“Actually, he has,” Arthur said. “Four, to be exact.”
I looked back at Falcon. “Really?”
He nodded. “Once when I was in college. Another when I was working as an EMT, and two recently.”
“The doctor let you deliver them?” I asked, gob smacked.
“Midwife, yes. Both occasions were home births.”
“And … you've been ditching guard duty all this time to study?” I asked, touching my belly when the baby kicked.
“It started out as a precaution, in case you went into labour at an odd time and we didn’t have anyone here. But…” He shrugged one shoulder, sitting back in the chair, his eyes still not meeting mine. “I thought maybe it’d be nice if it wasn’t just a precaution. But it would mean more time away from my duties for now.”
“I’m okay with that.”
“Told you,” Arthur added.
“So, you’re okay with me delivering her then?” Falcon confirmed.
“Yeah, but … you’d have to see my vagina,” I teased.
He frowned up at me then, and laughed. “I’ve seen your vagina, Ara.
Many
times.”
I cringed. He had too. Not only when they stitched me back up after the lighthouse incident, but then there was my attempted death at the Stone, and the innumerable times I’d stripped off to walk through the forest when he’d been on duty but five feet behind me. “Well, I’m fine with it, Falcon—with you being my doctor. I trust you.”
“Really?” His lip quirked in one corner.
“Of course. And, really, I’m more comfortable with you than some strange human who knows nothing about immortals, or immortal medicine for that matter.” I glanced back at Arthur. “Wouldn’t you agree?”
“Falcon knows almost everything I do—as far as female medicine for immortals goes,” he said, moving the slimy probe around under my ribs, pressing just hard enough to make me hold my breath. “I’ve not bothered teaching him anything beyond that just yet, but he has shown an interest.”
I smiled at Falcon. “You gonna be leaving us soon then—to pursue a career in medicine?”
“No, but—” He shrugged. “Getting back into it … I’m reminded why I chose medicine in the first place.”
I nodded. “So you’ll still be in my Private Guard, right?”
“Not sure I have a choice,” he said, sitting back with his hands behind his head. “When this little one comes along, I’m sure she’ll need as much chasing around as you used to.”
“I think she’ll be a good girl. Not half as much trouble as me.”
Falcon winked at me, then leaned around to look at Arthur, that indent above his nose showing again. “What’s wrong?”
Arthur drew the probe away from my skin, wiped me clean, and put my top down. “It’s not just her abdomen that’s too thick. It’s every inch of her.”
“Could you hear
my
heart with that thing?” I asked.
He shook his head. “Not through your abdomen or ribs. I didn’t try any higher.”
“But, you can hear it with your own ears?”
He stopped to listen for a second. “Yes.”
“But not the baby’s?”
“No.”
“What about a transvaginal scan?” Falcon suggested.
“I’m not sure we’ll be able to see anything. She’s quite far along now—”
“But she’s tiny.” He motioned to my belly. “You said it yourself, she looks as though she’s no further along than fifteen weeks. Maybe the baby’s small enough that we can see something.”
“What’s a trans—whatever he said?” I asked.
“An internal ultrasound,” Arthur said, and picked up a long, thin thing that looked like an electric toothbrush, just … without the bristles. “Using this.”
“How … how does that get …
inside
me?”
“The vagina, of course,” he stated, and Falcon laughed when I stiffened, my eyes landing on the floor as my cheeks heated up a few degrees. “I think it’s worth a try,” Arthur added, pressing buttons and angling that thing like he was readying it.
“Okay, why won’t a normal one work?” I grabbed the dome-shaped probe and put it to my tummy. “You might've been doing it on the wrong angle.”
“Give me that.” Arthur snatched it off me and put it back. “That’s expensive equipment.”
“Then it should work. I think we should ask for a refund.”
Falcon just laughed again, standing now at the foot of the table, his arms folded, cheeks flushed slightly with humour.
“It doesn't work because Jason was right—about your skin cells.” Arthur slid a rubber cover over the long probe and set it aside. “You can go on into the bathroom and undress from your waist down. There’s a sheet in there you can wrap around you for now. Oh, and empty your bladder first, please.”
I looked to where his finger pointed out the bathroom, and swallowed hard. “Do I have to?”
“No.” His hands rested casually in his lap, and he spun on his chair to look at me. “Why? What’s wrong?”
“Is that a joke?”
Arthur just frowned, confused.
“He’s an old-fashioned medical professional, Ara. He doesn’t get it,” Falcon said.
Arthur’s frown deepened and then flattened suddenly as it sunk in to his thick skull. “Oh, of course. Modesty. I’m sorry, Amara, it never even crossed my mind that you might be embarrassed.”
I crossed my legs at the ankles, folding my arms, too.
“If you like, we can wait until Jason returns,” Arthur offered. “He can do the scan for you.”
“Jason!” I slammed my hands down by my sides. “Why does everyone always assume I want Jason in my vagina?”
“Ara, no one—”
“Yes. They do, Falcon. David thought the same thing—automatically assuming from
one
memory that I’d already slept with him! Everyone else probably thinks the same, too,” I screeched. “And for your information, Arthur,” I added, turning slightly in my seat to face him. “I’d
rather
it was David.”
“David’s not qualified,” he said, looking at Falcon as though he’d talk some sense into me.
“Yeah, he’s a lawyer, they’re only qualified to probe assholes,” Falcon joked, and they both laughed loudly.
My fists balled up by my sides. “You’re missing my point.”
“I’m not, my dear.” Arthur patted my fist. “But, if you want to see the baby tonight, we can give it a try. And if not, I’m afraid you’ll just have to wait until Jason gets home—because I know you’re more comfortable with him than me, and that has nothing to do with desires you may or may not have for him sexually.”
