Page 96 of Fractured (Not Quite a Billionaire)
“Mm,” she said. Another doctor noise. “Why don’t you lie down here and let me take a look?”
When she started poking and pressing under my attractive paper gown, though, I tensed. “I’m not pregnant,” I said. “I’m on the Pill, remember?”
“Uh-huh.” She was focusing on the eye chart on one wall, her fingers still moving, and very uncomfortable they were. And then she rolled away, snapped off the gloves, tossed them in the trash, and said, “But you’re pregnant anyway.”
Talk about not being able to breathe.“What?I can’t be.”
“About eight weeks, I’d say, but you’ll be able to get a more exact due date once you see an OB/GYN. Not my specialty.”
“I had a period,” I reminded her.No.Not possible. “There’s got to be something else.”
Oh, God. A tumor. I had a tumor on my ovary, or in my uterus, more likely. And if it was already affecting my overall health—that wasn’t good at all. My mom had gone so fast. So very fast.
Karen.
Dr. Galbraith pulled back the edge of the gown and checked out my breasts. “Tender here?” she asked when I winced. “Sore? Swollen? Got some tingles?”
“Well, yes, but…PMS.”
She slipped the gown back into place and gave me a pat on the arm. “Nope. Those are pregnant breasts, kiddo. We’ll do a blood test, or if you need the proof right now, you can go pee on a stick. Or you can save yourself twenty bucks, because there’s not going to be any different answer to this one.”
“But my period,” I insisted again, even as my heart started to do a tango. If I hadn’t already been lying down, I’d havefallendown.
“Uh-huh. Let me guess. It wasn’t heavy.”
“Well, no. But…the Pill.”
“Implantation spotting. Good news is that you’re halfway through your first trimester already, and you’re probably not going to get any sicker. At least, that’s good news if you want to keep it. If you don’t, you probably want to get moving. I can give you a referral for an abortion, but sooner would be much better there.”
“But how?” I asked again, as if it would make a difference.
She seemed to agree, because she said, “Doesn’t really matter, does it? Pregnant is pregnant.”
Eventually, we figured it out. I’d had some dental work done before we’d gone to New Zealand, and I’d taken antibiotics. “One guess,” she said. “The dentist didn’t mention that they’d interfere with the Pill. Middle-aged guy?”
“Yes.” I barely knew what I was saying. My head kept trying to float away from my body.
“For future reference?” she said. “Backup contraception with antibiotics, please.”
“That’s great to know. Now.”
“What about the baby’s father?” She glanced at my ring. “Is it your fiancé?”
I almost laughed. What, like Hemi’s sperm wouldn’t have duked it out with anybody else’s, and won? “Yes.”
“Remember, your choice is your own. If you’re feeling pressured, if you’re feeling unsafe, talk to me. Meanwhile,” she added before I could tell her that, no, I’d never be unsafe, and that she didn’t know the meaning of ‘pressured,’ “take this.”
You’re Pregnant,the double-sided flyer read.Now What?
Now what indeed.
I took the subway home again at the height of rush hour, and this time, when I had to swallow back nausea for the four stops when I was pressed up against a strapholding guy in a tank top, his armpit practically in my face, at least I knew the reason for it.
I longed, suddenly, for New Zealand. For cool green grass and the impossibly exotic creations that were fern trees. For endless green vegetation and clear air. For a wide ocean and a wild wind and an empty beach. For a life that wasn’t mine.
When I got home, I checked my emails. No responses to my applications, except a chipper note from Nathan that he’d asked his dad, and there might be something for me. In banking.
Tomorrow,I thought, and went into the kitchen to microwave a potato, which had turned out to be one of the few things I could manage. Let’s hope a baby could grow on yogurt and baked potatoes.
