by D. Breeze
Lydia bit her lip and I just knew what she was going to say.
“I’d um...I’d love to, but I have my first midwife appointment in an hour and I don’t have any money anyway.”
“Here.” I handed her my credit card and before she even argue with me, Taylor snatched it from her fingers and handed it back to me.
“Uh uh. Not today, your money is safe. Today’s shopping trip is covered...isn’t that right, Jax?” She said, batting her eyelashes at him.
I smirked. Lydia might have forgiven him easily, but Taylor was going to make him pay for what he did. Literally.
God love that woman. Best thing that ever happened to my brother. Taylor wasn’t finished.
“And, you’ve yet to learn this, but Harper won’t be ready for at least a couple of hours anyway so you have plenty of time. What do you say?”
“Ok!” She grinned.
I blinked, shocked.
What the hell is going on?!
She never, ever agreed to things that easily, especially not where money was concerned. I wasn’t going to draw attention to it though in case she changed her mind. I let the females natter about shopping and babies and weddings and whatever other shit women talk about and leant back against the counter.
This was all I had ever wanted for us.
What exactly did you do when all your dreams had already come true?
You celebrated.
“We should meet later, all of us. We’ll go to dinner and to the club. Have drinks in the private room or something. Don’t worry, Lyds you can have lemonade.” I joked.
Everyone agreed and we made plans for later in the day.
Back in my room, Lydia was talking incessantly about the midwife appointment and I was actually starting to get nervous.
The dad part, I could do that. I was there every step of the way for Harley and even though it would be ten times harder with a baby of my own, I was confident that I’d be fine. But the pregnancy? No. I avoided Taylor like the plague when she was pregnant because she scared the fuck out of me. She was bitchy and snappy all the time and Jackson followed her around like a lost puppy.
Shit! Was I going to do that too?
I didn’t know anything about midwife appointments or ultrasounds or...labour! I tried my hardest not to show it, because I knew how excited Lydia was.
It didn’t take long for us to be ready and I waved a quick goodbye to everyone on the way out the front door. I clicked the locks to the garage and the door opened. Without thinking, I walked to my car and opened the passenger side door for Lydia. Hell yeah, I know how to be gentleman...albeit a stupid one.
“Whose car is this?” Lydia asked, looking confused.
I winced. Shit, she didn’t even know about my car. I have the same car as Mason but in a different colour, a midnight blue Vauxhall Astra. Nothing fancy, but we upgraded every year, so I had the sport version. It was the one luxury I allowed myself to have, with no feelings of guilt.
“It’s, um...mine?” I phrased it like a question.
Instead of flying off the handle like I expected her to, she just rolled her eyes at me, and slid into the passenger seat.
When I reached the driver’s side, I took a deep breath, and drove off to see our baby.
*~*~*
Lydia
Who likes the doctor’s surgery?
No one.
Even the people who worked there looked bloody miserable. I didn’t let it affect my excitement though, I was there for one reason and one reason only...to see our baby. We sat in the waiting room, glancing at the clock every five seconds. According to the receptionist, my midwife was running behind schedule, a fact that I hated. I was impatient.
The mere fact that I didn’t know how many weeks pregnant I was, had my tummy fluttering. I could have a tiny embryo in my womb, or a foetus that actually resembled the baby it would eventually be. I placed my hand over my tummy, it was such an incredible feeling.
“Miss Romero?” The receptionist called.
Ruben jumped up from his seat. I giggled at him.
“You can go straight through to room six.” She advised, with a nod of her head.
I was not a fan of the midwife. The second we walked through the door, she looked me up and down as if I was something she’d just stepped on. I thought midwives were supposed to be kind?
“Hello.” She said.
Ruben stepped forward. “Hi, I’m Ruben, this is Lydia.”
He held out his hand and she shook it limply, muttering her name.
Dr Cross. By name and nature apparently.
Bitchy midwife #1.
I idly wondered if there was an award for that title. She’d win for sure.
“Take a seat please.”
We both sat and she fired off questions about the pregnancy so far, then she started asking about family history and I answered what I could. She frowned, clearly annoyed at the fact that I knew little to nothing of Ruben’s family history. Little did she know that, that wasn’t exactly my fault!
“Have any members of either families, have a history of miscarriages or still-births?” She asked.
I shook my head, no. Ruben, on the other hand, made her dislike us a little bit more.
“I’m not one hundred percent, but I think my mum had a few miscarriages. Maybe three or four.”
“Did she have a medical reason for this?”
“Yeah, she was hooked on drugs for most her life.” He answered bluntly.
Oh, Dr Cross did not like that.
She started lecturing both of us on the risks of drugs, alcohol and tobacco use during pregnancy and Ruben cut her off.
“With all due respect, Doctor. Please don’t assume that just because there is a family history of drug use, that we partake in those sorts of recreational activities too, because that’s just not the case. I don’t smoke, I don’t do drugs and I only drink on occasion. Same goes for Lydia.”
