23. Fae #2
The room is small, clinical, and neutral.
It is designed to feel calm but not personal.
Soft daylight filters through a window with horizontal blinds, casting pale lines across the walls and equipment.
To one side sits the ultrasound machine, bulky and off-white, its screen glowing with grainy black-and-white imagery.
Buttons and dials cluster across its surface, slightly worn from use, with probes resting neatly in their holders.
It hums softly, like it’s always half-awake.
Beside it is the examination bed, covered in crisp white paper that stretches tightly across the padding, the edges of it are folded with precision.
There’s no comfort in it, just purpose. The walls are a muted light tone, broken only by a framed floral print that feels almost out of place.
The soft pink flowers inside the gold frame try to add warmth, but it doesn’t do enough to change the atmosphere.
I take a seat on the bed as Roman takes the free seat beside me.
His knee bumps mine as he leans forward, resting one hand on my thigh.
Every time I hear the click of a door down the hallway my body goes tight.
By the time a nurse appears and says my name I’m wound so tight I’m dizzy.
Following behind her is another woman in scrubs.
She looks to be in her early forties, dark hair pulled back neatly.
There’s something steady about her, something that doesn’t press or overwhelm me, and I feel my muscles loosen the moment she smiles at me.
“Hi, I’m Doctor Emery.”
“Hi,” I manage, and Roman’s hand tightens gently on my thigh. I reach for him, curling both of my hands around his and squeezing back as my legs shift restlessly beneath me.
“Okay, so my colleague took your bloods last week, is that right?”
“Yes,” I nod and swallow the lump in my throat as I think about what those tests actually mean.
“And are you a possible father?” she asks, glancing toward Roman.
“I am the father,” he responds sharp enough that the air shifts.
She lifts her hands in a placating gesture.
“Of course. What I mean is, are we testing your DNA? No offence intended.”
“Yes,” he looks at me. “Fae wanted it. It doesn’t change anything for me.”
Her eyes flick to me. I press my lips together, nodding faintly, but my pulse steadily climbs faster. Her expression softens as she looks between us, like she understands more than we’ve said.
“Well,” she says gently, “what a very lucky baby… Would you like the results now or after the scan?”
I turn to Roman and he’s already watching me with an unwavering gaze. There’s no hesitation in him, no flicker of doubt, just that same quiet certainty he always has when it comes to me.
It should comfort me.
It usually does.
But all I can think about is what comes next.
The moment it stops being something abstract and becomes real.
And the possibility that the first time I see my baby properly, the first time I hear it, it will be tied to him.
To Fisher. To everything he took from me.
I look at Roman, hold onto the steadiness in his eyes, and try to breathe through the feeling clawing its way up my throat.
“Let’s do the scan,” I whisper.
“Okay mum, I will need you to empty your bladder and then undress from the waist down. We are going to do an internal exam today to see your baby more clearly.”
The word internal lances through my chest. The idea of another doctor touching me there makes my spine lock, pulling my muscles tight as everything in me stiffens.
It feels like something heavy drops onto my chest, pressing down so hard that my breathing turns shallow.
My eyes flick to the door and then back again.
The walls feel closer than they did a second ago.
Too white. Too clean. Too controlled. My throat works as I try to swallow, but it’s dry, like my body is already bracing for something it doesn’t want to go through again.
“Does she have to?” Roman asks in a tight voice.
“It helps at this stage,” the doctor explains calmly. “We may not be able to see the baby otherwise.”
She softens slightly as she looks at me.
“Fae… it’s okay if you can’t. We can go at your pace.”
Her saying my name pulls me back to focus on her properly. I draw in a slow breath and force my shoulders down. If this is what it takes to make sure the baby is okay, then I’ll do it.
“I’ll do it.”
She offers me a smile as Roman helps me down.
I move into the adjoining bathroom, taking a moment before coming back and climbing onto the bed.
The paper rustles beneath me as I settle.
The doctor covers my lower half before positioning my legs and feet.
Roman stays near my shoulder, his hand gripping mine, as a shiver runs through me at the first brush of cold gloves against my vagina.
“I’m inserting the probe now. It may feel cold.”
