A Flawed Fragility: Chapter 29 (for the 5th Annual Poke the Dragon Ficathon) Part 1
Author: TheLadyHoll
Pairing: Andy/Miranda
Rating: M
Disclaimer: Yes, they are mine. I own them. Come to me my pretties and dance, DANCE I SAY. Or, more truthfully, not...
Chapter 29: Pressured (Pt. 1)
Super, giant, enormous mega-chapter as my own meagre offering to the greatness of the 5th Annual Poke the Dragon July Fic-a-thon on LJ. Please let me know what you're all thinking so far - my brain had one idea all along for this story, but I sense another ending might be a possibility...So review! Lend me your mouths as well as your eyes and ears.
XXX - TLH
Andrea couldn't feel her heart beating in her chest. Couldn't feel her body trembling or the sweat on her palms. All she could feel was Miranda's pain and fear of what was going on her own body that she was powerless to control.
"I need an ambulance at 117th and Park, 32B. High risk geriatric pregnancy with TTS twins experiencing abdominal pain and severe vertigo." Andy threw her phone to the side of the couch and dropped to her knees on the floor beside her fiancée, who leaned forward to rest her head against the younger woman's chest as her hand gripped the fabric of her sleeve, fumbling slightly as though she were trying to find hold of something to ground herself.
"I'm so dizzy," Miranda's voice was muffled, buried in Andrea's blouse, but she still heard the catch in her voice. "I don't, I don't know what's happening," Miranda continued. "This is nothing like I ever had with the girls."
Andy looked down at the older woman's greatly decreased lap where her free hand cradled her stomach and linked fingers with her. What had seemed so large before now looked small and fragile, insignificant and nowhere near close enough to term to be delivered successfully.
Miranda had called it labour, but both women knew that this early and in their unique circumstances it was much more accurate to call it a miscarriage or a stillbirth. Neither though, would give voice to the semantics. All that mattered at that moment was keeping Miranda calm and her water from breaking.
"The ambulance is going to be here soon, and it's going to be okay," Andy lied lamely, wishing that if she said it with enough conviction that it would be true.
Thankfully, most of the rush hour traffic had cleared and the ambulance arrived less than twenty minutes after she had called, the paramedics quickly taking over and lifting Miranda onto a stretcher, attaching IV lines and monitors, pulling off the buttons on her Versace blouse as they did so.
"Are you family?" One of the paramedics turned to Andy as they stood outside the ambulance, watching the stretcher be loaded into the back with Miranda on it.
"I'm her fiancée," Andrea flashed her ring and began to move forwards towards the double doors of the vehicle, but an arm stopped her.
"Ma'am, I'm sorry but unless you're a blood relative or have legal documentation of your marriage you can't ride along."
"What do you mean I can't ride along?" Andy's voice took on a hard edge. "That is my WIFE in there and those are MY CHILDREN whose lives you are risking with this conversation."
"I'm not the one holding things up, ma'am. We'll take good care of her but you'll have to find your own way to the hospital."
Realizing she couldn't win the argument AND do what was best for Miranda, Andy conceded, stepping backwards as the doors closed, the tears only coming as she heard her name called out before the ambulance doors slammed shut and the sirens started.
Andy turned in a helpless circle before jogging back into the townhouse to grab her coat and her phone before tripping out the door again, nearly forgetting to lock it in her rush to find a cab so close to dinnertime.
Andrea was beginning to wish she didn't know all the different ways to get to New York Presbyterian as she instructed the cab driver which side streets to take to avoid traffic. In fact she'd give anything not to need to know that information.
Miranda, sick and alone, was never a good combination; and Andy without Miranda when Miranda was sick and alone was just as bad. Now at least she was in the same building, but no one seemed to want to let her near her fiancée and Dr. Jansen hadn't yet arrived to mitigate the situation.
"Mrs. Priestly is indisposed at the moment. We need for her to calm down before we can start any type of treatment. And until we have express written permission from the patient, I'm afraid we can't let you in to see her. The area is restricted to family only" the person at the admittance desk explained in an excruciatingly even tone.
"I AM her family," Andy felt like screaming as she pushed away from the melamine counter. How could they not have her listed as proxy for Miranda's medical information? That file should have been updated the day Miranda was first admitted for her injuries from the assault. Instead, that fucker Stephen's information stared up at her from the standard form in Miranda's patient file. She dragged her fingers through her hair, thinking she probably looked like a madwoman as she began to pace the hall.
But before she could start her second lap of the hallway, the door to Miranda's room opened and a terrified looking orderly edged out and took off down the hallway.
"Get away from me. Get out! Where is Andrea? Andrea!
Andy looked around at the desk clerk, eyes blazing. "She's been asking for me and you won't let me SEE HER? I'm going in right now and staying as long as I want, and YOU better spend the rest of your shift praying I don't sue."
Bursting through the door, Andy headed straight towards the pair of male nurses who had been tasked with drawing blood and setting up the IV and monitors.
"Hey! Do. Not. Touch. Her. You heard her, back off. Once Dr. Jansen arrives, then maybe I'll let you near my wife again. But until then, you heard her. Back. Off!"
Andy avoided looking at Miranda, staring the two men down until they had left the room entirely and closed the door behind them. She turned around slowly, dreading Miranda's reaction to the scene she had just caused. But despite the authority she had still managed to command even from a hospital bed, she looked so small when Andy had first come into the room and she was surrounded by the two large men that anger took over for fear.
Miranda's heart seized and then relaxed as Andrea had burst into the room, eyes and tongue blazing as she told off the rough male nurses that in her opinion were being a little too rough with her 'wife'.
Her pride over the fight forgotten the moment she had first seen Miranda sway against Roy, Andy's next move was over and onto the bed, cupping Miranda's face before gently moving her hands down her body - neck, shoulders, arms until they came to rest lightly on her stomach.
