The REASON Series - the Complete Collection (36 page)

I'm in my bedroom, getting dressed for my appointment with Dr. Alston, when I realize for the first time that my breasts seem very swollen and tender. I was never well-endowed in that department, but holy crap, these things are getting huge. My nipples are puffy and turning a dark, almost cherry wood color.
 

I turn around to look in the full-length mirror on the back of the closet door. I'm a little shocked by what I see.
 

My eyes are a bright blue, bluer than I've ever seen them before. I turn completely sideways and look toward the mirror. Of course I've noticed my belly getting bigger physically, but I’ve never really looked at it like this. Okay, it's not huge, but it is definitely there, and it looks....
 

Tears prick at my eyes. Good tears, but damn. This whole thing is really sneaking up on me.
 

I face the mirror head on again, and now I can see why I really hadn't noticed it much; from this angle it looks cute and tiny, small compared to my breasts.
 

I notice too that my hips are softer, the bones no longer as defined as they once were. All the food I've been eating, plus the vitamins that Mikah has been making me take three times a day, have no doubt been helping me put on some weight. But it appears to be really good weight.

My face has completely filled in, rounded, and there is a flush to my cheeks, no doubt because I’ve been looking at myself in the mirror. My collarbones are still visible, but in a very healthy, almost sexy way.
 

"Sexy?" I say. I've never thought of myself as sexy before.
 

A knock on the bedroom door causes me to jump, like I've been caught doing something I'm not supposed to do. I cover myself instinctively as Andrew’s accented voice comes through the door. "Vivienne, we have about five minutes before we need to leave."

"I'll be right there," I holler back and slip the bra on. It's a little bit snug in the chest and made from a thin, sheer material. My nipples poke through like nobody's business.
 

Standing here in my sheer black bra and black yoga pants, I cannot help but admire myself. For once in my life I actually look and feel pretty. I flush at the thought and reach for a black tank top, then I grab an old Boston College hoodie I inadvertently “borrowed” from Mikah a couple of days ago. It's soft, huge, and warm. I throw it on and head out the bedroom door.

EIGHTEEN

Within a matter of moments we're out of the apartment, down the elevator and into the lobby. Connor is standing next to a sleek black SUV, something I've never seen before. The windows are tinted really dark, and it looks mildly intimidating. Andrew opens the rear passenger door for me just as Connor slides in behind the wheel. I clamber in, noticing that the window on the driver’s side is down, wiping out my anxiety of tight spaces. Andrew shuts the door behind me. He is quick to slide into the front passenger seat, and we're off.
 

I take a deep breath. "What's the big rush?" I ask.
 

Connor peers at me through the rearview mirror. "Safety precaution, ma'am."
 

I roll my eyes, whether at the safety comment or the fact that he called me “ma'am,” I’m not sure. "Call me Vivienne, please, Connor?"
 

"Yes, ma'am."
 

I scowl at him.
 

"Vivienne," he corrects himself.

"Thanks."
 

He turns back to the road, driving at a speed I'm not entirely sure is legal. I watch out the window as we make our way through downtown. It is Friday morning and the traffic is moving quickly.
 

A few minutes later we pull into the parking garage at H.C.M.C. Connor steers the car up the ramp to the third floor of the structure and pulls up at a door.
 

Andrew climbs out of the car, moving a little slower now. Is that deliberate?
 

He opens my door and I climb out. I expect Connor to drive away to a parking space as soon as Andrew shuts the door behind me, but the SUV doesn't move. Andrew walks with me through the automatic doors into the hospital.
 

"Do you know where we're going?" I ask Andrew.
 

"I do." He looks down at me with his bright blue eyes, and his thin lips stretch into a friendly, reassuring smile.
 

I smile back. Andrew has been really nice to me these last couple of weeks.

We round a corner, and it's practically a dead end except for a door to the right. Andrew goes straight to it and knocks.
 

