by Amira Rain
"Everything looks great with the pregnancy. I think we're right on track for a healthy baby. The only thing I will say is that we're really going to want to keep an eye on your blood pressure, Madison, as your pregnancy progresses."
I shot a sidelong look at Desmond, who had the decency to look slightly guilty, probably knowing that our little tiff out in the waiting room had been the cause of my high blood pressure reading.
Dr. Jansen went on to show us some laminated pictures of fetal development, and she told me what I could aim for as far as a healthy weight gain each trimester.
"You'll really want to make sure you're eating regular, nutritious meals."
That wouldn't be a problem. Even my heartache over losing Desmond hadn't dampened my appetite in the least.
After telling us a few other things, such as that at the start of my second trimester, she'd begin to work with us on something called a "customized birth plan," Dr. Jansen asked if either of us had any questions.
I asked her if I'd have an ultrasound soon.
"I'm kind of anxious to see the baby, even if it's still really tiny at this point."
Dr. Jansen said she understood, but that there was really no real reason to do one this early.
"I'm thinking maybe six weeks or so from now. And at that point, we'll probably be able to determine the gender of your baby, if the two of you would like to know."
I said that the two of us already did know.
"We both just have a gut feeling."
Dr. Jansen smiled. "Boy or girl?"
I glanced over at Desmond before looking at Dr. Jansen again.
"We're having a girl."
Desmond cleared his throat. "We're actually having a boy. I'm positive of it."
I looked over at him. "I hope he likes the name Sophie Alexandra."
Seeming to be one always in good spirits, Dr. Jansen burst into laughter.
"Well, I'll just let the two of you duke this out for the next six weeks. So long as it doesn't spike your blood pressure, Madison."
Once out of the doctor's office and into the main corridor of the twelfth floor, I told Desmond he didn't have to worry about taking the elevator back up with me, if that's where he was headed.
"I'm actually long overdue to visit my grandma, so I think I'm going to head there now. If you don't mind me putting our baby in 'danger' by driving a car, that is."
Desmond lowered his voice so as not to be heard by people coming from and heading to the elevator bay.
"I think that's a bit unfair. Forgive me for not wanting the mother of my child to be right in the midst of a battle between dragons and other dragons and sorcerers."
Realizing that I probably was being a bit unfair, I quietly apologized.
"I think you do take my point, though. Life is unpredictable, and although people can take steps to be as safe as possible, everything is a calculated risk to some degree, and I'm personally one to take a few of those risks. Also, for the record...I'm the type of person who thinks it's better to love, even if that leads to a loss eventually, than to never love at all. That's why I don't regret our time together, brief as it was."
With that, I headed over to one of the elevators, got in, and closed the doors, leaving Desmond in the corridor, staring after me.
What I'd said had been the truth. I didn't regret the time I'd spent with Desmond. For one thing, we'd created a child that I loved already, and I didn't regret that. For another thing, although I was currently in pain, that didn't negate the fact that for a short while, I'd experienced complete happiness with Desmond. I'd felt what it was like to be truly in love. I could never regret that experience, no matter how long the resulting heartache lasted. No matter that I had a feeling that might be a very long time.
Honestly, deep down, even while we'd been fighting in the corridor, all I'd really wanted to do was throw myself into his arms and just have him hold me. I was still extremely attracted to him, and I knew that would probably never change, but it was something even more than that why I wanted him to hold me. I just wanted to feel the connection and love that we'd once shared, and it was even something deeper still. It felt like some natural, primal urge to want to be held and comforted by the father of my child. I supposed that I'd just have to find a way to get over that.
I took the "back roads" way back to Quincy instead of the highway, because I was just in the mood to get lost in some music and pretty scenery. It was now June, and all the trees were a deep, vivid shade of green. The weather was perfect, too, high seventies and sunny.
I figured I'd take advantage of this by taking my grandma for a little walk in the wooded area behind the care home if she was feeling up to it. Maybe we'd try to spot some birds. Maybe I'd stay for dinner after that. I didn't really care what we did as long as I could see her sweet face, and maybe see her smile a time or two.
It had been too long, a couple of weeks, since I'd seen her. I really felt a bit ashamed. After keeping up with my frequent visits so well after moving to Chicago, I'd just kind of fallen into a funk since Desmond and I hadn't been speaking, and I didn’t feel like I'd be the best company for my grandma. I had, however, at least called Eloise every two or three days, and twice I'd even spoken to my grandma on the phone.
The first time, she'd been a bit confused, but she had managed to tell me a joke, something about a rabbit and a turtle walking into a bar. The punchline hadn't exactly made sense, but I'd laughed along with my grandma, laughing out of pure delight to hear her laughing.
The second time we'd spoken the phone, it hadn't gone so well. Eloise said she'd become upset earlier that day because she'd forgotten how to change the TV channels, and when my grandma got on the phone, she'd somehow thought I was the "TV repair shop," and she'd asked me to "come fix the damned TV." I'd never heard her swear in my entire life.
