Page 108 of Office Hours
There’s a loon on the lake, and I watch it dive, surfacing halfway across the water.
I nudge Liam. “See? Monogamous for life.”
He wraps an arm around my waist and pulls me close. “So are we,” he says.
And for once, I believe it.
24
UNEXPECTED NEWS
SIMONE
The walls are the color of old yogurt—thin, slightly yellow, vaguely biological. Even the abstract art on the gynecologist’s wall is designed to calm you: big, safe shapes in muted blues and greens, like a children’s playroom for people with premium health insurance. I sit on the paper-covered table, which crackles and sticks to the backs of my thighs when I shift my weight. My hands are restless—nails digging into the soft foam of the seat, or drumming arrhythmic code on the crisp paper runner. There’s a stack of ancientPeoplemagazines on the counter, as if reading about the latest celebrity divorce will soften whatever is about to happen in here.
It’s supposed to be routine. Just a check-up, post-surgery. See if the plumbing is clear, make sure the uterus hasn’t collapsed into a black hole or fused with my small intestine. Standard stuff for girls who spent their teens being told by every sex-ed teacher and well-meaning foster mom that pregnancy would be a statistical inevitability, followed by the same teachers and foster moms telling me, with matching sorrow, that I’d probably never have a baby at all.
The nurse is new, maybe a recent undergrad herself. She asks if I’m comfortable, which is hilarious, then offers me a latex-gloved hand to help onto the scale. I’m a half-pound heavier than last time, but I can’t tell if it’s scar tissue or residual stress eating. She smiles anyway, as if to congratulate my cells for trying. She leaves me alone with the wall charts: cross-sections of ovaries, fallopian tubes, a diagram of a fetus at six weeks that looks more alien than mammal.
My phone buzzes in my jeans, folded on the chair in the corner. I left it there on purpose—no doomscrolling, no distractions. But I’m already feeling the itch. I wonder if Liam is thinking of me now. He’s teaching summer session and probably mid-rant about Marianne Moore or the devastating sexual ambiguity of Robert Lowell. I think about our last night together, his hands tracing the scar on my stomach, the way he whispered that he loved all of me, even the parts that didn’t work right. I don’t believe in fairy tales, but sometimes I want to.
The clock on the wall ticks too loud, each minute a warning.
When the doctor finally comes in, she’s trailed by a med student who can’t be more than twenty-five. The doctor is the same one who took out my fibroids, her hair wrapped in a severe bun, her mouth shaped like it’s about to scold someone for eating gluten. She’s got a tablet in one hand and my chart in the other, and her first question is, “How have you been feeling, Simone?”
I want to say, “Like a puzzle with half the pieces jammed in the wrong places,” but I settle for, “Pretty good, considering.”
She nods and starts in on the usual: bleeding, pain, night sweats, cramps, headaches. All the things that might mean my insides are staging a mutiny. I answer, mostly monosyllabic, because it’s hard to admit you’re afraid everything could go sideways again,even when you’re sitting in a room built to catch that kind of fallout.
Then she glances up from the chart, and there’s a new shape to her mouth—less professional, more tentative.
“We got your bloodwork back,” she says, “and there’s something I want to discuss with you before we get to the exam.”
I brace myself. Cancer? Polycystic? Some rare, Instagrammable auto-immune?
She says, “You’re pregnant, Simone.”
The word doesn’t land, not really. It just hovers in the air, a dense little neutron star, warping gravity in its wake.
I blink. “That’s not possible,” I hear myself say, voice two octaves too high. “You said the odds were?—”
“Very low,” the doctor finishes, “but not zero. And sometimes, with younger patients, we see a strong rebound in fertility after myomectomy.” She glances at the med student, who nods, like I’m a case study from the world’s most interesting textbook.
I look down at my hands, which are squeezing each other like a lifeline. I feel a bizarre pressure in my chest, not panic, not even fear. Just unreality. A line in a script that isn’t mine.
“How far along?” I ask, eyes fixed on a knot in the floor tile.
“Five, maybe six weeks,” the doctor says. “Very early. We can do a confirmation ultrasound if you want.”
My head swims. I try to do the math, but my brain is a balloon, untethered. Liam. It finally happened. We knew it could, but never let ourselves really believe. But now it’s true! I feel sick,but also incredibly elated too, like I broke some rule and got away with it.
My hand moves to my stomach, almost involuntary. There’s nothing there, not yet, but suddenly I can feel the exact spot, like a splinter under skin.
The doctor is talking, her words soft and careful, but I only hear every third one: “options… health… support… up to you.” She hands me a tissue, and I realize I’m crying, silent and stunned.
I want to ask, What does this mean? But I already know. It means everything is going to change. It means I have to call Liam, and tell him he’s going to be a dad, and then we have a lot of decisions.
The doctor puts a gentle hand on my shoulder. “Are you okay?” she asks.
