He walks me from the office to the elevator, pressing his lips against my throat to say goodbye. My pussy flutters from the gesture, and when he steps back, a rush of his cologne, sandalwood and leather, engulfs me.
“I’ll miss you,” I tell him.
He winks, and heads back to his office. The doors close, and now my mind shifts to Brielle, my best friend, and her very first ultrasound ever.
I’m going to be there for it, and a month ago, I wasn’t sure we’d ever be friends again. I couldn’t be happier.
Dr. Manning slides the vaginal ultrasound wand out of Brielle, and she exhales with relief.
She adjusts the little paper pillow beneath her head, blonde hair spilling down the sides of the bed. “How come I can have sex with a dick bigger than that, but the ultrasound wand turns me into a virgin?” she asks. “That thing makes me want to close up shop!”
The doctor chuckles, peeling off her purple rubber gloves, disposing of them on her way to the computer in the corner of the room. “It’s the coldness, and I think because there isn’t a smooth end.” She types for a second then glances back at us. “The next evolution of vaginal wands will have a head on them, or be shaped as a phallus.”
I laugh at that, and so does Brielle. “That would make sense. You don’t make a rectangular peg for a circular hole.”
Dr. Manning laughs. “You can wipe up and get your clothes back on, I’ll be back in a minute, okay?” she slips out the door and I turn away, letting Brielle get cleaned up.
“I can’t wait to see the pictures,” I tell her, staring at a chart of the female reproductive system that is laminated and hung on the wall.
“Same. I’m so, so excited,” Brielle says, getting to her feet to toss the crumpled napkins into the trash. She tugs on her Crave & Cure hoodie, and reties her sweatpants, stacking her arms behind her head as she lies back.
“So, are you and my dad… you know?” she wrinkles her nose, her face twisted in discomfort.
“Trying to have a baby?” I offer. “Well, we aren’t doing anything to stop it.”
“Did you quit your birth control?” she asks, sitting up.
I shake my head. “I never took it regularly before because I always made the guy wear a condom. Quitting was kind of… already happening.”
She nods, chewing the inside of her cheek.
“What?” I ask her.
“It’s weird to think you could have a baby with my dad. Your baby could be my sister. That’s wild, you know?” she asks, but I take the time to study her face, the way she moves her hands when she speaks, and how her tone never ebbs. She isn’t dreading the idea of her dad getting me pregnant the way I thought she would.
“You really wouldn’t be weirded out?” I ask, because I thought this would be our second hurdle, whenever it did happen.
She shakes her head. “You two are together. I can’t say I’ve accepted that if I secretly hope you don’t do couple things.” She nods staunchly. “I am excited for when it happens.”
I smile at her, and then Dr. Manning returns, a nurse in tow. The nurse gets to work, typing and clicking, using a huge mouse ball looking thing to scroll and click. A few minutes later, Brielle and I are both crying as we stare a white blob in the photo.
The doctor tells us the baby’s heartbeat is strong, that it’s too soon to know the gender, and that everything looks good. I listen while Brielle stares dreamily at the ultrasound photos, because I don’t blame her.
“Most of the first trimester symptoms ease up around week twelve, sometimes not until week fourteen or sixteen though,” Dr. Manning says while simultaneously noting things in her chart. “And how have your body aches been? When you came in at week six, you had a lot of body aches and fatigue. Have those subsided?”
Brielle volleys her head. “I could sleep at any time. My body is still killing me. My hips… my lower back, mostly, still going strong,” she says, then slides her hands over her non-existent belly, adding, “but for a good cause.”
The nurse cleans up the area as Brielle and Dr. Manning plan her next appointment, and I can’t help but think… My back has been hurting. I’ve been exhausted, too. The week that Big Daddy and I spent apart, I spent most of that time in bed. I thought it was sadness, avoidance and my SSRI’s potentially needing a dose change but now… “Holy crap.”
Dr. Manning, the nurse, and Brielle all swivel their heads to face me.
“What?” Brielle asks, a small dip of curiosity carved between her brows.
“Uhh…” I draw out, unwilling to toss the possibility out in the public. Not yet. And not here first, that’s for sure. “Just thinking about how cool ultrasound photos are,” I say, holding the stack of folded images.
Dr. Manning nods. “We’ve come a long way, indeed.”
A few minutes later, I’m dropping Brielle off at Crave and heading straight for the drug store on the corner near Parker & Pen.