The delivery room had eight beds, on which women moaned and twisted, tended to by fully covered nurses.
Two of the women were in the act of delivering. There were no curtains between the beds.
Laila was given a bed at the far end, beneath a window that someone had painted black.
There was a sink nearby, cracked and dry, and a string over the sink from which hung stained surgical gloves.
In the middle of the room Mariam saw an aluminum table. The top shelf had a soot-colored blanket on it; the bottom shelf was empty.
One of the women saw Mariam looking. “They put the live ones on the top,” she said tiredly.
The doctor, in a dark blue burqa, was a small, harried woman with birdlike movements.
Everything she said came out sounding impatient, urgent. “First baby.”
She said it like that, not as a question but as a statement. “Second,” Mariam said.
Laila let out a cry and rolled on her side. Her fingers closed against Mariam's.
“Any problems with the first delivery?” “No.” “You're the mother?” “Yes,” Mariam said.
The doctor lifted the lower half of her burqa and produced a metallic, cone-shaped instrument.
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