Chapter Ten
CHAPTER TEN
L UCA DID RETURN to work the next day. There were things to see to, and they were of utmost importance. But then, everything in this job was. Still, he’d had to put everything aside out of concern for Polly’s health and well-being for the past few days. At first it had given him no small measure of discomfort. To discard his routine. To be away from his work for an extended period of time—not that he hadn’t checked in, or completed tasks in his home office—but eventually, he had realized that it was a good thing.
He wanted things to be as Polly had said.
He wanted to rearrange his life.
He felt a powerful connection to this child. This child who wasn’t yet born. He could already feel the desperate pull to rearrange everything so that he could be a good father.
Not the sort of father who would reject and shame his child. A father who would care for them no matter what.
He found himself thinking about Polly, back at the penthouse. He found his mind more there than in the office, and given that he had not been into the office for some days prior to this, it surprised him. More than that, he found he wanted to hold on to this.
It was a rare thing, this sort of moment when he could hold multiple thoughts in his mind. Multiple concerns.
Yes, single-minded focus got a fair amount of things accomplished. But he wanted to be single-minded in his parenting as well. He wanted to hold his child with him, even as he went about his day.
In many ways, he did that with his mother.
She was his motivation. His reason.
But practically, she required nothing of him.
She was a memory, and nothing more. Living for a memory of a person was much simpler than figuring out how to foster a relationship with a person who was here.
She had a doctor appointment scheduled for later that same day, and he made a call down to the office. He let them know that he would be attending, and that he wished to help conduct the tests and exams. No one argued, even though it was unorthodox, because he was Dr. Luca Salvatore, and his reputation in medicine preceded him.
He was eager for Polly to return to the office, because he did not like her absence. Even though she would be taking another job, she would be here, and things would feel better. They would feel right. He did decide to call her and let her know that he would be at her appointment.
“I should’ve thought to include you,” she said.
She had been extraordinarily different with him these past days. When she had apologized to him, because she had hurt his feelings, and not to make herself feel better, it had shifted something inside of him.
No other person had ever treated him that way. Not since his mother.
His mother had known and understood that he had so many feelings, and that they were complicated. That he didn’t know how people expected him to express them, nor did he care.
But she had seen him. And he didn’t think that Polly had this entire time, but she certainly did now.
He hadn’t thought he cared about that.
It hadn’t occurred to him that it might be a nice thing to have someone understand him.
He had decided that he by and large didn’t need emotional connections with people, but he was going to be a father, and that meant he was going to have to forge an emotional connection with his child. So perhaps it was only a good thing to practice by forging emotional connections with other people.
And trying to get a sense for what it felt like when they had them with him.
“I was happy to include myself,” he said.
“Yes. Well. I suppose that’s not surprising.”
“I will see you in an hour.”
“See you then.”
They rode in the same car over to the private doctor’s office. They were taken into a room where the doctor did an initial Doppler check to establish that the fetal heart rate was normal. All was well, and he felt the tension in his chest ease that he hadn’t been aware was there.
“And an ultrasound,” he said.
“We typically don’t—”
He looked at the doctor. “I am aware. But I would like to have one done. I called ahead.”
“Of course, Dr. Salvatore.”
They were ushered into the sonogram room, and he introduced himself to the technician. “I would like to perform the sonogram,” he said.
Polly looked at him, her eyes wide. “What?”
“I’m a doctor.”
“You aren’t an ultrasound technician,” Polly said.
“No. But I have the necessary qualifications and knowledge.”
“I don’t want you to do it,” she said.
“I told you that I—”
“Yes,” she said. “You are a doctor. But you’re not my doctor. You’re the father of my baby, and that’s it.”
“Is that all?”
He felt...scalded by that.
“Yes, Luca,” she said. “That is all.”
“You’re acting like I don’t have feelings again,” he said.
She shook her head. “I’m really not. I’m asking you to be reasonable. To consider if it’s a typical thing for a father to be in charge of running the ultrasound, or if you should trust the people who make this their expertise to do their jobs.”
He scowled. Mostly because he could see that she was potentially right. He still wanted to be the one to do this. He wanted to be the one to make sure that everything was okay. It was important to him.
“You can stand there,” she said. “And look. And if you see something of concern, why don’t you ask the woman to linger there.”
The ultrasound tech was looking between them and Luca didn’t bother to try and read her expression. He didn’t care. He only knew that he was irritated, in part because she might even be right. And even if she wasn’t, he could see that it was going to benefit him to bend here. He didn’t want to bend. Medicine was the way he cared. It was all he was.
And yet again, Polly didn’t understand that. She didn’t understand that for him this was caring.