But then, after I said a few things that I hoped would calm her down, she was quiet for a few seconds, and then she'd said that she loved me, saying my name. I told her that I loved her too, in return, trying to keep my voice from cracking.
By the time I arrived at the care home, I'd enjoyed a pleasant drive, though it had been a bit difficult to keep my mind from wandering to Desmond. But I succeeded for maybe a minute or two at a time.
However, when I saw my grandma's face, all other thoughts in my mind disappeared.
Standing in the kitchen, stirring something in a mixing bowl with a caregiver and another resident by her side, she looked up, then gasped when Eloise and I entered the kitchen.
"Madison! I'm so glad you're here."
Beaming, she abandoned the mixing bowl, wiped her hands on a pink-and-white checked apron she was wearing, and then made a beeline for me and pulled me into a hug.
"Oh, Madison, it's so wonderful to see you. I've missed you."
Swallowing a huge lump in my throat, I hugged her back, reveling in her sweet, powdery scent, the feel of her thin little arms, and her recognition of me and her happiness to see me.
"I've missed you, too, Grandma."
After a few moments of patting my back, she pulled away, smiling.
"You came at the perfect time. We're making a pound cake for dessert tonight, and we're going to top it with fresh strawberries and whipped cream. Would you like to help us make the cake?"
Heart soaring, I said I'd love to. It had been years since I'd baked a cake with her. So many that I couldn't even remember when the last time had been.
The afternoon was nothing short of perfection. After we finished making the cake and put it in the oven, we sliced the strawberries while my grandma told a few jokes. Unlike the one she'd told me on the phone recently, the punchlines of all these jokes were right on the money. I laughed along with Eloise and the other caregiver, and my grandma's fellow resident, a woman named Sally, repeatedly told my grandma she was good enough of a comedian to be on Johnny Carson.
After our kitchen work, my grandma and I took a long stroll around the vast, wooded backyard, looking for differ
ent birds and spotting a few flitting from branch to branch in the sun. Eventually, we sat down on a small, wrought-iron bench for a little rest, and my grandma asked me if I was still teaching the kids at "the tumbling school," which is what she'd always called the gymnastics center.
Amazed by how sharp she was this visit, I told her that no, the tumbling school had closed.
"I have another job now, though. I work in Chicago, doing different tasks for the government."
I thought it might be a bit much to explain that those "tasks," specifically, included electrocuting sorcerers, and trying to incapacitate dragons so that other dragons could decapitate them.
"Someday, though, I'd like to start my own tumbling school in Chicago."
It was true. Brianna, who'd been a fitness instructor before becoming a Gifted, and I had even talked about starting up a gymnastics center-slash-fitness club together, with classes for both adults and kids.
"But I don't think I'll open my own tumbling school for another year or two."
"Oh? And why's that?"
I took one of her wrinkled little hands in my own and gave it the gentlest of squeezes.
"I'm going to have a baby, Grandma."
With her eyes wide and her mouth in a perfect circle, her face had become a perfect, sweet mask of surprise.
I smiled, giving her hand another very gentle squeeze.
"That was pretty much my reaction, too."
She soon hugged me, sniffling, but saying that her tears were happy ones.
"I'm so proud of you. I'm so happy. You're going to become a mother...and I'm going to become a great-grandmother."
My misty eyes cranked right up, and this time, I didn't even try to stop them. The tears I was now crying were happy tears, too.
My grandma asked me lots of questions about the baby, like when it was expected to be born, if I had any names picked out, and things like that, but maybe slightly surprisingly, she didn't ask anything about my baby's father. Whether that was because it just wasn't crossing her mind, or whether it was, but she realized I wasn't married and just didn't want to embarrass me, I had no idea.
I knew that back in her day, an unmarried woman becoming pregnant had been a highly embarrassing situation for a woman to find herself in, to say the least. At any rate, I considered it a mercy that for whatever reason, my baby's father wasn't crossing her mind. I had no clue how exactly I would explain what was going on with Desmond and me. I felt like I didn't have a very good handle on it myself.
Dinner together with all the other residents and caregivers was simply wonderful. Lifting a glass of milk, my grandma toasted to "her wonderful, beautiful granddaughter" and "her great-grandchild yet to be born," and everyone clinked their glasses with hers. Only briefly, after she'd been working on her baked chicken, mashed potatoes, and steamed broccoli for a while, did she slip into a state of confusion, looking up suddenly, asking where she was.
Eloise told her, but she just shook her head, frowning, asking again where she was. But then just as suddenly as she'd slipped out of it, she slipped back into reality, asking if one of the caregivers could please pass her the salt. A short while later, she asked me if I'd given thought to how I might like to decorate a nursery.
