops to escort us to the hospital, you better tell 'em you're in labor.”
As Tony brought the whisky bottle to his mouth, the Ford hit a pothole. A loud crack came from Tony's mouth.
“Motherfucker!!!” He gripped the bottle tightly to stop it from sloshing his legs. “Why don't they fix this god damn road?! Oh for fuck's sake—I swallowed the fucking tooth!!!”
He clenched his teeth in a smile and looked in the rear-view mirror at his reflection. There was a jagged black gap where half a front tooth was missing.
“Stop primping,” Liz said. “Keep you eyes on the road.”
“Don't tell me how to drive!”
Tony looked back at the road and rubbed his throat.
“I can feel it cutting up my esophagus.”
“That's the whisky burning you.”
“It's not the whisky!”
They were about 50 yards from an intersection and the light turned yellow. Tony pressed the accelerator. The tires squealed through the salty slush. The light turned red, and a black car pulled out in front of them from the cross-traffic.
“Shit!”
Tony slammed on the brakes. The tires screeched. The Ford pickup stopped right on the line before the intersection.
“I told you,” Tony said. “No matter how shit-faced I get, I still know how to drive better than anybody.” He took a swig of whisky and smacked his lips.
Liz saw that the black car was a hearse. Behind it, a funeral procession followed, cars as far as Liz could see.
“”That guy must have had a lot of friends,” Tony said. “It didn't help him any, though.”
He lit a cigarette and pounded on the horn.
“Dead motherfuckers think they own the streets,” he said. “I'm going through.”
He pressed his hand down and held it there, blaring the horn. Then he inched the truck into the intersection. A blue Chevy stopped just before Tony hit it. Tony gave the driver a mocking salute.
Liz unbuckled her seatbelt and opened the door. An icy gust blew in.
“Close the door!” Tony screamed. “It's fucking freezing!”
She stepped out of the car. The car was rolling, and she fell hard as her foot slipped on the icy road. She pulled herself up and staggered toward the funeral procession. The amniotic fluid soaking her pants was freezing, clinging icily to her. There was a numb burning on her flesh. She'd get frostbite on her thighs and buttocks, which would then have to be amputated. That ought to make Tony happy—no more fat thighs and butt.
“Get back in the fucking car!” Tony screamed. He was getting out now and slipping after her.
Liz waved her arms at the funeral cars. A gray Acura stopped. A man and woman were in the front seat, a boy and girl in back. The man, who was driving, rolled down his window just a crack. He had a blond, bristly mustache and crows' feet at the corners of his eyes.
“Please—I need a ride to the hospital,” Liz said. “I'm pregnant and my water broke.”
The man glanced over Liz's shoulder. Tony was crunching through the salty snow, approaching her from behind.
“Sorry,” the man said. “I can't pick up hitchhikers.”
His window rolled up.
“Motherfucker!” Liz screamed. She pounded on the back hood as the car drove away. “I'm gonna get frostbite on my twat!”
Tony grabbed her hair and started yanking her back to the Ford. She tried to bolt away. They both fell hard on the ground. Tony slapped her head back and forth. The numb skin on her thighs and buttocks was burning fiercely now. She knew it was the onset of frostbite. The funeral procession continued to pass by. No one in the cars looked directly at Liz. Tony was her only ride.
She got back in the passenger seat and buckled her seatbelt. Tears poured from her eyes, but she tried to stay silent. She didn't want to give him the satisfaction of hearing her cry.
“Bet now you're glad for the heat, aren't you,” Tony said.
He lit a cigarette and they started to drive. Liz stared out the window.
Suddenly, there were flashing lights behind them.
“Fuck,” Tony said.
“Just tell them you're driving a woman in labor to the hospital,” Liz said coldly.
Tony smiled at her, one of his front teeth chipped and jagged. He took a deep swallow of whisky. Then he jammed his foot on the accelerator.
The police siren started to wail. Tony took sharp turns, nearly flipping the car over. He ignored Liz's pleas to pull over. He made a sharp turn. The car skidded off the road and collided headfirst with a concrete barrier. The front hood collapsed like an aluminum can that someone stepped on. Tony, not wearing a seatbelt, crashed through the windshield. Liz was caught by her seatbelt and slammed back in her seat, squeezing her ribs until they snapped. Her head lolled on her neck. Cold wind gusted in the jagged hole her husband had left in the windshield. Her body moaned with pain. She hoped it was only whiplash.
Her door creaked open. A large policeman was there. He cut off her seatbelt with a knife and pulled her out onto the sidewalk. She caught a glimpse of Tony's remains. He had slid across the coarse pavement, leaving a trail of ground flesh. So much meat had been torn off that his bones were exposed. The policeman told Liz to hold on and he felt her pulse. There were more sirens and flashing lights. Before they loaded her into the ambulance, she gave birth right there on the icy sidewalk.