How else was he supposed to show it?
He wanted to be in control of everything happening. He understood that. He didn’t see what was wrong with it, though. That was the problem. She was being stubborn right now.
The ultrasound tech readied the equipment, and Polly looked at him. “What?”
“I’m going to have to put the gown on.”
“Yes,” the tech said. “It’s going to be an internal ultrasound.”
“In that case, Polly must be certain that she wants one. I directed this, but didn’t think the implications through.”
“It’s okay,” she said. “I would like to see the baby.”
“You’re certain?”
He had been controlling this, from the beginning. And he logically knew the way that ultrasounds work, but he hadn’t fully considered what that might mean to Polly, or that she might find it invasive. He did sometimes shut off the full implications of things. He knew that to be true.
And he felt regretful that he had perhaps inadvertently caused the situation when what he had been trying to do was make himself feel better.
“I do want to see,” she said. “But I need you to turn around right now.”
He did, though he didn’t understand why she was being shy now when he had seen her naked.
He was struck then by a completely unexpected arrow of lust. He had done a very good job not thinking of her that way. She had been poorly. And he had been obsessed with the idea of having her back at his side. Of sorting out all of these things pertaining to the baby. Pertaining to them.
He hadn’t thought of that night. Deliberately. Because he had been intent on hiring her back. But suddenly, it was replaying itself in his mind. Vivid. Intense.
He curled his fingers into fists, and waited. Listening for the sounds of her disrobing.
This feeling, of course, was exactly why they were in this situation.
This feeling and May twenty-fourth.
And that night.
He really hadn’t used a condom.
He still couldn’t... He couldn’t quite believe it. He couldn’t remember it. Couldn’t even remember thinking about it. And that was completely outside of his experience. Contraception, protecting both himself and his lover had always been paramount rules.
But he hadn’t thought of rules when he was with her.
Not even a little bit.
“You can turn around now,” she said.
He did. She was lying on the table with a sheet draped over her knees, and the angle he was at prevented him from seeing anything.
“Sorry,” the tech said. “This part is always cold. And a little bit uncomfortable.”
He couldn’t see what was going on beneath the sheet, but he knew. Because he knew the procedure well.
He found that he could not entirely find the doctor in the scenario though, and that was odd.
He felt a knot of worry, concern about her potential discomfort.
These were things he had never felt when he had done residency. And while he didn’t practice medicine in the traditional sense, he had learned to do it.
He had always felt disconnected from the experience the patient was having, but not now.
The black-and-white screen flickered, and then, he could not tear his eyes away. It took a moment, but then he was able to see a fluttering. The amniotic sac. The embryo itself. “There he is,” he said, unable to hold back a smile. Unable to be rational. Because this was such an early stage of development. Anything could happen. And yet he didn’t feel detached. He didn’t feel as if he knew he should. He felt something broad, expansive growing inside of him.
Love.
Deep and intense, along with it the desire to protect.
Fiercely.
This was beyond the scope of anything he had ever known before. It was beyond him.
“Incredible,” he said.
Even though it wasn’t. It was run-of-the-mill. It was average. People did this every day.
But he could not find a single thing that felt commonplace about it.
Because Polly was carrying his baby in her womb. This was the result of their night of passion, his loss of control. The culmination of a hundred things that felt unlikely and yet right at the same time.
He felt...gratitude that transcended logic. He felt something that he could not easily name. He felt everything. All at once. Like the cover had been lifted on something bright and intense inside of him, and now that it was revealed it couldn’t be hidden.
He looked at Polly, because suddenly it was very important that he see her face. That he see what she was feeling.
Her eyes glittered, but he couldn’t figure out what exactly the tears were for. Tears, he found, were a constellation. They could contain many truths. They were never half so simple as sadness, or happiness. They spoke of intensity. Overwhelmed. Sometimes he thought it wasn’t that he couldn’t understand what other people were feeling, but that people were very quick to simplify feelings. Tried to put one name to them when they had a depth, and all-encompassing nature that was different than simply happy or sad.
Often he was angry because he was afraid. Often he was happy, but tired, because that happiness had come at a cost. From many sleepless nights. Right now he was grateful, but with it came a measure of awe. Of uncertainty.
He moved closer to the screen then, and began to examine the black-and-white image. Because emotions might be something that he found difficult and complex, but there was nothing complex about the physical.
To his eye, everything on the scan looked normal. “Go back,” he said.
The ultrasound tech looked at him. “To where?”
“I would like to get a look at the heart chambers.”
“It is very early.”
“I would still like it. Along with a full panel of blood work.”
“I don’t order blood work. The doctor will, if she sees a need.”
