Tikira Wallace was returning from Conway in the early afternoon on March 31st to her mom's apartment off Chenal Valley Road in Little Rock. She had gathered some clothes because she knew she needed to be with her family. 20-year-old Tikira, also known as Ti, was 8 months pregnant and her doctor had recently moved up her due date. For support during her pregnancy, she had moved in with her mom.

Ti's mom, Laquita Wallace frantically called Ti as she approached Little Rock.

“Don’t come,” Laquita warned.

Laquita knew the weather was getting rough as the tornado sirens started to wail. Laquita’s apartment was hit by the tornado. After losing contact for an hour or two, Ti finally connected with her mom.

“She was screaming, scared, in the tub,” Ti recalls. “The crazy thing is, where it hit her apartment and caused the most damage is where I would have been, I would have been hit. I was always in her room.” 

Since the tornado, mother and daughter have been staying in a downtown Little Rock Red Cross shelter. They have been living there for three weeks. Added to the stress of the tornado and moving out of her mom’s apartment, Ti knew it was only a matter of time.

"Sunday, I woke up at three in the morning, feeling pain,” Ti said.

After a quick trip to Conway Regional, Ti was sent back home, back to the hotel to wait for labor to start. In the middle of the afternoon, the pain continued. Ti made a few trips back and forth between the bathroom and jacuzzi along with several calls to her OBGYN just to make sure everything was okay.

With her last trip to the bathroom, Ti thought it might be time. She called her mom and a friend. They sat her on the couch in the hotel room.

“They put towels on me, and I looked down and his head was right there,” Ti remembers. “I started pushing before the ambulance got there and told them I was tired, and I wanted my baby. I can’t make it to the hospital. I want to have my baby.” 

Ti’s family walked downstairs to the hotel and got more towels and support.

“They came down and got the crew from here and made me comfortable,” Ti recalls.

That crew included Red Cross volunteer Angela Working.

“Once the EMT got here, they transferred me back to the bed. I pushed like five times, and he flew out. Like those machines that shoot out footballs, that's the way he came out. He zoomed out,” Ti chuckled.

At 6 lbs., 6 oz, baby Eiress Wallace was born. As she tells her story and touches Eiress' tiny hands, teary-eyed, she remembers how she just wanted to hold her newborn baby. 

“They call him Little Red Cross. I’ve been here and they feel like I’m part of the family. I grew a bond with the workers. I grew a bond with Raybo. He checked on me. I was sitting down here one night, and he made sure I was OK." 

Raybo is Raybo Franks. A retired pastor and Red Cross volunteer from Maine.

“She was so quiet when I met her. I told her I couldn’t handle it if she birthed this baby at the hotel,” Franks said.

He recalls checking on Ti three to four times a day for the two weeks he worked at the Red Cross shelter. "Every time I saw her, I checked to make sure she was OK. I am a people person, I’m going to get you to open up. I made sure she got the juice she needed.”  

Franks has been on over 20 disaster missions. He’s met a lot of interesting people and has been in strange situations.

“This was a first for me,” Franks said. "We started them on a relationship with the Red Cross. I feel like I have done the mission. The only pay we get is seeing them happy. When they are happy, it makes me happy." 

“It’s a crazy story," Ti says. She is already playing out the question and answer she will give Eiress when he asks. 'Hey Mom, where was I born? You were born at the Courtyard, son!' " she laughed.

For Ti, her family, and baby Eiress, they will have a forever bond with the Red Cross long after they start their recovery journey.