Chapter Thirteen
Four months turns into five, turns into six, and then seven, and my belly grows so large it protrudes like a beach ball from my frame.
Round and firm and heavy, pressing up against my ribs and pushing my organs into unfamiliar configurations that make breathing a conscious effort and sleeping a negotiation with gravity.
I’m slower now, my center of balance completely altered, my gait shifting into the characteristic waddle of late pregnancy that I used to watch other omegas do with distant sympathy and now understand with visceral intimacy.
Everything is uncomfortable. Sitting, standing, lying down, existing.
The larger and further along I get, the more Hyunwoo fusses over me.
My clothes no longer fit, none of them, not even the loosest sweatpants and biggest t-shirts in my wardrobe, so Hyunwoo orders me an entirely new set of maternity clothing.
Soft stretchy fabrics in dark greens and neutrals that accommodate the belly without making me feel like I’m wearing a tent, though I still feel like I’m wearing a tent because there’s no fabric on earth that can make a seven-month pregnant man feel sleek.
When I complain about the constant back pain from carrying the extra weight, a deep grinding ache in my lower spine that never fully goes away no matter how I sit or stand or lie down, Hyunwoo researches solutions and comes home with a special support belly band that wraps beneath the bump and distributes the weight more evenly across my hips.
It actually helps, which annoys me because it means his obsessive research habit has once again proven useful and I’ll never hear the end of it.
When my breasts swell further and get so large the skin starts to feel tight and stretched, tender to the touch, I stand in front of the bathroom mirror one evening cupping the swollen mounds in my hands.
They’re unmistakably breasts now. Full, heavy, the nipples dark and enlarged, the areolas wider than I ever thought possible on my body.
The reflection staring back at me looks nothing like the lean, athletic man I was eight months ago.
I sniffle, tears welling up and spilling over before I can stop them, because I no longer recognize my own body.
The face is mine but everything below the neck belongs to someone else, someone softer and rounder and more vulnerable than I’ve ever been in my life.
Hyunwoo finds me like that and doesn’t laugh.
For once. He just steps behind me and wraps his arms carefully around my expanded middle, his chin resting on the top of my head because even at six feet I barely reach his shoulder now that my posture has compressed under the weight of the belly.
He massages my aching breasts with gentle hands, his palms warm and careful against the tight, swollen skin, and then reaches for the bottle of oil on the counter and squeezes some into his palm.
He rubs it onto my stretched stomach in slow circles, his fingers tracing the faint silvery lines that have started to appear along the sides of the bump where the skin has been pulled beyond its tolerance, and tells me it’s all natural, that my body is doing incredible work, that I should be proud of what it’s accomplishing.
“I feel like a milk cow,” I croak, my voice cracking on the last word as fresh tears roll down my cheeks.
Hyunwoo presses his lips to my temple and says against my skin, “They’ll shrink and flatten again once the baby’s weaned. It’s temporary, Yuggie. All of it.”
I want to believe him. I stare at our reflection in the mirror, at the way his tall frame curves around mine, his arms encircling the enormous swell of my belly, and I look so small against him despite being six feet tall.
I look like an omega. I look like exactly what I am, for the first time in my life, and I don’t know how to feel about that.
Later that night he gives me a long back massage on the bed, his thumbs digging into the knotted muscles along my spine while I lie on my side with a pillow wedged between my knees, the only position that doesn’t make something hurt.
His hands are strong and warm and he knows exactly where the worst spots are by now, working them with patience.
I fall asleep under his hands and wake up hours later with his body curled around mine from behind, his palm resting flat on my belly, his breath warm and even against the back of my neck.
One night as we’re lying together on the couch, Hyunwoo’s arm around my waist and his hand resting on the swell of my stomach as we watch some cooking competition show he’s gotten us both hooked on, the dogs dozing at our feet in a pile of tawny fur and twitching paws, we both feel it.
A distinct, unmistakable flutter beneath Hyunwoo’s palm, followed by a firm thump that pushes visibly against the stretched fabric of my shirt.
