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“No siblings?”
“Only stepsisters.” Her tone is clipped. She doesn’t like them.
“Okay.” He asks about her lifestyle, and she tells him she doesn’t smoke or take drugs.
“Do you drink alcohol?”
“Ah…” She glances at me, and I raise my eyebrows as I think about the night we met. She looks back at Mathew, trying not to laugh. “Just socially, you know. Rarely to extreme, and definitely not since I realized I was pregnant.”
He confirms she’s not on any medication. Then he asks about her nutrition.
I wonder whether she’s going to lie, but she says openly, “My diet isn’t good.”
“Can you give me an idea of what you eat on an average day?”
She tells him what she told me: Weet-Bix and milk, jam sandwiches, and pasta with mince and vegetables. “I know it’s not great,” she adds in a low voice.
“That’s actually not too terrible,” he says. “It could be a lot worse. The only real issue is that you need more calories when you’re pregnant. We’ll talk about diet later, and we’ll take some blood, and do a urine test too. First, let me take your blood pressure, and then we’ll weigh you.”
He fits the sleeve on her arm and pumps the bladder. I keep my hand on hers as we wait for him to finish.
“That’s fine,” he says, removing the sleeve. “Which is good news. Right, let’s check your height.” He measures her—one hundred and seventy-five centimeters, just under five-ten—and then weighs her. “Hmm,” he says. “A little underweight. I’d like to see more flesh on those bones, Catie! Okay, so let’s get you on the bed, and we’ll do an ultrasound.”
She gets to her feet and goes over to the bed. “Do… um… I need to undress?”
“No, no,” he says, “we’ll just pull up your tee, put a bit of gel on your tummy, and use this wand to take a look.” He holds it up to show her.
I help her onto the bed. Conscious that she might feel uncomfortable revealing her bump in front of me, I say, “Would you like me to wait outside?”
“I’d rather you stayed, if you don’t mind,” she whispers.
“If you want me to.”
She nods, so I stand on the opposite side of the bed and hold her hand. My heart is racing, and my mouth has gone dry. When she lies back, she definitely looks more than four months pregnant. I want to believe she’s telling the truth, but how can it be mine? I guess I’ll know for sure in a few minutes.
Mathew pulls up a stool and opens the tube of gel. “Right, let’s lift your tee.”
He helps her push it up, then squirts a generous amount of the gel over her skin. It’s paler here, with less freckles, a beautiful gentle swell. Catie closes her eyes.
Keeping the screen turned away a little, he passes the wand across her belly. He takes an interminable amount of time, moving the wand backward and forward, occasionally taking screenshots. I watch his face, waiting for his expression to change. And eventually, it does. He purses his lips. His eyebrows rise. And then he glances at me. To my surprise, he looks amused.
I walk around to the foot of the bed so I can see the screen, and stare at it as he moves the wand, showing me.
“Holy shit,” I say.
“What?” Catie opens her eyes. “Is it okay? Is there something wrong with it?”
“No, Catie.” He turns the screen toward her. “Your babies look fine.”
She blinks. “Babies?”
“Yes.” He smiles. “You’re having twins.”
Chapter Nine
Catie
My brain is refusing to work.