She harrumphed, either not believing him or not caring. By the time she asked me to undress my bottom half; I was ready to storm out. She was rude, judgemental and downright mean. More than once, I had to put my hand on Ruben’s knee to stop him from saying something that would get us removed from the premises before we’d gotten to see our baby.
She put a red trumpet-shaped device to my stomach and lay her ear on it. Ruben and I frowned at each other, not sure what she was doing.
“Clear, nice, strong heartbeat – because I can already hear it, I’ll assume you’re more than twelve weeks. Therefore, we’ll try an external ultrasound first. We should be able to see the baby well.”
I sucked in a breath. More than twelve weeks?
I sort of assumed that I’d be anywhere between four and twelve weeks, but more than twelve, that didn’t even enter my mind.
The gel was squirted on my stomach and I looked to Ruben with a smile. He leant down beside my ear and whispered, “How’s that...Squirt!”
He hadn’t called me squirt in years and I almost burst into tears. It was a reminder of how much we’d been through. While I was staring up at him, the unmistakable sound of a heartbeat filled the room and I spun my head around to look at the screen.
The midwife’s eyes softened for the first time since we walked in, as she looked at the screen and she flicked the mouse around.
She moved the curser to a large white circle at the edge of the screen and left it there.
“That, is your baby.” She announced. She moved the curser each time, showing us different parts of the baby. “Here you have the head, the heart, the legs and the hands.”
I was so engrossed, I didn’t even notice how hard Ruben was squeezing my hand until he let go to lean closer to the screen.
“Not to sound stupid here, Doctor. But it looks awfully big for a bean sized baby.”
She gave him a condescending look. Oh, Dr Cross was back.
“That’s because it’s not a bean sized baby,” She looked at me and asked, “When did you say you last had a period?”
; “I really don’t know, maybe five or six months ago. But that’s usual for me.”
She hmm’d.
“Well, from the measurements and development of the foetus, I estimate your due date to be April sixteenth.”
My jaw dropped. I looked at Ruben, he was staring at Dr Cross like she’d grown a second head.
“B-but...that’s in like...four months!” I stuttered.
“That is correct. It looks like you are twenty three weeks and two days. Of course, this is only judged by the size of the baby and as we cannot determine when you actually conceived by your menstrual cycle. So you could be a week either side of that realistically.”
I was speechless. You’re supposed to have at least seven eight months, give or take a few weeks, to prepare for a baby!
“Does that mean you can see if it’s a boy or a girl?” Ruben asked.
We hadn’t discussed it, mainly because we hadn’t had chance, but also because I don’t think either of us had realised that I’d be that far along.
“If baby cooperates, then yes we should be able to see today. Would you like to know?”
I glanced up at him, I didn’t even need to ask.
“Yes, please.” I answered.
She moved the wand across my stomach, searching. Within moments, she clicked a few buttons and froze the screen. I looked blank. I was just staring at three little white lines and I had no idea what that meant.
“Mm hmm, she’s not even a little bit shy.”
“She?” Ruben whispered, sounding like he was in awe.
“You have yourselves a little girl in here.” She nodded.
A girl!
A princess.
Dr Cross printed out a few photos of the scan, advised me to get dressed and to join her back at her desk. I did so, in silence.
She took four vials of my blood and handed me a prescription for calcium tablets and an appointment card for two weeks time. Before we left she asked if we had any questions and Ruben and I seemed to jump in at the same time. I smiled at him, but he let me go first.
“I’m worried, if I’m already twenty three weeks, why have I not felt any movement or anything? Or had morning sickness? Or tender boobs? Or a weird taste of metal in my mouth? And, why don’t I have a bump yet?” I was growing more and more panicked by the end of my questions and she looked annoyed.
“The metal taste does not happen to everyone, it can be due to a lack of iron in the blood but it’s not uncommon to not have that at all - same with morning sickness. Yes, you were obviously one of the lucky ones who do not have any, but the baby is absolutely fine so do not worry. Your breasts may not grow tender at all; or at least not until later in your pregnancy and especially after the baby is born.” She stopped and took a breath.
“It’s perfectly normal, with first pregnancies, for mothers not to show until they’re well into their fifth month. You’ll probably have a couple more weeks, maybe less, until your baby decides to start making you uncomfortable and stretching your womb. As for the movements, again it’s your first pregnancy and we usually advise not to worry until after twenty weeks because you may not even know that you are feeling the baby move. Obviously, seeing as you are already past that milestone and the baby is fine, I would assume that you are indeed feeling movements. As you did not know that you were pregnant until a few days ago, is it not possible that you have just been unaware of the movements?”
My tummy took that opportunity to flutter and I wondered if I had just been ignoring the signs for a while.
*~*~*
Ruben
I watched the look that came over her face and I knew that she was realising she’d been feeling the baby for a while. I also knew that she had panicked when the stupid midwife told her that she was already twenty three weeks pregnant.
I wasn’t worried.
The fact that my beautiful fiancé, had already gone through almost half of her pregnancy and not had any issues, made me feel practically giddy. My girl, always so incredible without even realising it.
