As the doctor slides the probe around on my belly, spreading conducive jelly this way and that, she chats nonchalantly, asking me questions about my diet, my energy level, even my urine. Then, after a longish pause, she addresses another issue, one that she knows will be a sore spot for us.
“Have you given any more thought to an amniocentesis?”
My stomach clenches. I thought I’d made myself clear last time. I don’t want to even have this discussion again.
“No. I haven’t changed my mind.”
“Lena, if there’s a genetic abnormality—”
“That won’t change anything,” I interrupt somewhat tersely. “We want this baby. Period. We won’t love it any less if it has some disability.”
“But the test could prepare you for—”
“If there was no risk, I might consider it. Might. But there is a risk to having an amnio, and I already have enough risk stacked against me. I appreciate your concern, but I’m declining the test.”
I know my tone brooks no argument, and the doctor simply nods, unwilling to press me any further.
Good!
“Well, I don’t see any obvious abnormalities, but what I do see is…” The doctor pauses dramatically, running the probe over one spot and pushing up and into my belly. She clicks a button and then rolls a mouse, clicking again. Expertly, she wields the probe and works the computer until she turns to Nate and me, and with a smile announces, “I see no little boy parts. Mr. and Mrs. Grant, I’d like you to meet your daughter.”
She enlarges a photo on the screen that shows our daughter lying in the perfect position for us to see the blank slate between her legs.
I gasp.
“It’s a girl?” I whisper, trying to keep the quaver from my voice.
“It’s a girl,” Dr. Stephens confirms, her eyes crinkling at the corners as her grin widens. “And she’s sucking her thumb.” She minimizes the picture back down to its normal size, and I can clearly see the little arm with its tiny hand tucked up to her mouth.
“Our little girl is sucking her thumb,” I say in awe, turning to glance back at Nate. He’s watching the screen, mouth slightly ajar, eyes shining brightly in the eerie glow of the monitor, and I know he’s moved beyond words. He merely nods. Only after a few more seconds of gazing in wonder at the digital image does Nate finally drag his eyes away and toward my face.
Between us, no words are spoken, but a wealth of sentiment is exchanged as we stare at one another. There have been moments in our life together when everything has changed. We’ve had so many of them in the last six months, it’s hard to say which ones rank highest on the list.
Until today.
Today is something different, something special. And we both know it. This is real. This is happening. After all the trying and waiting and being disappointed, after finding out that I’m going to die and that our time together is drawing to a close, we’re finally going to have a child.
Together.
The perfect mixture of each of us, a piece of both Nate and me that will live on long after we’ve passed. Nothing could be more important than that.
Nothing.
Dr. Stephens says something that neither Nate nor I hear and then gets up to leave. When the door closes and we are alone, Nate leans down and presses his forehead to mine.
“A girl. I prayed for a girl,” he confesses on a shaky breath. “I hope she’s the very picture of her mother.” His voice is thick with barely-contained emotion. “Please God, let her be just like her mother.” He says the last with eyes closed and voice lowered, as if in actual prayer.
My heart lurches behind my ribs. It rips my insides apart to see my husband hurting. Even though he is, without question, deliriously happy about the baby, I know he’s also devastated over the impending loss of his wife.
He’s hurting. Badly. I can feel it.
I find it odd how happiness and agony so often travel in tandem, almost as though the one is made stronger by the other. The greater our happiness over the baby, the greater our agony over being unable to make a life together as a whole, as a family. As one grows, the other grows in direct proportion.
Exponentially.
It will always be this way, I know. For her as long as I live and, for Nate, as long as he does. But I also know there is no light without the darkness, no rainbow without the rain. I know without a doubt that it is the presence of my pain that makes the pleasure of this moment so much more meaningful. In the face of death, life takes on a new level of preciousness. And I have only a short amount of time to appreciate it before mine will be over.
Shortly after Dr. Stephens returns, we are released. I ask Nate to wait for me in the waiting room. All the pressing around Dr. Stephens did to get good pictures of the baby has stimulated my bladder.