Page 166 of The Catalyst

“Hello, Miss Mercer. What’s brought you in today?” he asks in his gravelly voice even as he flips through a chart in his hands, not even looking at me.

Rude.

“I had a car accident and was taken to the hospital. They did some blood tests and discovered that I’m pregnant, but I don’t know how far along I am.”

He nods, still scanning the papers in his hand.

“How old are you?”

“Eighteen.”

“And when was your last menstrual cycle?” he presses monotonously.

“I have irregular cycles. I usually go months without having one.”

“Again, when was your last one?”

I roll my eyes. “Four months ago.”

“And you’ve been sexually active in that time?”

“Obviously, unless you’re expecting Baby Jesus to come flying out of her vagina,” Oliver grumbles as he clenches his fist. He’s probably seconds from bashing this doctor’s face in just for his stupidity alone.

The doctor’s head snaps up and instantly moves to Oliver, who scowls at him as if he’s praying lasers will shoot from his eyes and vaporize the poor doctor.

“I have to ask these questions before every initial obstetrics exam,” the doctor explains before looking directly at me. “Have you had an ultrasound performed yet?”

“No. They didn’t do one at the hospital.”

“We’ll start with that and move from there. Shall we?” He motions to the exam table with his hand as if it should be obvious what I’m supposed to be doing.

One, I’ve been examined before, so I know the general drill. Two, I’ve never had an ultrasound on my lower abdomen, so I have no idea what to expect.

I lay back on the table as Oliver moves beside me and offers me his hand.

The doctor grabs the wand for the ultrasound, but the one he grabs looks like a melted dildo.

Please, tell me that is not going where I think it is.

“Spread your legs, Miss Mercer. This will be painless but a bit uncomfortable.”

Judging from the size of the wand, I would be inclined to trust him on that front. The monster in Ollie’s jeans is still bigger. Taking a deep breath, I let my legs fall apart, and he put a glob of gel on the end. His hand with the wand disappears under the sheet. He presses it inside me, and I groan from the irritation of pressure inside my cunt.

“There we go.”

The screen turns bright white before fading out to black with gray shadowing until I see it–the bubble that holds the baby inside me. It’smybaby, and it looks so comfortable in its temporary home.

My heart warms and stretches to accommodate one more love, the love for this life growing inside me.

“I’ll take a few measurements, and we’ll figure out how far along you are,” the doctor says, and that snaps me out of it.

How the hell is he going to take measurements?

I really feel like an idiot when he uses the buttons on the ultrasound machine to measure the picture of the baby. Then, he clicks on the pulsing circle on the baby’s body, and the sound of a rapid heartbeat fills the room.

Perfection. Absolutely melodic and beautiful.

“Looks like you’re nine weeks in gestation.” The doctor’s words send me reeling. I did quite a bit of research concerning calculating the time of conception. The conception is believed to be two weeks before what is considered to be “pregnant” meaning one is pregnant before they are even knocked up, medically speaking.

---