Page 75 of Unexpecting

J.B. lifted his shoulders in a shrug. “Thought you’d come around. Face it, Case, you don’t hold a grudge too often.”

″You ass!”

″Ah, the sweet sound of insults flying across the table. I have to say I missed the two of you bickering,” Coop mused in a singsong voice.

“We don’t bicker,” I argued. “Bickering is for old married couples.” Coop raised an eyebrow at me but didn’t say anything.

Chapter Thirty-Three

“Hearing the heartbeat of the baby is one of the most magical moments of the pregnancy. It should be something treasured by both the mother and the father.”

A Young Woman’s Guide to the Joy of Impending Motherhood

Dr. Francine Pascal Reid (1941)

With Brit’s stagette finallyover, I could get back to the more important things in my life, being, of course, my first doctor’s visit. My baby doctor. I was going to hear my baby’s heartbeat. My appointment took place the Tuesday before Labour Day, the weekend of the all-important wedding.

I felt a little weird when I arrived at my appointment and found the waiting room packed with couples. I was the only expectant mother sitting alone in the waiting room. Everyone else had a supportive partner to go along with their beautifully swollen belly except me and my still unnoticeable bulge. I felt like I’d wandered into an Expensive Shoe Club meeting wearing Payless specials.

Being alone was what I had planned for. If everything had gone according to my schedule, I would have been artificially inseminated with a stranger’s semen, and I would be planning how to raise my baby alone, as a single mother. But J.B. and I… I may still be a single mother—and despite Brit’s opinion on the matter, I’m quite okay with that—but I may not have to go it alone.

I smiled at J.B. as he walked nervously into the waiting room. I couldn’t help but notice him goggling at all the baby bellies. As soon as he came in the room and sat down beside me, he grabbed one of my hands and held it in both of his. I didn’t know if he thought I was nervous and he was trying to reassure me, but I was just excited. The handholding was doing more for him, especially since I couldn’t even flip through a magazine.

″You okay?” he asked for about the tenth time.

″I’m fine. Are you?” We’d been waiting for twenty minutes, and I didn’t think his body had stopped moving. Either he was tapping his foot or patting his knee or fingering my hand.

″Sure, no problem,” he waved my question away. “Piece of cake.”

I laughed aloud at his show of bravado. “You’re full of shit.”

″Hey,” he narrowed his eyes at me. “Watch the potty mouth. Lots of babies in here.” But he gave my hand a squeeze.

Ten minutes later, we were finally called into the doctor’s office.

″How are you feeling, Casey?” Dr. Morrissey asked. She was a tiny, grey-haired woman, with glasses perched on the end of her nose, and somehow managed to appear ferocious instead of motherly. It was like the grandmother and the big bad wolf from “Little Red Riding Hood” morphed into one. My beloved GP, Dr. Dennis, referred me to her, saying that she was highly respected in the field of obstetrics at Women’s College Hospital, which was where I’d decided to give birth. Dr. Morrissey might be highly respected, but I was not getting any warm and fuzzy feelings about her right then. Maybe it was just because I was a little nervous, but I felt irrationally afraid of this woman. Maybe it was because I felt she held the health of my baby in her hands. A baby I was already very attached to.

″Okay,” I stammered slightly. I was sitting ramrod straight in the chair across from the doctor. This time I’d rammed my hands between my knees, so J.B. resorted to clutching the arms of the chair he was perched on. “I mean, I’ve been sick and I throw up a couple of times a day, but other than that, I feel fine.”

″Morning sickness is unfortunate, but very common,” she said without looking at me. She was reading my file. At least, I hope it was my file. “I’ll give you a prescription which should help. And you’re the father?” she asked J.B.

″Well, uh… you see, I…um…”

″Either you are or you’re not,” Dr. Morrissey said with an amused smile. “Makes no difference to me.”

″Yes, I am the father,” J.B. gulped. He glanced at me with a sheepish expression. I hoped it would get easier for him to admit that as time went on.

″Glad we cleared that up. Let’s get started, shall we?”

We had a short chat about my periods—to J.B.’s obvious dismay—and she told me my due date was February 16, which Dr. Dennis had already told me. Then Dr. Morrissey asked me to hop up on her table and we’d listen to the heartbeat. This was the moment I’d been waiting for. I jumped up so eagerly, I tripped over my purse on the floor beside me.

″Should I… do you want me to leave?… I don’t need to…” J.B. floundered. I saw his eyes go wide as he noticed the stirrups on the edge of the examining table.

″It’s probably nothing you haven’t seen before,” the doctor told him briskly.

″It’s okay with me if you want to stay,” I tried to smile reassuringly at him. He only managed a faint one in return and hovered at the side of the room, near the door so he could make a quick getaway if he needed to.

I lay on the table, and the first thing Dr. Morrissey said after I pulled up my shirt did nothing to improve my first impression of her.

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