Chapter 36
Vienna
Before
“So, Mrs Cavanagh, I heard you’ve been having some abdominal pain?” the doctor asked, entering the room without looking up from his notes.
Gabriella’s grip on my hand tightened, and I brought our joined hands to my mouth, kissing her knuckles.
Lying on the bed, her hair fanning the pillow, holding on to some part of me seemed to be the only thing anchoring her.
Her face was pale, a stark contrast against the darkness of her hair, and her chest was rising and falling rapidly.
“A little,” she murmured, not meeting his gaze when he looked up. I knew she was uncomfortable with the lie. She hadn’t wanted to register under my name, but we could hardly have her medical treatment under her own name. And the doctor was paid a hefty price to look the other way.
“Well, let’s get you looked at then, shall we?” he said with a pleasant smile, handing his notes over to the sonographer.
“Mrs, err… Mrs Cavanagh. If you could just lift your top up for me, please? And shuffle down on the bed a little,” the nurse asked, flicking her eyes in my direction and then looking away again quickly.
Gabriella rolled her eyes and mouthed the word “beard” at me, but I just grinned back happily.
She hated my beard, and I knew it made people wary of me for some bizarre reason—Gabby said it made me look menacing.
I happened to think it made me look like a very jolly Santa. She told me I was fucking deluded.
Pleasant woman, my old lady.
The sonographer went quiet as she set about doing her job, and I looked down at Gabby, but her eyes were fixed on the screen she couldn’t see.
“Any signs of barking?” I asked, attempting to break the thick silence. But all it did was make the sonographer jump.
“Barking?” she asked, looking alarmed. “Err… N-no, no barking. Should there be barking?”
“Ignore him!” Gabby snapped. “He’s being an idiot. Is everything okay?”
The nurse looked on the verge of tears. Her eyes came back to me, and I tried to offer what I thought was a reassuring smile, but she simply whimpered and lowered her head back over the monitor.
“Oh, for goodness’ sake, Sally!” the doctor snapped. “He’s not going to hurt you. Just give them the news!”
I might hurt her. It depended on what news she gave us. But I wisely decided to keep that information to myself.
“Well… erm, everything s-seems l-like—”
“Get out!” the doctor snapped again. “Go and get yourself a coffee and calm bloody down, woman!”
He waited with folded arms for the nurse to leave, and then threw himself into her seat with a heavy sigh, clicking at the buttons on the keyboard.
“Just as I thought,” he grinned, turning the screen around to us. “It’s just growing pains, Mrs Cavanagh. Your baby is growing quite nicely.”
The screen turned with agonising slowness, every second feeling like a minute. And yet, it all happened with a quickness I couldn’t fathom.
Because there, on the screen, its little heartbeat flickering strong and fast, was my baby.
And my whole world changed.
“Would you like to hear?” he asked and flicked a button without waiting for us to answer. The rhythmic thump of the heartbeat filled the silence of the room, and my own heart seemed to stop in response.
“Everything’s okay?” Gabby asked tearfully.
“More than okay, I’d say. That’s one strong baby. Just like his dad,” he said, winking at me.
He couldn’t be more wrong.
That baby was strong like its mother. She was the strongest woman I knew.
He went on to explain what we were seeing—the baby’s length, what tests they had run (all clear), what we could expect in the next few months, and then printed out a bunch of black and white pictures for us to take with us.
As he handed them over to me, I looked down at them, utterly entranced by what I was seeing.
How the fuck did something that small already own me?
How did it already feel like everything?
How could something so tiny have such a grip over me, such control?
I looked down at those pictures, my thumb brushing over the blurred outline like I could feel something through it.
Mine.
Ours.
And in that moment, there was no doubt left in me.
I’d burn the entire world down before I let anything touch them.