Chapter 18 #3
Ava shrugs, then seems to think better of moving, eyes flaring wide before she grins at me. ‘You looked a little more freaked out than me.’
I scoff, attention flicking to the smirking tech before focusing back on Ava. ‘I do not look freaked out.’
‘Fine, then broodingly grumpy.’ She mimics my expression, brow furrowed, lips tilted down dramatically. ‘Is that better?’
I have to fight to remain broodingly grumpy, because all Ava ever does is make me want to smile. ‘I’ll accept that terminology.’
She playfully rolls her eyes before recounting the story of her first ultrasound and how nervous she was, and how she almost peed her pants on the way there because they asked her to come in with a full bladder.
Her tone is light, as if she can look back and laugh at her past self, but it only reinforces my desire to be there for every next step.
‘All done,’ the tech announces not long after Ava finishes her story, her attention shifting back to us. ‘Dr. Khan will discuss our findings with you in a bit.’
Her bearing is perfectly calm, giving me no reason to be concerned, and yet I’m still on edge. ‘Is everything okay?’
‘Baby looks great,’ she soothingly reassures, but it’s not the full confirmation I’m looking for. ‘Would you like to hear the heartbeat?’
‘Yes, please,’ Ava rushes to answer, glancing my way, and I nod without hesitation even though I don’t care for the way I’m being redirected.
The tech hits a few keys on the machine and then the whooshing sound of the baby’s heartbeat fills the room. It’s fast, strong, and steady, the most perfect thing I’ve ever heard. It’s all I ever want to listen to.
On the edge of the bed, Ava’s hand brushes against where mine is resting, and without thinking, I hook my pinky around hers, holding tight. Our eyes meet when I look over and I already know she’s thinking the same thing I am: We have to be the luckiest people in the world.
‘And would you like to know the sex today?’ the tech asks after a few more moments of letting us listen.
‘Yes,’ I answer this time. ‘Please.’
With a knowing smile, she turns the machine’s screen toward us so we can see the image of the baby.
Ava showed me pictures from her first ultrasound but I couldn’t make much out past it being a small smudge on the paper.
But now there’s so much more to see, and there’s no mistaking the slightly alien shape of our baby, even as it wiggles on the screen.
‘It’s a girl.’
The sound that leaves Ava is a cross between a laugh and a scream, and she’s quick to smother it with a hand over her mouth. Even still, I can tell she’s smiling underneath, eyes welling with tears as the tech points out fingers and toes and remarks on how active the baby is.
In contrast, I’m frozen as I stare at the screen, stuck in a state of awe that Ava has created this. That’s my daughter is all my mind can repeat on a loop as I watch her tiny body move, and I’m convinced I’ve forgotten how to breathe.
Walking in today, I didn’t care what we were having, despite being curious to know.
I didn’t let myself imagine a life with specifically a son or a daughter, just vaguely a child, a little version of me and Ava combined.
It wouldn’t have mattered either way, because my hopes and dreams for this baby would have been the same no matter what.
But a daughter. My daughter. It just feels right to be able to say, and now I want to scream it from the rooftops.
I’m disappointed when the tech finally pulls the probe away and announces that she’ll step out and let Ava get cleaned up, then will bring us over to a different exam room.
I move without much thought for what I’m doing, taking the towel next to Ava and gently wiping away the gel on her belly until she’s clean.
‘Are you upset?’
I glance up from my task at the sound of Ava’s quiet voice. Her former excitement is subdued as she catches her lower lip between her teeth, like she’s afraid to hear my answer.
I’m still trying to silence my swimming thoughts, to organize them into something coherent so I can reply to her question. ‘Upset?’ I repeat for my own sake. ‘That we’re having a girl?’
She nods, still hesitantly staring up at me, and it hits me that my reaction probably left something to be desired. I’m so used to keeping my emotions locked down for the sake of my reputation that it’s become second nature.
‘Ava, no,’ I rush to reassure her. I toss the towel aside in favor of grasping her shoulder, helping her sit up and bringing us eye to eye. ‘Of course I’m not upset.’
But because she’s an overthinker and people pleaser extraordinaire, that isn’t enough to convince her. ‘I mean, I understand that some men want sons to carry on their legacy,’ she rambles on. ‘And obviously you’re giving them some pretty big shoes to fill, so I—’
‘Our daughter will do that just fine,’ I gently interrupt. ‘I’m excited, princess. I really am.’
Thankfully, the cloud of anxiety around her blows away with my reassurance, and I’m left once again staring at my personal sun.
‘Me too,’ she says, giving me a smile that makes me want to match her joy. ‘I can’t wait to meet her.’