Chapter 33
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
PHIL COLLINS & MARILYN MARTIN, “SEPARATE LIVES”
Gabby
Two weeks later, Matt took me to my OB appointment.
“This must be the lucky dad,” the nurse said as Matt followed me from the waiting room to the exam room.
“You bet,” he said.
I shot him a look over my shoulder as the nurse stopped at the scale. He winked.
“Turn around,” I said.
“Huh?” He squinted.
“I don’t want you to see my weight.”
“Gabby—”
“Just do it.”
He turned while giving me a heavy sigh. The nurse eyed me as I stepped onto the scale. It was a silent tsking, as if I had a terrible boyfriend who judged me for my weight. Matt was neither my boyfriend nor overly judgmental. And while I was no longer actively pursuing him or trying to impress him, I didn’t want him to know my weight.
“Okay, follow me,” she said after jotting down my weight. “Your boyfriend can wait in this room,” she pointed to the exam room on the right, “while you pee in this cup for me. The restroom is down the hall on the left.”
I nodded as Matt sat in the chair next to the exam table.
After peeing in the cup, I returned.
“This is weird,” I said, sitting on the exam table, legs dangling off the side. “What would Julianne think of you being here with me?”
He made duck lips for a few seconds. “Good question.”
“Would she be mad?”
He shook his head, crossing his arms over his chest. “Would Ben be mad?”
“No. Well, maybe. Yes. He’d be mad because you’ve been his nemesis.”
“Me? Why?”
“Because he had to endure my talking about you when he liked me. And he was mad when he found out that we almost had sex.”
“Mad? You said his name.”
“Exactly. Thank you. That’s what I said.”
“Good afternoon, Gabriella. How are you?” Dr. Murray came into the room.
“I’m good. This is my friend Matt.”
She shook his hand. “Nice to meet you. The father?”
“Yup.”
I rolled my eyes. “No. He’s just a friend.”
She smiled at him. “Well, you’re a good friend.”
Matt ate up her compliment, sitting up straighter in the chair.
“Your weight is good. How has your morning sickness been?”
“Better,” I said.
“That’s great. Can you lie back for me?”
I nodded, lying on the table with one hand propped behind my head while my other hand lifted my shirt.
She folded the waist of my sweatpants to expose more of my lower abdomen. I glanced at Matt to see if he was looking at me, and he was.
“Might feel a little cold,” Dr. Murray said, squirting some lube onto my belly, then spreading it with the wand. The machine made a static noise as she moved it around, stopping occasionally to press a little harder. “There it is.” She smiled when my baby’s heartbeat pumped to a fast rhythm.
My grin doubled, and Matt’s did too.
“Is it okay?” I asked.
She nodded, removing the wand and wiping my belly with a wad of tissues. “It’s perfect.” She proceeded to measure my belly.
“I just look chubby, not pregnant. What are you really measuring?”
Dr. Murray gave me a reassuring smile. “I’m measuring your uterus. And it’s exactly where it should be for twelve weeks. You’ve made it to the end of your first trimester. Congratulations. Your baby is about the size of a lime.”
Matt grabbed my hand and squeezed it. Who would have imagined that he would be with me while I was pregnant with another man’s baby?
After my appointment, he took me to dinner and then back to my dorm.
“You don’t have to walk me all the way to my room.” I laughed.
“I do.” He opened the front door for me and followed me up the stairs and down the hallway.
After I unlocked my door, he took a step backward. “Call me if you need anything. Okay? And I’ll add your next appointment to my calendar.”
“I shook my head. It won’t be necessary. Ben will be here by then. But thank you so much.”
Matt tried to smile, but it fell short of a real one. Instead, it was obvious he felt bad for me. Poor me … thinking Ben was going to read my letters and immediately return to Ann Arbor to be with me and his baby. But I had hope, and that was enough.
* * *
Dear Ben,
The nausea has subsided. Hydrating works well along with a bottle of ginger ale mid-morning. I had a good birthday. Your card to me must have gotten lost in the mail, but thanks for thinking of me.
Our baby has a strong heartbeat. I think it’s a boy. I don’t know why, but I do. Have you thought about names?
I haven’t told my parents because I want you to be the first to know. So I’m patiently waiting for your reply. However, when the semester is over, I’ll have to move back home, and I suspect I’ll have a noticeable bump by then. Right now, I just look full in the middle. Enough to make my jeans tight so I’ve been wearing elastic waist leggings and sweatpants.
How’s it going with learning ASL? I’m getting so much better at it, but my instructor said it will take a year to learn enough signs to have extensive conversations, and another year or two after that before I’m good at it.
I love you. XO
Gabby
I wasn’t happy that Ben refused to open my letters or reply, but I knew that eventually he would miss me so much that he would cave and read them. Hope was enough to keep me going, passing my classes (just barely), and eating healthy for our baby.
And nothing could have prepared me for the gut-wrenching feeling of losing that hope.
“How was the camp?” Mom asked when we talked on the phone the first Saturday morning in April.
“Uh, it was fine. How are you and Dad?” I quickly changed the subject.
“We’re good. We miss you.”
“Miss you too.” I curled the phone cord around my finger. I hated lying (even if by omission) to my parents. “How’s Ben? I haven’t heard much”— anything— “from him recently.”
Mom made a clicking sound with her tongue. “Oh, well, he’s working now. He’s back at the store in the meat department, but he doesn’t have to tend to the counter or have interaction with customers. Carmen said when he’s not working, he still spends hours in his room. But …”
“But what?”
“Well, um …”
“What?” I repeated.
“I guess I should just prepare you. He has a friend he’s been doing things with occasionally.”
“Oh, that’s good. Right? Someone he works with?”
“No. It’s someone who just moved to town. They met at church.”
“Oh, even better. Is he our age?”
“ She’s actually twenty-three. And she’s a substitute teacher at the school for now, but Agnes Kline is retiring at the end of the year, so Ben’s new friend will teach the third grade full-time in the fall. Her name is Laurel, and her father is deaf. She knows ASL. Carmen hopes she’ll convince Ben to learn it.”
At some point, all the tears broke free. There were no sobs, not so much as a peep, but my eyes hemorrhaged emotions. Pain mixed with pregnancy hormones.
“Gabby?”
I swallowed hard and cradled the phone between my ear and shoulder to wipe my face. “Yeah?”
“Just making sure you’re still on the line and we didn’t get cut off. Carmen didn’t know if I should tell you about Laurel since you and Ben had a rough moment over Christmas break. But I told her you’d be happy for him. We all just want him to get better and adjust to his new way of living without hearing. It’s not like you wouldn’t want him to make new friends.”
Friends …
Ben’s history with female “friends” involved sex. I was his only platonic female friend until he kissed me in the hallway.
I rested my hand on my stomach. “A friend,” I murmured. “Good for him.”
Benjamin Ashford was a cruel asshole, and had I not been pregnant with his baby, I would have vowed to never speak to him again.
But—and it was a big but —I was having his baby. It wasn’t a secret I could keep forever. And I wanted nothing more than to sneak into his house and steal all the letters that I knew were unopened. Except the first few I sent him. He deserved every nasty word in those.
“Any boys we need to know about? Are you being good?”
I glanced at the ultrasound picture beside my bed. “Brushing and flossing every day.”
She laughed. “You know that’s not what I meant, but I’m glad to hear you’re taking care of your teeth. We didn’t spend all that money on braces for you not to take care of them.”
I barely registered her words because my heart ached too much, and my mind was numb from the shock.
“Tell Dad I love him.”
“I will, hun. Talk to you next week.”
I nodded without so much as a mumbled “goodbye” before hanging up the phone.