Chapter 19
Alyssia
“You don’t want to know the gender, right?” Dr. Dupas asks before she begins to lower the wand to my belly.
Travis looks down at me.
“Do you?” I ask even though we’ve discussed this before. He’s assured me that whatever I want he’s fine with, but I want to double check.
“No,” he answers, jostling my hand that he holds in his. “We’ve decided against it.”
My heart skips a beat. It sounds as if we’ve come to a mutual decision like a real couple.
But we’re not a couple. I have to remind myself of that
“No,” I agree, turning to Dr. Dupas.
She gives me the warmest look, smiling as she lowers the wand.
My new doctor is highly competent, and based on the dozens of pictures of parents with their newborns taped around her office, it’s easy to see how much she cherishes her work. Gratitude washes over me as I recall, not for the first time, that Travis put in some research and work to find her.
Moments later the rhythmic heartbeat fills the room.
Even though this isn’t the first time we’ve heard the baby’s heartbeat, an astonished gasp escapes me nonetheless.
“Hi,” Travis says to the screen facing us, his voice a touch wobbly. His hand tightens around mine.
Or, perhaps, this time it’s me clinging to him. Either way, there’s a mutual comfort that we both partake in as we stare at our baby.
“We can compare the size of today’s ultrasound to the previous one,” Dr. Dupas explains.
My previous doctor sent over my files.
“Un, deux, trois …” Dr. Dupas begins counting in French until the number twelve. “Right on schedule. Your baby is just over twelve centimeters. Oh, they might be tall.”
I look at Travis.
“Isn’t your dad like six-three?” I question.
He nods. “And Tristan is six-two.” He frowns. “I got the short end of the stick.”
I narrow my eyes. “You’re like six feet.”
“Six one,” he corrects with a frown.
I keep my eyes on him, while he stares at the ultrasound screen. The silly grin on my face refuses to fade away.
“Oh my God, are they yawning?” Travis asks, excited and pointing for me to turn back to the screen.
Dr. Dupas laughs.
“Yes,” she says. “Your baby is yawning.”
I cover my mouth with my free hand, my eyes misting over. This has to be the most precious thing I’ve ever seen in my life.
“We can get this video, right?” Travis asks Dr. Dupas.
“Yes, as soon as this appointment is complete, my staff will prepare the files to email it and save it to a thumb drive for you to take home,” she tells us as she wipes the goo off of my lower belly and aids me in sitting up to cover myself up again.
“Oh, and before I forget, Dr. Dupas. Is breakfast important at this stage in pregnancy, correct?”
My new doctor pauses, as if she weren’t expecting that question.
“Yes, it is,” she says.
Travis gives me a smug look. “Then you would recommend someone, who’s say, eighteen weeks pregnant to have a healthy, nutritionally dense breakfast each morning? Especially if they have a particularly grueling commute to work?”
“I do not have—” I try to pull my hand free of his, but he holds tighter.
He hasn’t let this drop since the first day he met me at my subway stop. Since then, every day that I’ve worked in the office, he’s met me to walk me to the office. He always has a cup of lemon-ginger tea and honey, with some sort of breakfast.
This morning it was an everything bagel with egg and bacon, and sliced peaches on the side. I’ll admit, I’ve started skipping my morning croissant to eat whatever breakfast he’s chosen, even though I have to put up a fight first.
Dr. Dupas chuckles. “I assume you’re talking about Alyssia. Yes, I would recommend a balanced breakfast, but that’s if you’re hungry. Your body will tell you what it needs. If you would like I can put you in touch with a nutritionist my office works with.”
“That won’t be necessary.”
“I’ll take that name and number, please.”
Travis and I say at the same time. I cut him a glare, but he simply deadpans me as if he’s proven something.
“We had a cancellation for today’s scheduled hospital visit and tour. If you have time, we can slide you in.”
“That would be great,” I say without considering Travis’ time. “My office gave me the rest of the day off, but…” I turn to Travis. “I’m not sure if you have something to do.”
“Hang on, I just need to make a call,” he says.
“You don’t have to—”
He holds up a hand. “I’m just going to step out to make a call, but yeah,” he looks at Dr. Dupas, “we’ll be there.”
We.
Such a little word shouldn’t have an impact on me.
“The tour will be an hour. Are you sure you have time?” I whisper to Travis who returned from his call frowning and has been eyeing his phone off and on since we entered the hospital.