"Come in," I hear a woman on the other side of the door say.
 

Andrew opens the door. "Hi, Dr. Alston,” he says. “Vivienne is here to see you."
 

"Of course. Come on in."
 

Andrew steps in and stands with his back to the door, holding it open for me. I sneak in between him and the jamb to see Dr. Alston sitting behind a desk.

"Is there any other way into your office?" Andrew asks.
 

"No, just the room behind you, but no outside access," she says, looking at the same door Andrew is leaning against.

Andrew quickly figures it out and checks the other room. Then, turning back to me, he says, "I'll be right outside if you need me."

"Thanks," I say, and he slips out, closing the door behind him.
 

"Hello, Vivienne, how are you doing?" she asks as she looks me up and down.
 

"Great," I say, but I feel a little uncomfortable at her gawking.
 

"You look amazing," she says with a bright smile on her face, and I relax. "You've put on some weight. Good job."

I blush a little bit. "It's all the food Mikah's been feeding me."

She laughs. "I'll bet. Come in, have a seat."

"Thanks." I do as she says and take a seat in the chair across from her. Then I look around her office. It's decorated in warm browns and tans, not sterile at all, but rather homey looking. She has a few landscape pictures on her walls, but nothing clinical. Though there are no windows, the room is well lit by lamps. The florescent lights overhead are off.
 

"So, you've been eating okay?"

"Yeah. I have some issues with meat, particularly red meat. The smell turns my stomach," I say, making a face.
 

"That's not all that uncommon. When we're pregnant, our bodies tend to crave the things it thinks it needs and reject the things it doesn't, or at least doesn't like. What about white meat? Like chicken or pork?"
 

I notice that as she asks these questions she isn't very doctorly – if there is such a word. She's talking to me like I'm a person, not a patient, and I warm up to her a little bit more.
 

"If I don't smell it in raw form, I'm okay, though mixing it into pastas or soups makes it easier for me to eat," I tell her.
 

"What about vitamins, have you been taking them?"
 

I nod. "Three times a day.” Partly because Mikah is insistent about them, but I leave that part out. “The one in the morning makes me a little nauseous, but it doesn't last for very long.”

Her cell phone rings. I don't expect her to answer it, but she picks it up. "Dr. Alston." She listens for a moment. "Hi, Mikah." Oh, fabulous. He's checking up on me. "I don't see why that would be a problem, but have you asked Vivienne?" She pauses again. "Well, she's right here. Want to ask her yourself? Alright, hang on."

NINETEEN

She reaches across her desk to hand me her phone. "It's Mikah," she mouths.
 

I take the phone from her, shaking my head in disbelief. “Hello."

"Hi, sweetheart. Look, I wanted to be there but I can't. I'm still in Phoenix taking care of stuff, but I'm wondering if it would be alright if I video conference in on your appointment?"

What? "Why?"

There is a pause on the other end of the line. I'm about to say
hello
again when he pipes up. "I really wanted to be there to support you today, and I can't, so...well...I was hoping this would be okay."

I take a deep breath - not in anger or frustration, but at the fact that this is one of the many signs he’s shown over the last couple of weeks that there is more than friendship between us. His persistence in making sure I’m well taken care of extends to the baby, and I don't want to deny him this.
 

"It's fine, though I have no idea how-"

"Don't worry about it, Dr. Alston knows. Hand the phone back to her and I'll see you in a minute."

"Ohhkaaay." I hand the phone back to Dr. Alston, my stomach flip flopping with excitement at the idea of seeing Mikah. Sure, I'd talked to him on the phone last night, but it’s not the same. Speaking of which: Why didn't he bring this up last night?
 

"Sure, okay. Call me back in about ten minutes and we should be ready." She pulls the phone away from her ear and presses a button. "Are you sure you're okay with this?"

"Yeah, it just took me by surprise. I talked to him last night and he didn’t mention anything about wanting to be here."