I had questions, more questions than I thought I could voice, but I decided against asking Dr Cross...mainly because I hated her and she had judged us the second she saw us.
No, we were not married yet.
Yes, my girl was still kind of young to be a mother.
No, that did not give her the right to pass judgement.
She didn’t know anything about us or the life we could give to our child.
The second we left the building, I turned to Lydia.
“We’re going private. I am not letting that woman treat you like that, look down her nose at you and have a blatant disregard for your feelings like that.”
“Ok.” She shrugged.
“Ok?” I copied, as a question.
“Yeah. I don’t care. I didn’t like her, she was rude and mean. But Ruben, did you hear what she said? We have just four months to prepare for this baby. Four months!”
I just knew she was having an internal freak-out about that. I gave her a reassuring smile and pulled her into my arms. Her hands slid around my waist and she held on tight.
“You can’t panic about this. We can’t change it, and it really makes no difference. This is a good thing, we get to meet our baby sooner than you thought!”
“But don’t you get it? We still have to find somewhere decent to live, buy all the things we need to buy, pack a hospital bag...and we still have to sort ourselves out first!”
“Stop.” I demanded. Her working herself up wasn’t going to fix anything. “You can’t do this. We can find somewhere to live in four months, and even if we don’t, we can stay at Jackson’s house until we do. You know money isn’t an issue anymore, and as much as I’m sure you’ll want to argue, if you let them girls, especially Harper, loose with a credit card – we’ll be sorted within a few hours. Packing a hospital bag will not take long and we have time, so that’s just a moot point.”
“As for our relationship, yes we have things to talk about, but nothing has changed for me. I love you and you love me, everything else will work itself out because that’s what we’ve always done.”
Her shoulders deflated.
“I’m sorry. I really need to work on that habit of freaking out over nothing. I’ll get better, I promise.”
I smiled at her, even though she couldn’t see me because her head was still buried in my chest.
“You already are. You just had a shock today and that’s normal.”
We stood silently for a while, me leaning against the car and her leaning against me. I was desperate to get home and tell everyone the good news but Lydia seemed content to stay for a while and what she wanted, I’d give her.
Her head shot up from my chest and I was pretty close to getting a head-butt to the chin.
She whispered in awe, “We’re having a girl!”
“Yeah, beautiful, we are.”
Chapter Twenty-One
Ruben
“Can I have a word?” I asked.
Jase turned to me, looking apprehensive, but still a little pissed off. Not that I blamed him of course. “Sure, what’s up?”
I nodded my head over to the opposite end of the bar from where the girls were sat and he followed me.
“I need to apologise for everything I said before at the club. I know, you know, that I didn’t mean it. But it was still completely out of line and you didn’t deserve it. You shouldn’t have had to be in that position in the first place.”
“Well, um, thanks? I didn’t expect an apology, but I did avoid you guys for a while because it just felt awkward. I’m not sorry that I told her because she did need to be told. But still, I’m sorry that it fucked you guys up for a while.” He replied.
I was shocked, humbled even, that he’d accepted my apology so easily and he actually felt bad about causing issues. I didn’t want anyone shouldering any of the blame for my fuck-ups though.
I squeezed his shoulder, “Don’t. Don’t be sorry about anything because all
you need to do is look at Lydia, to see that you did the right thing. It should have been me, but it wasn’t. So I’m glad that you were the one who got to give her that.”
I walked away.
I didn’t want to see the gratitude in his eyes for me giving him something he rightly deserved.
As soon as I reached the table, Mase stood up.
“To the next Brent baby! Another girl to welcome into the family. Good luck with that, brother!” He snickered, with his glass in the air and a grin on his face.
Jackson put a hand over his heart and wiped non-existent tears from his eyes.
“My baby is having a baby!” He whimpered sarcastically.
“Shut it, jackass!”
He laughed out loud, then his face dropped slightly and he looked me in the eyes. I braced, not being able to get a read on what his face meant.
“Seriously though, Ruben. You’re still only twenty-three. It’s a big deal and you don’t even seem to be panicking slightly.”
I glanced around thinking it probably wasn’t the best time or place to be having this conversation seeing as the girls were sat about ten feet away at the bar.
The little family pub was only a mile or so away from Jackson’s house so he thought it’d be a nice idea to take us out for a pub lunch and drinks, rather than go to the club.
Lydia was on lemonade, of course.
I looked her way at the bar and smiled when she threw her head back laughing at something Harper had said. If anyone could make her laugh, it didn’t surprise me that it’d be Harper. The girl had no filter.
She wasn’t listening. Good.
Swinging my eyes back to my brothers, I kept my promise to Lydia and gave them nothing but honesty.
“I’m petrified.”
Jackson smiled like he knew exactly what I meant.
“I don’t know anything about pregnancies, or babies or being a dad. I know about being an uncle, but that’s not the same. No one knows when Lydia is going to freak out about something tiny again, or when Freddy…”
I stopped and gulped.
They didn’t know about Freddy. No one really did.
“Who’s Freddy?” Jackson asked, immediately.