39. Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Thirty-Nine
“Proper pre-natal care is effective in assuaging some of the irrational fears and concerns of the first-time mother.”
A Young Woman’s Guide to the Joy of Impending Motherhood
Dr. Francine Pascal Reid (1941)
S o Brit was finally married and on her honeymoon. I wished Tom all the luck with her. Morgan swore she was over Anil—telling him off at the wedding was the last thing she needed to get him out of her system, and the quick jab to the nose didn’t hurt. I reluctantly gave her my blessing to get involved with Derek. My friends were happy, and I was happy for them.
As for me, I had no idea what was going on with J.B. I kept thinking about the look in his eyes when he kissed my fingers. But that was all I did. I didn’t want to push; I didn’t want to rush. I’d just coast along and see if I could figure out where things were going. If they were going anywhere. I mean, technically, nothing needed to be going on. Lots of parents lead separate lives. Just because I was having his baby didn’t mean I had any claim to J.B. But I had noticed the lack of overnight visitors in the house in the last few weeks.
I really didn’t know what to think. One minute J.B. was kissing my fingers and telling me this baby was bringing us closer together, and then he backed right off. It was confusing. Was it a man thing, I wondered, or was he reconsidering things between us? What did he want from me? As with anything that confuses me that much, I did my best to stop thinking about it. It was not easy, but at least I had a pretty good distraction.
The week after school started, I had an appointment for my first real ultrasound, as opposed to the one Dr. Morrissey gave me. I was going to see my babies again. I settled impatiently into a chair in the waiting room of the lab, shifting uncomfortably because of a very full bladder.
″Hey,” said a voice. I looked up to see J.B. standing in front of me.
″Find it okay?” I asked as he sat beside me.
″No problem.” He drummed nervously on his leg.
″Are you nervous?”
″No! ’Course not. It’s just—look what happened the last time I came to one of these things with you. We ended up with triplets.”
I had to smile at his logic. “Unless they find another one hiding in there, it can’t be that bad. You do know what they’re going to do to me in there, don’t you?”
″They’re going to do something to you? Something bad? Will it hurt?”
″Well, they’re just taking pictures, but they’re like, pictures of the babies. Is that what you want to see? Not that they’ll look like babies yet, they’re really just—well, they’re babies, but I’m only sixteen weeks, so…” I trailed off when I realized I was babbling. “Is that okay? You want to see the babies?”
J.B. gave me his slow smile, the one I hadn’t seen since before this baby stuff started. I had to admit it gave me a bit of a thrill to see it. So much for not thinking about him. “Well, I thought I’d just have a chance to see your bare belly and all,” he drawled. “And maybe those other things that look like flotation devices.” I gave a bark of laughter and covered my breasts with my arms as he grinned at me.
″Aren’t they huge?” I whispered. “And the doctor said they’ll only get bigger.”
We sat in the waiting room for over half an hour. J.B. waited patiently, leafing through a magazine, but I couldn’t sit still. It might have had something to do with the two liters of water currently on hold in my bladder and anxious to escape. Finally, they called my name, and J.B. stood up with me. The nurse/technician put up a hand to stop him.
″Perhaps your husband can wait here for a few minutes,” she began, with such a strong Scottish brogue it took a minute for me to understand her .
″Oh, he’s not my husband!” I told her a little too loudly. “He’s not—he’s just the father.”
″I’m a friend,” J.B. cut in grimly, with a disgusted look at me.
″He’s a friend,” I repeated lamely. I gave J.B. a sickly smile.
″Well, anyhow, I’ll see that he comes in after I do my tests.” She raised an eyebrow at J.B.
″Thanks.” Without a word to me, he sat down.
I followed the woman—who looked sturdy enough to walk across the entire Scottish Highlands without stopping—down a dim hallway into a curtained cubicle with a bed and a computer. It was very dim, with the screen providing the only light in the room, and very warm.
My Scotswoman gestured to the bed. “Hop up there, dear, and we’ll take a little look-see.” I complied, and after a brief tussle with my pants, allowed her to help me pull them down so that my stomach was exposed. She then slathered it with the jelly stuff Dr. Morrissey used, only much more of it, talking all the while, but with such a thick accent, I could only understand about every third word she said.
″When did your doctor say you’re due?” The way she said due sounded like doo. It made me smile. She placed the roller-ball thing on my belly.
″February 16. Dr. Morrissey said—”
″You have Dr. Morrissey?” the technician tried to hide a smile. “She’s a verra good doctor.”
