Chapter One
Sierra
“Three months since your last period?” Dr. White says, looking at the questionnaire I filled out.
“Yeah, but I’m irregular,” I say, lying on the examination table. I wish we’d talked about all this before I got on the table, my butt bare and lady parts exposed, but Dr. White likes to talk throughout appointments and go over anything that bothers her about my condition—or my answers on the questionnaire I filled out when I arrived in her office.
“You’ve never gone beyond six weeks.” She’s been my doctor since forever and doesn’t need to consult anything to know. She taps something on her phone. “I ordered a pregnancy test, just to be sure.”
“I can’t possibly be pregnant,” I say with a laugh to cover up a surge of mild are-you-kidding-me annoyance.
“You’ve been celibate since the divorce?” She is aware of the pathetically unceremonious end of my marriage to Todd.
“No, there’s a new guy in my life.” But my getting pregnant is as probable as my giving birth to Bullet and G-Spot’s baby. Bullet and G-Spot being my hamsters.
Dr. White should know this. She’s the one who told me I couldn’t get pregnant due to blocked fallopian tubes. How can she remember my cycles but not this critical point? “Let’s do your pap and I’ll do the sonogram, just to be sure. That’ll be quicker than the test anyway.”
“Okay.” I’m already half-naked. When she finds nothing, I’m going to say, “I told you so.”
I stare at the ceiling as she does her thing to gather cells from my cervix. Then she takes a thin tube.
“What’s that?” I ask.
“For transvaginal ultrasound. Since it’s your first time, I want to make sure everything looks good.”
“Aren’t you supposed to do that over my belly?” I remember seeing that on TV.
“It’s too early for that. Don’t worry, it won’t hurt. You won’t even notice.”
Contrary to her reassurance, I most definitely notice. But it isn’t super unpleasant.
“Look at that screen.” She gestures at one of the monitors.
I tilt my head. All I see are black-and-white dots. Nothing that could pass for a baby. “Looks like I’m not pregnant,” I say with a triumphant grin.
She gives me a look. “Actually, you are. You are most definitely pregnant.”
I jerk my head up off the table. Wait, wait, wait—I’m what? Is she messing with me? It could some sort of morbid medical humor.
“Congratulations. I know you wanted to have children for a long time.” She beams, her pale gray eyes crinkling. She sucker-punches me, and now she’s smiling like she just won the Nobel Prize in Medicine?
This awful bedside manner isn’t like Dr. White. She gave me the news about my blocked fallopian tubes with sympathy and kindness, allowing me plenty of time to regroup, think and ask questions. This woman has to be the good doc’s evil twin, out to ruin her life. Give patients a broad grin after telling them they’re pregnant—or they have cervical cancer.
“Could you, uh, look again?”
“Why don’t we both look?” She points at the monitor.
What’s on the screen is as meaningful as tea leaves. “I have no idea what I’m seeing.”
“Well, this is your womb.” She moves the wand around. It’s unpleasant, but I ignore it because maybe from a different angle, we won’t see the baby that she apparently can see.
“I’d say you’re about ten weeks and three days pregnant.”
My brain quits. It takes at least a full minute before I can speak. “But that’s impossible! You said my fallopian tubes were blocked. So no sperm”—I raise my left index finger—“can meet my egg there”—I raise my right index finger—“for fertilization!” I bring my fingers together and squish and rub them against each other in a biology demonstration.
Dr. White blinks. “No,” she says slowly. “I said your tubes are partially blocked, which makes it very difficult for you to get pregnant. But it isn’t impossible. Sometimes the sperm and egg can still get through.”
“Oh my God.” I cover my mouth with a shaking hand.
Dr. White pats my other hand gently, apparently having mistaken my reaction for stunned joy. “Thankfully, everything looks great. No ectopic pregnancy for any of your babies.”
Okay, so at least that part is good. Ectopic pregnancies can become life-threatening if not treated properly. Even rupture your fallopian—
Wait a minute.“Did you just say babies?”
She nods and gives me that smile again. And I know that whatever comes out of her mouth next is going to upend my life. Permanently.
“You’re having triplets.”