It feels like a strange act of defiance but my b.r.e.a.s.t.s are sore and the idea of freeing them right now in this frigid room seems like cruel and unusual torture.
In just my bra, I slip the gown on only to realize it ties in the back. And I can"t reach.
That"s what husbands are for, Robyn. Duh.
My subconscious is an a.s.shole. And stuck in archaic gender and societal roles that I will not succ.u.mb to.
I"ve thrown every excuse I have at Dallas. Telling him repeatedly that I think what I have is contagious so he won"t come by. He"s called to check on me half a dozen times and I just keep telling him I"m tired, which hasn"t been a complete lie. I blink back the tears and twist the stupid offensive ties together the best that I can.
I can do this myself.
My mind churns through the many changes I"ll have to make, checking off each one as totally doable. I can turn my small home office into a nursery. I can explain to Mr. Martin that I need maternity leave and to reduce travel for a while. I can put a crib together. How hard can it be? YouTube should tell me exactly how to do everything that I need to.
Shouldn"t it?
The magazine I was reading had articles on antibiotics, immunizations, vaccinations, breastfeeding, and several other topics that hadn"t yet occurred to me to worry about.
Fuuuuck.
But I can do this. I can. I will.
I got this.
"We got this," I say while patting my still-flat belly.
If there"s no one in there, well, I"ll laugh at my own ridiculousness and go celebrate with a drink. Or two.
"Good morning, Miss Breeland. I"m Dr. La.s.siter." A gentle female voice accompanying a fair-skinned woman with shoulder-length auburn hair interrupts my mental breakdown. "How are you feeling today?"
I suck in a deep breath and smile. "Great. I"m feeling great today, actually."
"Actually? Have you not been feeling well?"
"Um, well . . ." Licking my lips, I say it out loud for the first time ever. "I"ve been feeling kind of sick, not in the mornings, though. Mostly around dinnertime. And I"m a few weeks late. I also haven"t had a Pap smear in, uh, a while. So I thought it would be a good idea to come in and-"
"How many weeks?"
"Ma"am?"
"How many weeks late are you?" Dr. La.s.siter looks down at the folder she"s holding. "Better yet, just tell me when your last menstrual cycle was."
I know the answer, but I pause like I have to do math in my head.
"My last period ended September thirteenth," I tell her on a sigh, because I know, I know that was two months ago and anyone who is two months late and thinks they might not be pregnant is half-crazy. Or completely delusional.
Thankfully Dr. La.s.siter doesn"t pin me with a judgmental frown. She just jots something down before meeting my apologetic gaze. "Taken any home tests?"
"Three," I answer honestly.
"All the same result?"
"One negative that I probably took too soon, one positive last week, and one that didn"t have a clear result."
"I see here that you"ve been on Loestrin for a while now. Have you taken it regularly and at the same time every day?"
I take another deep breath. Maybe this will be good practice for explaining my situation to my mom.
"I travel a lot for work from time to time. I have missed a few doses. I tried to double up to make up for a few missed pills but then I read online that it isn"t a good idea to do that."
She nods but her mouth turns down. "If you"d just missed one day, I"d say it would be okay. Missing multiple doses, however, not so much. Let"s go ahead and run some tests and see if we can figure out what"s going on with you. If it turns out that you aren"t pregnant, though I heavily suspect that you are, we"ll look at alternate forms of birth control. Ortho Evra, for instance, which comes in a patch you change weekly or possibly an implant that lasts even longer. I typically recommend those to women who travel or have unpredictable schedules."
"Okay," I say meekly.
"A nurse will be in to collect a urine sample and some blood shortly."
With that, she smiles at me once more and exits the room, slipping my chart casually into a plastic bin by the door as if she didn"t just deliver huge news with the subtly of a deathblow in a George R. R. Martin novel.
If I ever own my own gynecological practice, which is unlikely, but still, if I do, I"m going to make sure that all rooms are stocked with cupcakes and expensive boxes of chocolates. Maybe a big screen connected to Netflix or with a Nicholas Sparks marathon constantly on repeat. Because this is seriously the most emotionally draining experience of my life.
Time doesn"t actually move when you"re waiting on the results of an official pregnancy test. Or maybe it moves backward. h.e.l.l, I don"t know. But I have been sitting on this table for what feels like forever after being poked, prodded, and forced to pee on command. My b.o.o.bs hurt, my back aches, and the fluorescent lights overhead are giving me a migraine.
"Miss Breeland?"
I have never been so simultaneously thrilled and terrified at hearing my own name.
"Yes," I croak out because my voice is hoa.r.s.e from disuse.
"Results are in," Dr. La.s.siter says, waving my chart at me. "Congratulations. You"re going to be a mom."
This is the part where I"m supposed to panic. Or where I"m supposed to turn to my husband and cry while he showers me with kisses.
I do neither. I take a deep breath. Right now, breathing is about all I can manage successfully.
I"m pregnant. A human being is growing inside of me right this very second.
I mean, I guess I already knew. But there is something so final about this, so completely irrevocable that I can feel it down to my bones. Deep down into the marrow.
"Right." I nod and try for the love of all things holy to get some moisture to my mouth. "Of course. Thanks."
I"m still nodding. I can"t stop nodding.
"Robyn," Dr. La.s.siter says gently, placing a hand gingerly on my knee. "Breathe."
"Yeah. Breathing"s good. I like breathing."