“I see the need.”
“Luca,” said Polly. “Let’s discuss this later.”
She was speaking to him like he was a naughty child. And that irritated him as much as he had been awestruck the moment before.
The ultrasound tech moved back to the heart, and he watched. Watched it move. Flutter.
“Thank you.”
When they were finished, Polly demanded he turn around again so that she could get dressed. At that point, the tech left the room.
“You didn’t have to be that difficult,” she said.
“I’m not being difficult.”
“I didn’t know that you were coming here and you were going to try and act as a doctor. I thought that you were here as the father.”
“I was,” he said. “But for me the two things are not different. Because nothing inside of me is different.”
“You cannot be this obtuse. Surely you understand why it’s frustrating for a professional to have somebody looming over them like that.”
“It was not looming.”
“You were,” she said.
They exited the exam room, and went out into the front of the office. She made a new appointment.
“That is during my workday.”
“I don’t care.”
They walked out, and a car was waiting for them. She got into the back, not waiting for him to let her in.
He slid in beside her. “Did you need to be told that I was going to want to have involvement in the medical side of this?”
“No. I didn’t need to be told. We needed to talk about it. Because what you are wanting to do, is it normal?”
“I’m not normal,” he said, feeling at the end of this. At the end of himself. “You know that. You have worked with me for five years. What about me has ever said normal human being.”
“I don’t think of you that way,” she said. “I don’t think of you as being weird. Or abnormal. But this isn’t normal. And when something is going to be abnormal, then surely it must occur to you on some level that you have to actually speak to the other person involved in the situation before you go...being that.”
“If I knew, if I had that level of clarity, then maybe I would. But it seems perfectly logical to me, and I don’t understand how it doesn’t to you. I am a medical doctor. I did a residency. I have done all the schooling, and all the training. I also have a doctorate in medical research, and have been responsible for many advancements in the field of medicine over the past decade. You know this. Why would you think that I would...not want my eyes, my expertise, my opinion involved in the single most important medical event that has ever occurred in my life.”
She said nothing for a moment. “You’re afraid, aren’t you?”
“I’m not afraid.”
“Yes, you are. You thought that I was sick when you came to Milan. You’re afraid of things going wrong for people that you... I don’t know, do you care about me, Luca?”
“How can you say that? My life would not function without you in it, and you are well aware of this.”
“All right. It’s all about how functional your life is or isn’t because I am in it. I forgot. That’s not caring.” She was silent for a moment. “You care about the baby, don’t you?”
“I do care,” he said. “I want you to allow me to care in the way that I know how to show it.”
She looked at him, something in her expression softening. “That’s admirable. But you also have to care in a way that the other person can receive it. It feels stressful for me. To have you be... There in an official capacity. There is a doctor. I want you there as...”
“Your husband? Because you don’t want me to be your husband in any other capacity. It is you who are inconsistent.”
Just then, the car pulled up to his building. He got out, and this time, he was the one who didn’t pay her any mind. He was the one who didn’t pause.
He walked into the building, a tangle of anger growling around his chest. Yet again, a whole layer of emotions he couldn’t quite so neatly define. But anger was certainly the hottest part. It made him burn.
She caught up to him by the time the elevator doors opened, and she got inside with him.
“Are you suggesting that you want to be my husband?” she asked when the doors closed.
“I asked you to marry me. You were the one who issued edicts about our physical relationship. And about what we would and would not be.”
“Can’t you see why?”
“Yes,” he said. “Because it is impossible to approach any of this fully logically. And I would prefer it if we could.”
“We’re human. Not Vulcan.”
“I’ve been accused of being a Vulcan more than once.”
“I know. By me. But you told me that isn’t how you are. You have to find a way to let that part of you come forward. The part that feels.”
“It’s uncomfortable.”
“Incubating your baby is pretty uncomfortable. I don’t know if you’ve noticed. But I’ve been rather unwell.”
The elevator reached its destination and she swept out.
And it was like everything in him went blank. It was like everything was calm. Clear. He saw her.
Just as he had May twenty-fourth at three thirty in the afternoon. When she walked into his apartment the sunlight tangled with her hair. Illuminating it. Casting it in gold.
Feeling.
Yes. He could open himself up to feeling. To all of it. To be a better husband, to be a better father.
But she had said that she didn’t want what he felt.
Now she wanted his feelings.
She was entirely and utterly inconsistent. But more than that, she was radiant. More than that, he wanted her.
So she wanted feeling. She was going to get his feeling.
He crossed the space, and wrapped his arm around her waist. And before she could say anything, before she could beg him or protest, he lowered his head and claimed her mouth with his.