Not long after our delicious dessert of strawberries-and-cream-topped pound cake, she and a few other residents began getting obviously sleepy, yawning and sitting pretty quietly with their eyes closing.
I helped Eloise and the other caregivers clean up and load the dishwasher before assisting them in getting all the residents out to the living room for "TV time," which was a time period of about an hour or two when the caregivers got everyone ready for bed one by one. Whoever seemed to be the sleepiest usually missed TV time entirely.
Once Grandma was sitting comfortably on the couch, I gave her a big hug, telling her I'd come to visit again soon. She hugged me back, saying she'd be looking forward to it. I practically bounced out the front door.
Never having liked driving in the dark much, I was glad to see that it was still light enough out that I could make it back to Chicago in plenty of time before night fell. When I started my car, the sky was just barely dusky lavender with the approach of early evening. I put on some music, buckled my seat belt, and was just putting my car into drive when I heard my phone going off above the music.
I thought about just driving away anyway and checking who'd called later, but for some reason, after a moment of thought, I put the car back in park, thinking that I should probably answer, just in case Eloise had forgotten to tell me something, or maybe my grandma had wanted to give me another hug.
Some months earlier, on another day that she had no problem recognizing me, Eloise had called me with this very request as I'd been about to leave.
After turning the music down, I pulled my phone out of my bag, surprised to see that it was Desmond. Puzzled, I answered, and he began speaking before I'd even finished saying the first syllable of hello.
"Wherever you are right now, get in your car immediately and start heading back to Chicago. The Angels are coming to Quincy, and they're going to try to kill you."
*
Mouth going dry, I gripped my phone just about hard enough to break it.
"What do you mean, Desmond? What's happening?"
"We were able to get a spy into one of the Angel dragon camps two days ago. Today he reported that he learned that after their recent defeat, Darius Archer decided to try a different tack. He'd heard about me expecting a child with a new Gifted, so he found out who you were, hacked into a government database, and learned everything about you.
“Knowing that he probably couldn't get to you in Chicago, and having read in your file that your grandmother is still back in Quincy, he positioned lookouts to try to spot your car whenever you next visited, and they've already done that today.
“Now Darius and the rest of them are on their way to Quincy, so you've got to be fast, Madison. Darius is going to try to kill you to provoke me into a fight on neutral turf, where he thinks he can win. So, wherever you are-"
"I'm still at my grandma's in my car. I haven't even left the driveway yet."
"Then throw it in drive and go the very second we hang up. Start heading back to Chicago. I'll have scouts out looking for you, and they'll fly right above your car until you're safely back home.
“I am flying to Quincy myself with some of my men. We're now only minutes away, if we speed. We were already nearby trying to locate the new Angel encampment when I just happened to call to check in with my spy, and learned about Darius' plan. We're hoping to arrive in Quincy before he does, and I want you to be long gone."
Hand on the gearshift, I was just opening my mouth to tell Desmond that I was on my way and hanging up now when I heard a sound that made my blood turn to ice water. It was a chuckle, low and menacing. It had come from my backseat. I suddenly couldn't move a muscle, couldn't breathe. My heart was hammering in my ears. Above it, I heard another chuckle, then felt a hand on my shoulder.
"Darius Archer is actually already here, Miss Bennett. He is me. Did you hear that, Desmond? I'm already here. You've been talking so loud I've been able to hear every damn word through the phone, even from the backseat.
“So, fly as fast as you can, but you'll be too late. Your baby mama is about to die, and then you and I will fight for Chicago on neutral turf. I figure the sky above an old folk's home is as good a place as any."
I'd been completely frozen with fear, petrified. But now, a reminder that my grandma was not even thirty feet away from the maniac behind me spurred me into action.
Dropping my phone, I whipped around in my seat, shooting a beam of electricity from my palm even as I did so. Seeming to take him by surprise, just as I'd obviously wanted it to, it hit Darius square between the eyes, making him howl. Immediately taking advantage of his temporary incapacitation, I all but flew out of the car and started running, knowing that he'd probably soon be flying, too, but in dragon form.
My p
lan, or as much of a plan as I'd been able to think of in the span of two seconds, was to try to lead him into the massive backyard and woodland behind the care home, and then into the deeper woods.
He probably wouldn't be able to get through them in dragon form, or if he did, the thick trees would certainly slow him down, because he'd have to crash through them as he went along.
However, I thought it much more likely that he'd take to the skies. He knew Desmond was coming and that Desmond would surely fight him, so really, Darius didn't even need to kill me anymore. It made more sense that he'd just ascend to keep a lookout for Desmond.
Unless, of course, he liked killing just for fun. Though honestly, I didn't care what he liked doing or didn't. I wanted to live, of course, but the main thought running through my mind was to just get him as far from the care home as possible. I didn't think he'd try to hurt my grandma, the other residents, Eloise, and the other caregivers, for the same reason that it didn't make sense to kill me anymore.