She shrugs. “I'll set him up so that he can't see much more than a little bit of you and the monitor. I'd like to do another ultrasound, just to check on progress. After today, we will wait a couple of months for another one."
 

I nod, a little excited at the prospect of seeing my baby again.
 

"Did you open the envelope I gave you last time?"

"Envelope? What..." I think back for a moment. "Oh, you mean the one where you wrote down the baby's sex?"
 

She nods and smiles wide, hopeful.
 

"Um, no," I say shyly.
 

"Do you really not want to know?"
 

I think about it for a minute. What are the reasons to not know? Other than the surprise when it's born? "I guess I kinda forgot about the envelope. I haven't seen it since you gave it to me. But yes." I smile wide. "Yes, I want to know."

Dr. A., in a very uncharacteristic manner, starts clapping excitedly. I can't help but laugh at her reaction.
 

"Come on, let's have a look." She stands, comes around her desk, heads toward a door next to the main door into her office and opens it.
 

I stand hesitantly, not sure where she's taking me.
 

"I have a private ultrasound and exam room in here."
 

Oh.

I follow her into the room. This room is a little bit more clinical, but it’s still decorated in the light tans with red as an accent color, and it looks nice. There are a couple of monitors near the head of a short bed that has stirrups coming off of the end.
 

"I'm going to step back into my office. I would like you to remove your pants and underwear." She hands me a blanket, similar to the one that was on my hospital bed. It is far from warm, but it beats sitting here naked. "Climb up and cover yourself with this when you're done. Once we're done with Mikah and the ultrasound, I'd like to do an internal examination, if that's alright."
 

I nod and she turns to leave.

TWENTY

After just a minute or so I hear her knock. "You all set?" she asks through the door.
 

"Yeah," I call back, and she comes in.
 

"Go ahead and lie back," she says as the thing in her hand starts ringing. It's not a phone; it’s similar, but bigger, white with the Apple logo on the underside. She pushes a button and waits. "Hi, Mikah," she says and then turns the machine toward me.
 

"Hi, beautiful," he says to me, and I can see his smile, big and bright.
 

"Hi," I say, blushing at his words.
 

"Mikah, Vivienne has decided that she wants to know the sex of her baby. Do you want to know, too?" Dr. A. asks.
 

Mikah's face lights up. "If she wants to know, then I'd like to know, too." The whole time he says this, it's as though his eyes are boring into me, searching, seeking, wanting. Similar to the way he looked at me when I first met him at the diner.
 

"Okay then," Dr. A. says. She walks around to the other side of the bed from the ultrasound machine and places the device into a holder of some sort that is attached to the bed. "How's the view, Mikah?"

I now notice the little image in the corner of the screen that shows what Mikah can see. It isn't much, really: a little bit of my bump, but more of the machine that Dr. Alston is now standing at. She turns the monitor toward us. "This might be a little shaky on your end, Mikah."

"Alright. Viv, you okay?"
 

"Yeah," I say to Mikah.

Dr. A. proceeds to push my sweatshirt and tank top up so that my belly is exposed. Once that’s done, she goes for the bottle and squirts nice, warm gel along the lower half of my belly. Then she brings out the small, flat-headed wand and gently presses it to my stomach.
 

Everything is very quiet as Dr. Alston does her thing with pushing buttons.
 

I can see the baby's heart pumping wildly. She pushes another button and the echoing sound of a heartbeat fills the room.
 

She moves the wand around a little more and the head comes into focus. It looks similar to last time, but this time it's bigger; there isn't as much black surrounding the baby as the first time.
 

She points to the monitor. "There are the eyes, nose, lips and chin. See this string of pearls? That's the baby's spine." I watch as the baby moves. "Oh, I see. A little showoff." She laughs and moves the wand again. "There's an arm, and the other one is...right there." She moves her finger up on the screen, pointing at a faint, translucent white line in the background, leading up to a cluster of shorter white lines. "The other hand."