The baby’s first kick.
We both go still. Hyunwoo’s hand freezes on my belly.
I look at him and he looks at me and for a moment neither of us says anything, the TV droning on unheard in the background.
Then Hyunwoo’s face breaks into a grin so genuine and unguarded that my chest aches at the sight of it.
Not his usual smirk, not the cocky flash of teeth he deploys like a weapon.
This is something I’ve seen maybe a handful of times in our lives, open and boyish and completely unself-conscious, his dark eyes crinkling at the corners.
It transforms his sharp, angular face into something almost soft.
“Was that—” he starts.
“Yeah,” I say. My voice comes out quiet.
Hyunwoo’s palm presses flatter against my belly, his fingers spreading wide, and we both wait in silence.
Another thump, stronger this time, and Hyunwoo lets out a breath that sounds like it’s been yanked out of him.
He laughs, a single bright burst of sound, and says, “Holy shit, Yuggie, that’s—I can feel it. That’s actually a kick.”
“No kidding,” I say, but I’m smiling too, my hand drifting down to rest beside his on the bump. Our fingers overlap. The baby kicks again, right against our stacked palms, and my lungs feel tight.
From then on Hyunwoo touches my stomach constantly.
At the table while we eat, his free hand sliding over to rest on the bump between bites.
On the couch during movies, his palm flat and waiting, his face lighting up every time the baby obliges with a flutter or a kick.
In bed, where he falls asleep with his hand curved around the lowest part of my belly and his face pressed to the back of my shoulder.
Walking past me in the hallway, he’ll pause just long enough to press his palm there, feel for movement, and then continue on his way like it’s the most natural thing in the world.
His hand gravitates to the bump like a magnet, and I stop flinching away from it after the first week.
He’s going to touch it regardless of what I say, and honestly, the warmth of his palm feels good against the tight, aching skin.
He hovers even more than before, constantly on my heels, helping me up from chairs when the belly makes it hard to generate enough momentum to stand on my own, steadying me on the stairs with a hand at my elbow, stopping me from lifting anything heavier than a water glass.
He complains vocally and at length when I insist on continuing light exercise at the gym, gentle stretching and walking on the treadmill at the lowest setting, hovering behind me like a worried shadow while I waddle along at a pace that would embarrass a geriatric patient.
“You’re going too fast,” he says from directly behind me, his hand hovering near my lower back as I walk at literally three kilometers per hour on the treadmill.
“Hyunwoo, a turtle could pass me right now.”
“A turtle wouldn’t be seven months pregnant.”
I flip him off without turning around and bump the speed up by half a kilometer out of spite.
Finally Manager Kim forces the issue, sitting me down in his office and telling me firmly that it’s time for paternity leave.
He folds his hands on his desk and gives me the look he usually reserves for members who try to cancel their contracts, and says that me waddling around the gym floor with my heavily pregnant belly is making the clients uncomfortable.
Especially, he adds with a pained expression, when I try to spot them on the bench press and my belly is practically resting on their faces while they’re trying to push two hundred pounds.
I want to argue, but Kim’s expression brooks no debate, and honestly, he has a point. My belly does get in the way of basically everything now, including my ability to demonstrate exercises without looking like I’m trying to balance a watermelon on a surfboard.
Ye-eun throws me a combination baby shower and going-away party at the gym.
She strings up streamers in the break room and orders a cake shaped like a dumbbell with a tiny fondant baby rattle sitting on top of it, which is both the most ridiculous and most thoughtful thing anyone has ever done for me.
She hands me a card signed by all my regular clients, their messages ranging from heartfelt (“You’re going to be a great parent!
”) to alarming (“Please come back soon, the new trainer doesn’t understand my knee”) to Ye-eun’s own contribution, which reads in her sharp handwriting: “If that baby comes out looking like Hyunwoo, it’s going to be insufferably hot and I’m going to be furious about it. ”
I’m genuinely touched, even if I’ll never admit to crying over it. The tears are the pregnancy hormones. Exclusively.