Tuesday morning

Today felt like the day.

Tuesday.

The day after Memorial Day.

A trip up to the hospital.

The last time we did the exact same thing on the exact same day, it all started.

I was awoken out of my sleep when my water broke. I was half-dazed, walking to the bathroom and could feel my pants starting to soak with fluid. I thought I had urinated on myself at first.

When I turned the light on, I looked down to notice that my pants were tinged with a pinkish color. I smelled them. It smelled like nothing at all. I knew what happened.

Erik had been sleeping on the couch because he had a terrible cough just like me. I punched him hard in the back to wake him up. I had him smell my pants too. Same thing, nothing.

I was terrified and shaking. Erik called my mom and told her she needed to get to the house, now. I - and I still have no idea why - took a shower. I felt that I absolutely had to take a shower first before we could leave. Besides, we had time - no one was here yet to watch Sadie.

While I was in the shower, Erik had tried to call our friends - Carrie and Mike - a few times (they live just a few doors down from us) but there wasn't an answer. So he ran down to their house and rang their doorbell until someone came downstairs. Carrie was here just minutes later as we were ready to walk out the door.

I will never forget how scared I was at that exact moment - Carrie gave me a huge hug.

I remember the sound of my shoes as they pounded down the stairs out to the garage. I remember driving in the darkness and silence all the way to Chicago. I remember Erik pulling into the parking garage, desperately telling the attendant that I was in labor - where do we park? I remember, with each contraction, thinking that we were never going to make it to the hospital.

We did make it. And for that time, we were still okay - together. Three hearts beating.