Page 54 of The Lover
Or maybe it was the baby. Fatigue, I knew, was part of the whole pregnancy thing. I left for work with what I knew was a shit-eating grin on my face.
* * *
Ellie
It wasn’t a big deal. According to the internet it could mean nothing. Still, I had to be careful. I didn’t tell Jake because I knew it would freak him out.
It was just a little spotting.
I had been back at the house for a few days. Things were pretty great between us. I had resumed mostly my normal role. I fed chickens, I rode Petunia, I shoveled shit out of the barn. I was barred from any heavy lifting by Jake, which I had already concluded myself. I wasn’t a total idiot. But I considered myself a young, healthy person.
There was no reason to change my workload just because I was pregnant.
But this morning when I woke up and went to the bathroom, I noticed a few drops of dried blood in my panties. So I told Jake I needed to grocery shop, which was true, and took the truck into town.
I stopped first at the clinic. As I walked through the door there was always thatuhg, I’m here againmoment. My memories of this place were nothing but bad ones. Broken bones, horrible flus, and then of course thethingthat happened last year with Bobby.
The good news however was that Mary had officially passed her boards, so she was an actual nurse now. She was behind the front desk and it looked like she was filling out some paperwork.
“Hey, Mary.”
“Ellie.” She smiled. “I heard you were back in town. And that you and Jake were a thing.”
That was Riverbend. Everyone knew everyone else’s business and had absolutely no problem getting confirmation from the source.
“Yep. Jake and I are definitely a thing.” Big, massive thing.
“That’s not why you’re here, though. What’s up?”
“Uh, where is Dr. Jenkins?”
“Sorry, he just left to grab lunch. I’m all you’ve got.”
Mary would probably be the one to examine me anyway. “Can we use the examination room? Just in case someone comes in.”
“Sure.”
She led me down a short hall to one of two examination rooms. We stopped at the first one and I stepped inside and sat on the paper-covered examining table.
“Okay, now tell me what’s wrong.”
“Not wrong really. I’m pregnant.”
Her eyes got wide, but she said nothing.
“At least that’s what three different little sticks told me.”
She smiled. “Okay, well first we’re going to get that confirmed. You’re going to need to pee in a cup for me. When was your last period?”
“April ninth or tenth, somewhere around there. Not exactly sure. It’s not like I put it on the calendar or anything.”
“Got it.”
“But here’s the thing. We can do this like a normal visit, but I actually came down here today because… well, this morning I had a little blood in my underwear. I checked online and read that it could be normal…”
“It can be. Especially in the first trimester. Any cramping?”
I shook my head. “Nothing that made me go ow.”
