I made the mistake of looking at Hayes when she took a wand shaped instrument from the nurse and began applying lube. He looked horrified and I couldn’t prevent a half-hysterical giggle from escaping. “Is that — I thought the ultrasound was the thing on the belly?”
Dr. Blankenship tilted her head in question. “This early we use a transvaginal ultrasound. It’s more accurate.”
“Holy sh —”
“I’m sure I’ll survive,” I broke in hastily, and with a smile lurking at the corners of her lips, the doctor began the procedure.
There were several minutes of quiet wherein she pressed and repositioned the wand and murmured quiet observations to the nurse. Then a faint drubbing filled the room, and she held the wand still. “That’s your baby and his heartbeat,” she said.
“His?” Hayes pounced on the word.
“Well, not literally. It’s too soon to tell that just yet.”
I felt Hayes’ hand tense on mine and squeeze. “Look at that,” he breathed, and I did. Both our gazes were riveted on the monitor next to me, on the amorphous black and white image that was at once nothing recognizable and everything life-altering. I felt my throat seize with that imminent about-to-cry feeling, and I swallowed. “She’s beautiful,” Hayes whispered, and I nodded.
I didn’t know if our baby was a she, or a he…all I knew was that she was no longer an ‘it,’ no longer some theoretical object. She was real.
My free hand moved to cover my stomach. I wanted to look at Hayes, see my own emotion reflected on his face, but I couldn’t tear my eyes from the screen.
This. This was everything.
The mood between us as we left the obstetrician’s office was subdued. I knew my mind was on that little white peanut I’d seen on the screen, whose picture I clasped in my hand now as we hurried to the truck. The weight of responsibility was palpable, now. How was I going to care for a baby when I could barely take care of myself?
I wished I knew what Hayes was thinking. Probably kicking himself for insisting we split that cream puff.
Our collective mood was weather-appropriate, with a heavy gray sky hanging heavy above us. It looked like a deluge was imminent, the idea of which made me shudder. My psyche no doubt remembered the last rain shower I’d dealt with, even if my conscious brain did not.
Hayes handed me up into the truck and I wondered if he’d always been courtly like that. A gentleman.
“Everything okay?”
He asked the question as he seated himself and turned the engine over with a quiet roar.
“I’m good. Just thinking. That was… It was a lot.”
His attention was forward as he drove, and I took the opportunity to admire the scruff of his beard on his pale cheeks. “It was.” The light ahead turned red and he slowed to a stop, sweeping his gaze sideways to me as he did. “It was incredible. I can’t believe we’re going to be parents, Birdie.”
I huffed out a laugh, my own gaze skittering around as the light turned green and he pulled out. “You can’t believe.” The rain had started, a soft, steady drum against the roof. The sound scraped against my nerves along with the rivulets sluicing down the windows. It was making me edgy, and I twisted my hands together in my lap. “Can you slow down, please?”
I felt Hayes flick a glance in my direction, but I couldn’t look at him. I was too focused on the rain and the way it had invaded every sense. Its sound against the roof. Its wash against the glass. It even had a smell: not the summer ozone smell, but redolent of damp and rot. The taste of copper in my mouth as I bit my tongue.
“Birdie? Babe, are you all right?” I shook my head. I wasn’t all right, not even a little bit. The air felt pent in my lungs, and I struggled to exhale and then inhale properly. I looked at Hayes in panic. “Birdie!”
I felt the truck slow and then turn, and then cut off entirely. The arm rest was whisked upwards and then Hayes’ hands were at my seatbelt, fumbling to undo the clasp. Then a pair of hard hands were under my arms and hauling me up and across the seat, until I was seated on his lap and blinking into hazel eyes.
He released my arms and clasped my face, forcing my eyes to his. “Breathe, babe. Nice and slow. In for a count of five, then out for a count of five. One-one thousand. Two-one thousand.”
He counted me through each breath until my lungs took up the measure on their own, and my panic eased.
I leaned against him, exhausted suddenly. “God, I’m sorry. I don’t know what happened.”
Hayes wrapped his arms around me and tucked my head under his chin. With my face burrowed into his neck, I could smell his aftershave, fresh and spicy, mingled with his own masculine scent. I breathed in deep, hoping he would attribute the inhalation to my continued breathing exercises. “Looked like a panic attack.” He stroked a lazy path up and down my back with one of his hands.
“It’s never happened before.”
“I think it was the rain,” he said. “It’s very similar to the night you had the accident, and Dr. Chen said there might be some post-traumatic stress.”
“You were there, right? The night of my accident?” The nurse had told me he had been the one who called for an ambulance. Hayes tensed beneath me, subtly enough that if I hadn’t been sprawled boneless against him, I wouldn’t have noticed.
“You were driving in front of me and hydroplaned. You went over an embankment and into a tree.” His voice is carefully bland.
“Where were we going?”
“Home.”
I leaned back to look at him. There was still that careful tone in his voice, as if he was debating what to say and how to say it. “Why do I get the sense that there’s more to this story than you’re telling me?” I asked, watching closely for the micro expressions that would give me some hint of truth. There. There it was: a tiny twitch of his left eye.
He set me back in my seat. “You were upset. I was trying to call you, get you to slow down, to talk to me. You wouldn’t listen.” His hands were back on the steering wheel, clenched tightly enough around it that his knuckles had whitened.
“What was I mad about?”
He looked at me and the pain in his eyes was stark. “Can we just let it go? It was arguably one of the worst days of my life. I just want to forget about it.”
“You feel responsible,” I whispered, the truth slamming into me. “Are you responsible?”
“No!” His expression was tormented, and bile rose in my throat. “Maybe.” The barely audible admission had the bile burning and I fumbled with my door latch.
“Birdie —”
“Gonna be si—”
The word was cut off by a stream of vomit. As I heaved in the parking spot, rain sluicing down over me, I was distantly aware of Hayes climbing from the truck behind me. He held his coat over me to block the worst of the rain and waited until I was finished, then handed me a bottle of water. I rinsed and spat.
He caught me as I turned to get back in the truck, pulling my back flush against his front. I was shivering from the rain; he was warm and a shield. I relaxed into him for a heartbeat before pulling away. “I’d like to go home now.”
I pulled away from him with a twist of my shoulders and climbed back into the truck. There was a metallic clang as Hayes slammed his hand against the side of the truck in an outward display of frustration. “Fuck,” I heard him mutter loudly as he walked around to his side and climbed in, closing the door with an angry jerk. “We need to talk about this.”