"Miranda, what did the paramedics say? Are they coming? Are you and the babies okay? Honey, talk to me. What's happening?" Andy was growing more desperate as the seconds ticked by without an answer.
Much to her own dismay as well as Andy's, Miranda had started to cry as soon as the orderlies had left the room and now she couldn't stop long enough to answer Andrea's question. The honest love and concern she could see in the brunette's eyes when she had fought her way inside the room and with her own fear and frustration of not knowing what was happening combined with how awful she felt and what that meant for the babies essentially paralyzed her.
Andy seemed to realize this after a moment and moved closer in. Miranda immediately pressed herself against the younger woman as best she could, trying to stop her useless crying long enough to apologize to Andrea. Andrea's cool fingers brushed against her clammy forehead as she ran her fingers gently through Miranda's hair. God, her head hurt so badly.
Pushing the button for the nurses' station had had no effect in the last several minutes and Andy guessed the original two who had dealt with Miranda had informed the entire obstetrics floor that Suite B was to be avoided at all costs.
"Where the hell is Dr. Jansen," Andy growled in a low voice in between the soft words and reassurances she was murmuring into Miranda's hair as she held her, wanting answers she knew Miranda was desperate for as well.
"Not hell. A dinner party actually…" Dr. Jansen entered the room in a striking navy lace sheath by Donna Karan, Miranda noted, even in her legitimate distress, with a tie-neck backless design that ended scandalously low in contrast to the conservative neckline.
"Alright," Dr. Jansen wheeled the tiny doctors stool over to Miranda's bedside and crossed her legs elegantly, leaving Andy to wonder what in the hell she had been doing wrong before.
At one of Miranda's last appointments, Andy had happened to be wearing a pair of Christian Lou's from the closet that Nigel had convinced, wheedled and cajoled her into despite being half a size off and her feet were now killing her. And so cursing the art director's name, Andy had moved to take the only other seat in the room besides the exam table.
However, it seemed as soon as she felt the chair beneath her, she shifted her weight backwards to sit and the stool scooted out from under her, leaving her sore and mystified as to what had just happened.
They nearly had two chair-related casualties as Miranda was laughing so hard she came near to rolling off the table.
She'd mock glared at Miranda for laughing until the older woman promised to 'kiss it better' once they were home - a promise, Andy mused as she looked in the mirror that night, that she had most definitely kept.
"Miranda, I think you just made me the first person in history ever to have a hickey on their butt! At least I don't have to worry about anyone seeing it I suppose."
"Darling, I work in the fashion industry," Miranda had purred, pressing her own naked body against Andrea's back but not quite flush due to the bump. "You know the importance of branding in my line of work." She had nipped her shoulder then and Andrea had turned suddenly, leveraging her weight to lift Miranda and toss her lightly back onto the bed, where they had remained for the rest of the night in a flushed and sweaty tangle of limbs and whispered endearments.
Andy came out of her recollection to hear Dr. Jansen say "You're not in labour, Miranda." Miranda lifted her throbbing head slightly from where she lay against Andy's chest to look at the doctor through swollen eyes. The auburn haired woman got straight to the point, speaking bluntly as she began to start the waylaid IV drip and connect it to the venal catheter the paramedics had inserted into the skin on the top of her hand while she was in transit to New York Presbyterian. She also instructed Andy, who was by this time was sitting next to and nearly behind Miranda, to hold the oxygen mask she handed her just over Miranda's nose and mouth so that the older woman could still talk. "What you are is pre-eclamptic, Miranda your blood pressure is off the charts."
All three women turned to look at the bank of monitors and telemetry at the side of Miranda's bed, and even the two out of three without medical degrees knew the number was more than double what it should be.
"You're dehydrated, anemic and exhausted, and this is your body's way of telling you that is not up to the task of carrying these babies without issue."
"So she's not in labour," Andy confirmed, trying to understand what was going on. "So why is she having contractions?"
"Dehydration can bring them on or exacerbate them, and it was probably stress and her high blood pressure that intensified them past normal Braxton Hicks. So they aren't currently working to push the babies down through the birth canal, but they are causing uncomfortable pressure that if it gets too bad could rupture the amniotic sac which would mean we would have to deliver them immediately to avoid an infection that could be fatal for Miranda." Replacing the medical chart on the counter, her gaze met both women's once more before settling on Miranda. Already, her colour looked better even having only been on the oxygen for 10 minutes and the IV only slightly more.
"But your cervical swab came back negative for fibronectin and I'm fairly sure after I examine you I'm going to find that you haven't dilated," Dr. Jansen continued as she moved to the end of the bed, slipping on a pair of gloves and gently separating a still silent Miranda's knees before checking her for any bleeding or signs of labour. Pulling off the gloves and disposing of them in the medical waste box, Dr. Jansen continued her exam, pressing on the bulge and feeling around carefully as the organ beneath her hands tightened and released. Her patient bit back a small sound of pain followed by a shuddering sigh and her partners hands moved to a pressure point in her back without any direction and she flexed into it instinctively.
"Okay, so being in a hypertensive state for a prolonged period of time, the babies are in a little bit of distress, and your oxygen levels are low so we're gonna have you wear the mask for a little while and lie on your left side while we run some other tests and the IV has time to do its job. The combination of drugs and the sedative in the IV is going to make you tired, and the best thing for your baby right now is for you to get some rest so try and sleep if you can.
"I was told today that both my job and the magazine I have spent 28 years of my life perfecting are in jeopardy, I don't see how that's possible, and - "
"And I'm telling you these babies are in jeopardy, Miranda. Which is more important? You decide what's worth the risk. It's nobody's decision but your own."
Then there was silence for a moment.
Continue on to part 2!