He pushes his phone back into his pocket, looking me in the eye. “There is literally nothing more important than being here right now.”
Something kicks against my ribcage. My mind forbids me to admit that it’s my heart.
I nod in lieu of speaking, and try to ignore the sensations happening between my legs. Which has been happening more and more lately.
“Alyssia?”
“What? Huh?” I startle, my words coming out a little louder than intended, which causes the rest of our eight-person group to turn my way.
“Your brochure.” Travis passes me one of the hospital’s brochures that the head of the hospital’s maternal department handed to all of us.
I thumb through the brochure, admiring the pictures of smiling families with their newborns and the statistics on the safe and healthy births that the hospital is responsible for over the past half a decade.
As soon as I make note of that statistic, the hospital administrator points it out to us in her speech.
We’re first given a tour of the ground level of the hospital where there’s a gift store and lobby complete with coffee shops and some small eateries before we’re taken up to the maternal unit.
The first section we come to is the delivery area. There are a few nurses who introduce themselves to us, and in both French and English tell us how much they’re looking forward to taking care of us during our deliveries.
Their welcoming and open natures further relax me.
The next section we’re brought to is the nursery. We all come to a stop in front of the large window that separates us from the dozen or so newborns in their glass bassinets. I swoon over the precious infants swaddled in their blankets.
“Look at him,” one of our fellow group members says. She’s around five months pregnant, just like me. I look to where she’s pointing to find one of the newborns has almost completely broken free of his swaddle and his little face is scrunched up as if he’s on the verge of crying.
“He’s not happy,” Travis says, beside me.
He joyfully watches one of the nurses come over to the baby and playfully scold the infant before reswaddling him.
With one of Travis’ hands pressed against the glass, his attention glued to the scene in the nursery.
“Did you ever want to be a dad?” I hear the question before I register that it’s me doing the asking.
It’s hard to square the man standing beside me with the guy I heard a month ago who said that the only thing on his mind was winning a championship.
Almost as if coming out of a state, Travis turns to me.
“In all honesty, I never gave it much consideration.”
I appreciate his honesty. “At the gala you said you weren’t ready for kids,” I paraphrase.
The space between his eyebrows narrows, appearing as if realization just dawned. “Is that why you were hiding from me that night?”
My eyes bulge. “You noticed?”
“How could I not?” he counters. “You practically knocked over a few guests to get away from me.”
I stifle my laughter. “I did not.”
My expression sobers when I notice the serious look he’s giving me.
“If I knew then what I know now, I would’ve never said it,” he says. “I’m sorry you overheard that.”
His face is so genuine, his eyes imploring me to believe him. A tugging in the pit of my stomach makes me want to lean in and brush my lips against his, to let him know it’s okay.
I can’t do that, of course.
“You’re focused on your career,” I say, hoping it conveys my forgiveness. “As you should. From what I hear you’re one of the best.”
Again, I’ve said more than I intended. Through work, I’ve learned more about the sport that Travis competes in. It’s obvious from the way my coworkers speak of him that his name garners a lot of respect.
“I can’t claim that title yet,” he counters. His gaze drops and he looks back toward the infants. “But I damn sure will soon,” he says fiercely, turning back to me. This time his eyes are on my belly. “Now, I have an even bigger reason to claim my spot at the top.”
A tiny thrill rushes through me at the determination in his voice. I’ve learned enough to know Travis is competing for the championship. I get the impression he feels as if he’s not good enough—worthy enough until he’s earned that spot.
I hold back from telling him that waiting until you hit some elusive goal to feel worthy can be a fruitless endeavor. I know better than most that life can be flipped upside down within a matter of minutes.
Everything you once knew as solid ground liquified, destabilized.
“The here and now is what’s important,” is what I find myself saying, drawing his attention back to my eyes. “It’s all anyone can firmly rely on.”
He tilts his head to the side, studying me. I unconsciously lift my hand to my right shoulder and begin massaging it. Travis watches my movements silently, observing. Typically, I can’t stand being underneath the scrutiny of anyone.
Right here in the middle of this hospital, with the man I’m having a child with, I don’t mind it … as much.
“Travis, Alyssia?” the woman leading our tour calls. “This way.” She holds out an arm toward where the rest of our group have walked on.
Travis—and I don’t believe he thinks about it before he does it—grabs my hand, leading me to catch up with the rest of our fellow tourists.