″She scares me,” I admitted. I didn’t want to say she was a bitch, but that was exactly what I was thinking.
″She scares everyone.” The technician smiled, and I saw that her name tag read Jeannie.
″That makes me feel better. I think—”
″Ah, now, here’s your wee one. Wee ones, I guess?” All talk of the scary Dr. Morrissey was forgotten as the computer screen was filled with squiggles and shapes I assumed were my babies. Just like when Dr. Morrissey did the ultrasound in her office (which, based on the equipment Jeannie was using, was very low-tech), I couldn’t make out heads or tails of them. I hoped they didn’t have tails!
″Three of them in there,” she mused. “Hope you’ll have some help?”
″I do,” I said, thinking fondly of J.B.
For the next little bit, I was not sure what Jeannie was doing. She ran the roller-ball thing over my stomach, back and forth, all the while muttering things I couldn’t make out. I didn’t want to ask her what the matter was since she appeared somewhat annoyed and I was afraid it was something I’d done. So I lay and watched the screen and the shapes moving crazily across it. It made me dizzy to watch, but I hung on, trying to catch sight of something I might recognize as my babies.
Finally, Jeannie stopped, and the screen went blank. “Lovie, I can’t get the measurements I need. The wee ones are wiggling all about. I’m afraid I’m going to have to do an internal to get what I want.”
″An internal what? Oh! Oh.” I watched as Jeannie pulled out this two-foot (okay, maybe it was not two feet, but it was long) thing that looked a bit like a thermometer. “Um, that’s going where?” I asked as she unrolled a condom onto the skinny head of it.
So that was how I underwent my first (and hopefully last) transvaginal ultrasound. It didn’t hurt. I actually didn’t feel much; it was just the knowledge something was sticking out of me. At least Jeanie was quite pleased with the results and made sort of a happy clucking noise like a chicken as she murmured into a microphone.
By the time she was done getting all her measurements (whatever measurements they were), I had quite the headache from watching the computer screen. But I still couldn’t tell what part of the babies were which.
″Now, lovie, would you like your young man to have a boo?” Jeannie beamed at me. I nodded, not wanting to tell her again that he’s not my young man. “I’ll just go grab him. What’s his name?”
″J.B. Bergen.”
″Be right back.” I liked the way she rolled her r’s. I lay there on the narrow table with my shirt hiked up and one leg kicked free of my pants. There was a thin sheet covering everything south of my pubes, which was a good thing since I didn’t make an appealing picture with the ultrasound camera-thingy sticking out of my who-who.
But that, of course, was how J.B. found me.
He looked at my face first off, with a smile, and actually looked pretty excited. Jeannie bustled in after him, and with a very businesslike manner, pulled up the edge of the sheet and adjusted the camera between my legs. J.B. watched her with confusion, and suddenly, as if he realized what he was seeing, his eyes went wide and he looked at me with something akin to horror. I couldn’t help but laugh, even though that was not the funniest part of the whole thing.
″I thought—” he stuttered.
″I’ll explain later,” I told him .
The funny part, although I doubted it was funny to J.B., was how about ten minutes of both of us staring fixated on the computer screen as Jeannie pointed everything out to us, J.B. started to sway. I didn’t notice right away. Like I said, watching the movements of the babies on such a small screen was making me dizzy, and I was lying down. But J.B. was standing, in the very small and now very hot curtained cubicle.
″Sit yourself down, laddie,” Jeannie said suddenly. With a firm hand, she pushed J.B. onto a stool in the corner. “Head between your legs.”
″I don’t…” I’d never seen J.B. so white. Even his lips were pale.
″Head down,” Jeannie ordered, and J.B. complied.
″It’s so hot in here.”
″It’s for the bare bellies.” She winked at me. “Happens all the time.”
″Really?” J.B. had his eyes closed as his head was hanging limply between his legs.
″Not really,” Jeannie admitted, with another wink at me.
″Fuck.” He said it quietly and I didn’t think she heard it, but I could see Jeannie smiling as she pointed out one of the babies’ legs. After a couple of minutes with his head down and some deep breaths, J.B. finally hauled himself to his feet again.
″All better?” Jeannie asked solicitously. J.B. made a sort of growling sound, and this time Jeannie tried to hide her smile. “All done! Would you like a video and a picture of your wee ones?”
When we got home, J.B. stuck the picture on the refrigerator with a magnet that was advertising twenty-four-hour beer delivery. Cooper found the whole thing hilarious, but Emma got misty-eyed when she saw the picture.