I jolt despite the warning. She murmurs a quiet apology and I shake my head, dragging in a deeper breath, trying to push down the wave of instinctive revulsion rising. Roman’s other hand comes to my shoulder, moving slowly and keeping me anchored as the doctor adjusts the machine.
The probe feels invasive, but not in the way Fisher did. The difference lands and my muscles loosen around it as the tension eases just enough that I can breathe again. I slowly open my eyes as the screen flickers to life. Grey and black shapes form, shifting into something I don’t understand.
“There,” she says gently. “That’s your baby.”
My breath catches, and I feel Roman go still beside me.
Everything around me seems to fade, the walls, the noise, the weight of where we are, until all that’s left is the screen and the tiny shape flickering against it.
I hadn’t expected it to hit me like this.
It’s so small it almost doesn’t make sense, curled in on itself like a little peanut inside its casing.
The doctor presses something on the machine and the sound changes, filling the space with a rapid, rhythmic thrum.
They’re so… alive.
I don’t realise I’m crying until Roman’s hand comes up, his thumb brushing gently along my cheek and catching the tears as they fall. The touch is so careful, like he’s handling something fragile, and it only makes the tightness in my chest ache more.
“Our little peanut,” he murmurs warmly against my ear as he leans down. A small laugh slips out of me.
“I just thought the same thing,” I manage to croak out as I tilt my head up to look at him. His eyes are glassy, as his own emotion sits openly in them in a way I’ve never seen before, and there’s so much love there it steals the remaining air from my lungs.
“You’re roughly eight weeks,” the doctor says gently. “I’d like to see you again in four weeks for your dating scan. Let’s get you cleaned up and I’ll print these off for you.”
The probe is removed carefully and I shift, moving off the bed on slightly unsteady legs before heading into the bathroom to clean up.
By the time I step back into the room, the doctor is seated again, facing Roman.
He reaches for me the moment I’m close enough, pulling me onto his lap.
I settle against him as the doctor’s gaze moves between us.
“Are you ready?” she asks in a careful voice.
I nod. Roman’s arm tightens around me as she draws in a breath, and I feel myself pulled closer into him. The doctor looks at Roman before speaking. Her eyes soften as she licks her lips and my heart feels like it’s going to explode.
“The blood results have shown a zero percent probability of paternity…”
“What?” I gasp.
“It means the tested male is not the biological father. I’m sorry if this isn’t the answer you were looking for.”
The floor drops out from under me as my stomach lurches hard enough that I have to grab onto Roman’s arm just to stay upright.
No.
No, no, no.
My fingers clamp down around Roman’s hand, like if I let go of him, I’ll lose something else too.
“Would you like a minute?”
I shake my head too quickly. Then nod. Then shake it again, my body unable to settle on anything.
Roman steps in for me, “can we have a minute please, Doctor?”
She nods straight away and leaves.
The door clicks shut with a softness that somehow makes it worse. Tears spill out, hot and relentless, as they slide down my cheeks and my body starts to shake. Roman turns me toward him, his hands coming up to hold my face, trying to ground me.
“Fae...”
“It’s his,” I whisper as my eyes drop to the floor.
“It’s mine,” Roman whispers back.
“It’s his,” I say louder this time, as if saying it can somehow change the outcome.
But it doesn’t change anything.
“I can’t…” my lungs seize. “I thought if I knew it would help. I thought it would make something clearer and it just—” I can’t finish.
Roman’s thumbs move under my eyes, wiping away tears as they fall.
“It changes nothing, Tinkerbell.”
“How can you say that?”
“Because it’s true.”
“It’s Fisher’s.” I spit as pain flares in his gaze.
“No,” he stands abruptly, setting my feet back on the floor before dragging a hand down his face. “This baby is mine.”
“It isn’t.” I shake my head. A sad smile pulls at my lips as I try and soften the blow.
“God damn it, Fae, it is,” he snaps, and I jump at the anger in his tone.
I drop my head into my hands, dragging in unsteady breaths as I try to slow everything down, but it only seems to make it worse.
I don’t even know why I’m pushing it, why I can’t just let him have this, but something in me won’t let it go.
It feels like he’s not really seeing it, not really taking it in.