“Thank you.” I say awkwardly. Lily tried to say it to me once and I cried. No tears so far, so I call it a step in the right direction.
The private waiting room is thankfully empty. The chairs are nicer, the magazines are more expensive and there are no TVs. Even if it was all home-improvement shows, TV makes me shudder after David’s stupid interview played on loop.
Him and all his lies. Eric had to be behind it. The timing was too close for me to think anything else.
“This is kind of exciting.” Lily whispers, even though we are alone. “Private waiting room, babies, you know. All that stuff. I never knew how all this worked.”
“I wish I didn’t have to.”
Her face immediately clams up. “Shit. I’m sorry, Kate. This has to be really uncomfortable and I shouldn’t have said anything.”
“No, no. It’s okay.” I reassure her without really feeling like it. “I didn’t mean to make you think… it’s just weird, you know? I don’t feel like this is really happening. Until now, I could pretend that maybe I just had a stomach virus. None of it was real. After this… it’s real.”
Lily takes my hand and squeezes it. I’m so freaking grateful for her I could cry. But I’m tired of crying, so I gently smack my cheek instead.
“I need to stop.”
“Kate?” A scrubs-clad woman in another bouncy ponytail opens the door and smiles. “Ready to see baby?”
Tears press against my eyeballs and my heart flits like a caged bird, but I take a deep breath and nod. Lily slips her hand in mine and I don’t let go as we pass through the bright yellow halls covered in pamphlets about babies and vaginas.
It reminds me of my regular gynecologist, whom I absolutely could not be seen at without the paparazzi swarming. Maybe I can just pretend I am going in for a yearly check-up, not to see the thing swimming in my belly.
“Here we are!” She chirps and ushers us into a room with a giant machine and a screen. “I’m Rayanne, the ultrasound technician. We’re going to start with taking a look at baby, so Dr. Reynolds can review them before seeing you. Since you’re a little further along than normal for the first appointment, we won’t have to use the vaginal ultrasound. How wonderful!”
I stare blankly at her, all her words foreign. I give a small nod. She hands me a dressing gown to cover the lower half of my body and gives me a squeeze on the shoulder when I’m told to lie down on the table.
Apparently, everyone can smell my fear.
“Remember that time we were in college and Brad Heinz paid us fifty bucks to make out at his party?” Lily asks brightly while Rayanne gets the machine up and running. “I would have made out with you for five. Just thought you should know that.”
“Thanks.” I laugh a little. It sounds high-pitched and insane. “I would have done it for free.”
“God, such a one-upper.”
“You know me.”
“Breathe, Kate. You’ll be okay. Like when we made out the first time. It feels scary at first, but then it turns out to be just fine. This will be just fine.”
“I hope so.” I whisper.
Rayanne exposes my belly and talks a mile a minute about her nephews and some birthday party they just had. Like this was all totally normal and I wasn’t about to have my life turn on its head.
I don’t do anything but lay there while she manipulates my body.
“Okay. This might be a little cold.” She grins at me and points to the screen next to me. “You’ll see everything there. One, two…”
I jump as she coats my belly with something cold and then shoves the ultrasound wand against it. Instantly, the screen goes from all black to static, like it lost the signal. Rayanne moves the stick around, talking to herself
“I think I am going to need the vaginal wand,” Rayanne says, furrowing her brow.
Lily squeezes me extra harder for reassurance, but all I can think is maybe I’m not pregnant after all.
“Phew, there he is,” Rayanne says, sounding either concerned or shocked. I’m not sure which is better. “How far along did you say you were?”
“Based on my last period, should be about nine weeks?” I shrug a little. “This is all sort of new to me, I’m sorry. Did I get it wrong?”
“Well.” Rayanne frowns and starts plucking around the ultrasound machine’s keyboard. On the screen, it looks like she’s measuring it. Numbers populate around the lines. “Baby does not look nine weeks along. He’s measuring closer to five.”
“Five?” I whisper. My heart pounds in my ears and I suddenly feel so, so cold. “That can’t be right according to the parenting magazines. I haven’t had a period in over two months.”