AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Chapter Twenty-Seven – Jess
I pull up to the doctor’s office with mixed feelings. Chris should be with me. I should be giddy with excitement, and we should be beaming at each other. But unfortunately, none of that is happening today. Sure, I’m excited to hear my baby’s heartbeat, but the overwhelming disappointment and pain outweigh the good. My phone pings, and I look down at the text from Skyla, causing me to smile.
Sky: Are you sure you don’t want me to come? I can be your fill-in baby daddy. I’ve been practicing Tank’s intimidating glare to give to the doctor.
The next text pops up pretty quickly, and it's a photo of Skyla wearing Jensen’s camouflage cap and brown service tee. She has her hair stuffed into the cap, and it’s slung low over her eyes. Her mouth is set into a hard line. She tried to look all badass, but I can see she was fighting back a smile. She’s even stuffed socks or something into the sleeves of the T-shirt.
I can’t help but laugh despite the circumstances.
Me: LOL. I love you, but I’m okay.
I enter the doctor’s office and smile at the receptionist. She’s new. I haven’t seen her here before, and I’d been here just three months ago for my annual checkup. That’s when Chris told me that during the autopsy, they discovered his mother had breast and ovarian cancer. That led to Dylan’s decision to one day soon remove her breasts and uterus because of the BRAC1 gene mutation. It really hit home how important it is to be responsible about my health. His mother hadn’t even had any symptoms.
The wait isn’t long today, and I finally get called into Dr. Barbara Brooks’ room. She smiles at me from behind her desk, her curly dark hair cut short at the sides, leaving the top a bit longer so that her curls look like waves. A little similar to one of Princess Diana’s hairstyles circa 1991. Our neighbor, Mrs. Chaplain, used to be crazy about Princess Di. Whenever my parents would leave me with her instead of dragging me off the pubs with them and leaving me in the car, I’d look at all the paraphernalia she’d collected over the years, from mugs to tea towels, and she’d tell me all about her.
“Hello, Jess.” Despite being here for years, Doctor Brooks has retained her charming British accent. I’ve always liked that. She looks down at my file. “What brings you back so soon?”
“I’m pregnant.” I swallow the lump in my throat.
She swirls her pen like a drumstick before setting it down and clapping her hands. “How bloody marvelous. Congratulations!”
“Thank you.” I should be jumping for joy, bursting out of my skin, but all I feel is loneliness.
“All right, so let’s get a quick history down, and we can go take a look. You were last here three months ago, and everything looked good. When was your last period?”
“August twelfth.”
As she writes it down, I gaze around the office. I’ve never really paid much attention to the space, always too nervous about the upcoming examination to take everything in, but this time it’s different. The office is painted a pale yellow with an abstract image of a mother holding her child. At first, it just looks like a giant pattern of orange, red, and teal swirls, but then I make out the image of a mother’s face bending to kiss a child’s forehead. It’s beautiful and elegantly weird, just like Doctor Brooks.
“And when did you do the test?” Her question pulls me back to the present, and at first, I draw a blank. So much has happened in the last few days; it’s hard to think it’s only been a short time since I found out I was pregnant.
“On Tuesday, so a few days ago.”
“Any symptoms?”
“The occasional bouts of nausea, but it hasn’t been too bad.”
“All right, let’s go, and then we can discuss prenatal vitamins, and I’ll order some bloodwork.”
Doctor Brooks leaves the room, and I walk into her examination room and get undressed. I’m on the bed in moments. I turn my head to look at the ultrasound machine and smile when I see what looks like the perfect outline of a baby on the screen from the last appointment. Excitement bubbles in my belly because soon it will be my turn to look at images of my child.
Doctor Brooks knocks quietly on the door, and when I let her know it’s okay to enter, she does so and washes her hands. She sits on a rolling stool and reaches for the wand next to the machine, sliding a condom over it. She adds some lube. Man, I’m not looking forward to this part.
“Since you’re still early days yet, I’ll be scanning you internally. You ready?”
“Ready as I’ll ever be.” I smile nervously.
“Don’t worry, I’ll be gentle.” She winks.
I flashback to the last time Chris and I had sex. He was far from gentle, and I loved it. My stomach bottoms out again, and I push the memories away. Why did things have to turn out the way they had? This was supposed to be one of the happiest days of my life. Not a day filled with mixed emotions.
Doctor Brooks inserts the wand and fiddles with the dials on her machine. She punches in my name while her phallus-shaped tool just hangs out in my vagina. She slides forward on the stool, and I turn to face the screen. Doctor Brooks moves her wand around in me. Ooh, that’s weird. The minute she moves the rod to the right side, I feel a dull pain. “That’s uncomfortable. Is that the side the baby implanted on?”
Doctor Brooks doesn’t answer me. She’s really, really quiet. You know that quiet when a doctor is looking at something and you’re lying there crapping your pants, not sure if you should let them focus or ask what’s wrong.
She sighs, and I don’t like the sound of that. Then she removes the wand. I feel disappointment hit when I don’t get to hear the baby’s heartbeat, but the look on Doctor Brooks’ face tells me this isn’t going to be the only thing I’m upset about today.
She pulls her stool over and reaches for my hand. I know that it’s going to be ice cold in her hands because right now I feel a chill from my head to my toes.