She"s trying not to smile despite the concerned look in her gaze.
"I know this is big news, and perhaps news you didn"t necessarily want."
"I don"t-um, I just don"t know that I-"
"Relax. No explanations needed here. Just a few more procedures, then you can go home and process in peace."
"More procedures?" My voice cracks like I"m a fourteen-year-old boy instead of a twenty-three, soon to be twenty-four-year-old woman.
Dr. La.s.siter nods and returns her attention to my chart briefly. "We"re going to do a quick ultrasound and see if we can get some solid confirmation on how far along you are. You"ll also get to hear the baby"s heartbeat."
My mouth drops open and she speaks again before I can.
"Unless you wanted to wait on that. Some moms like for the dad to be present for the first time. And some don"t want to hear or see anything until they"re sure they aren"t going to terminate or give the baby up for adoption. My guess is your baby is about the size of a peanut, so we might not be able to see much anyway at this point."
The mental image of someone crushing a peanut makes my stomach lurch.
"No, I"m definitely not t-terminating or, um, giving him or her up for adoption. And the dad"s not exactly . . . he probably won"t be coming to any of my appointments." The tension in my chest squeezes hard once before a new and overwhelming sensation takes over.
This is my baby.
Mine.
Innocent, helpless, and growing inside of me.
Inside of me.
Because it"s mine.
Nothing will ever hurt this child. If anyone or anything tried, I would destroy them. Annihilate them. Erase their family tree from existence and burn their entire universe to the ground.
Whoa. Where did that come from?
A few deep breaths later, I rein in this fiercely protective side I didn"t even know I possessed and smile at Dr. La.s.siter. Maybe it"s all the adrenaline, or just finally knowing the truth for sure, but a tranquil calm settles over me.
"I would love to see my baby. And I"m ready to hear the heartbeat, too. The sooner the better."
She looks as relieved as I feel. "Perfect. Be right back."
32Robyn.
I AM PREGNANT.
And from the looks of the ultrasound screen, I am carrying an immensely adorable gummy bear in my belly. One that apparently hates Italian food, loves Chinese, and will violently reject any red meat or chocolate I try to consume.
Chocolate, kid? Seriously? Perhaps I"m carrying the sp.a.w.n of Satan.
But I know I"m not because nothing that cute could be evil.
I stared at the blurry black-and-white image on the screen as Dr. La.s.siter informed me I was nearly seven weeks along. Seven.
I knew exactly when and where my little gummy bear had been conceived.
"Denver," I whispered to myself as a steady pounding rhythmic sound filled the room while tears swam in my eyes.
I left the doctor"s office with a serious hankering for pancakes.
Less than an hour later, in the middle of my second stack, I work through possible scenarios in my head. Most of them end with Dallas glaring at me with horrified hatred in his eyes and telling me that I ruined his life.
So I"m not all that eager to update him.
"Sorry, hon. The waitress for this section was a no-show," a wrinkled woman with blue hair tells me as she refills my long-empty cup of apple juice. "Can I get you some coffee?"
"No, thank you. I"m good."
Once she moves on to the table behind me, I pull up the tour schedule on my phone, making every attempt not to get sticky syrup on it but failing.
After wiping it with a damp napkin, I click a few times and see that only four shows are left. Noting the dates, I realize it"s only three weeks until it ends.
Nothing major is going to happen in three weeks. I"m not going to blow up like I swallowed a basketball or give birth, so we"re good. Once the tour is over, I"ll invite Dallas over for dinner and tell him in a warm and friendly environment that I"m pregnant and that he can be as involved or as uninvolved as he likes.
"We"ve got this," I say patting my full belly confidently.
But then a waitress about my age with hair in a falling-down ponytail and looking tear-stained and world-weary runs into the diner, apologizing profusely to the blue-haired woman who"s now glaring at her from behind the counter.
"I"m sorry. I"m so sorry I"m late. The babysitter didn"t show so I had to call my mom for help and she gave me this huge lecture about responsibility and then my car wouldn"t start and I got stuck behind a garbage truck. I"m so, so sorry."
"You can be sorry all you want. Your pay is being docked. And you have two tables over there that probably won"t tip you for s.h.i.t."
I wince at her harsh words.
Is this my future? Have I been put here in this very place at this exact time to see what my life is going to be like?
"I need this job, Irene. You know I do. Randy still hasn"t paid any child support and I"m doing the best I can. I have to get a new fuel pump on my car but I won"t be late again, I swear."
"That"s what you said last week," Irene of the blue hair says before disappearing into the kitchen.
The distraught waitress makes her way to me and offers me coffee, which I turn down but do so while smiling.
"You okay, hon?"
She gives me a weak smile. "This wasn"t supposed to be my life," she says quietly. Her name tag has Lexi printed on it. "I wanted to be a nurse when I grew up. But what can you do, right? We don"t get to choose the hand we"re dealt, I guess."
Her eyes are watery and I suddenly feel every bite of pancake I"ve taken like a lead weight.
She"s gone, having stepped over to the next table and moved on with her life, before I can say anything. Not that anything I could"ve said would"ve made her life any better. She wasn"t confiding in me in hopes of garnering advice, I don"t think. It was more like she had to say that out loud to someone and I happened to be here.
Knowing I should probably start being more frugal since I"m about to have another mouth to feed, but unable to just do nothing, I grab my wallet and a pen from my purse.