“But I think you should just let Arthur do it,” Falcon said. “He’s not gonna
look
at you, Ar, and it would be nice to determine exactly how many weeks along you are.”
I touched my belly, lifting my top a little to feel the skin. I did want to see my baby. If this actually worked, I might even be able to get one of those pictures all the moms on the forum had of their babies: ones with little fingers or little faces showing. I looked across at Arthur. “Can you take pictures—of the baby?”
He nodded once and smiled. “Of course.”
And my heart jumped with excitement. I just never thought I’d get to see my baby. I’d accepted that I was immortal and there was a good chance the ultrasound wouldn't work on me, given the complex anatomy of my cells, but with this new hope came some courage. “Will it take long?”
“Once we get an idea of the baby’s position and I can identify all the bits and pieces, no. But finding the right angle, being that you’re quite late in pregnancy, might be somewhat of a challenge. Not to mention, the reason for the ultrasound not working may have nothing to do with your skin cells and everything to do with the baby’s.”
“How so?”
“Well, an ultrasound machine works by bouncing sound waves off solid masses inside you. In some cases, like with very overweight people, it can be hard to see through the layers of fat. Your cells, or the baby’s, possibly mimic that fat, like a sheath, and since your own cells seem to create a block for any sound within you, there’s a possibility that your child may do the same.”
“Or we might be lucky, since the baby is obviously very small, and see her for the first time,” Falcon added.
I cupped my hands over the tiny abdomen. I whinged all the time about being bulbous, but in comparison to other moms as far along as me, I was minute. Falcon was right. There was a good chance we might actually see her today. And I was more than willing to at least try. “Fal?”
“Mm?”
“Will you stay with me?”
“Of course.” He nodded, and backed away a few steps to take a seat.
“Um.” I swung my legs down and, once my toes safely found the ground, stood up. “Don’t sit there, though.”
He looked around, noted his position and, realising the view he’d be exposed to there, grinned sheepishly and moved to the chair
beside
the table. “Didn’t think of that.”
“You would have,” Arthur said casually, loading up things on the screen. “Once she was in position.”
***
I flushed the toilet and wrapped the sheet around me, drying my clean hands on it, then tiptoed out barefoot to the table. Falcon and Arthur busied themselves while I stared nervously at the bed, now collapsed at the foot with enough room for only my torso and butt, and two flat metal plates waiting at the end for my feet.
“Climb up, Ara.” Falcon patted the bed. “Need some help?”
“I’m fine.” I scrambled awkwardly onto the table, repositioning the paper under my bare bum, and laid the white cotton sheet loosely across my nakedness.
Arthur tapped the metal footholds. “Pop your feet on here, my dear.”
With my lip between my teeth, my heart in my belly, I parted my knees and positioned my right, then my left foot on the hard plates, pushing the sheet down between my legs to keep the cold circulation of awkward air out of my warmer folds.
The gentle hum of the machinery filled the total and dead silence, the few clicks and taps of Arthur’s fingers on the keys amplifying the awkwardness for me. I’d never noticed it before, but the room smelled like latex and alcohol solution a little, leaving me with the kind of dread in my chest you get walking into a gynaecologist’s office.
I glanced sideways at Falcon for reassurance.
“It won’t hurt.” He pulled his chair closer to the bed. And I just wanted to be him—to be the one looking on, waiting to see something amazing on that screen. It might not have been a painful procedure, but that didn’t really help me relax.
“Okay,” Arthur said in a very professional tone, smothering the probe in KY jelly. I looked up at the ceiling. “This will make it easier to insert.”
That last word rang through me and I looked down just in time to see his hand disappear beyond my plump little belly, between my white parted knees, and under my protective cover, lifting it enough that he could see my most private area.
“This might feel a little uncomfortable,” Arthur said.
“Already does,” I muttered, casting my gaze to the ceiling again. I couldn't see his eyes considering my nakedness, but I felt them there—felt them probing me before the long plastic wand went anywhere near me. And then his thick, gloved fingertips spread the firmly-closed cleft and a cold, solid end entered me, gliding its way up to my insides.
“Relax, girl.” He rubbed my ankle.
I realised then that my toes were completely curled over, my thighs tight as rubber. “Sorry. This is kind of awkward.”
“Worse for him I think, Ara,” Falcon said, and when I looked at Arthur I noticed he was struggling a bit too, trying, at the same time as attempting to position the probe correctly, not to look at me.
I let my legs fall loosely apart at the knees and exhaled very slowly. “Nothing you haven’t seen before, right?”
He laughed, nodding, and with a gentle push, the probe went in and Falcon gasped.
“What?” I looked over at him but he was looking at the screen.
“Oh yes, will you look at that,” Arthur said, and tapped the keyboard with the hand that wasn’t between my legs. “Instant success. I’ll just make it a little clearer.”
“What?” My head flicked quickly to my right so I could see the screen, and there, cast in shadows of grey and white, was a tiny, sweet little foot and what I figured was a leg. Unless the arm of my baby was attached to its foot.
My eyes instantly welled, blurring the screen. I covered my mouth, the probe and the empty space between my legs completely forgotten. “That’s her? That’s my baby?”
“It certainly is.” Arthur pushed the probe inside me a bit more, and the view changed. “We’ll just get an idea of what’s what, but…” He tapped a few keys and another machine started humming. “From what I can see here, we have a very healthy heartbeat.”
“The circle that’s pulsing?” I asked. “That’s the heart?”
He nodded.
Falcon stood, and the slight tinge of sweat from the day entered my nose as he leaned across, armpit in my face, and pointed to the screen. “This is her nose here, and that—” He aimed his finger at something lower, “is her little mouth.”