Dr. Kramer didn’t seem surprised at all, as if expectant mothers regularly brought in their potential baby daddies for DNA tests. I mean, I suppose it was more common now for people to be a little freer with their love, but it was still an awkward experience. One I had to remind myself that I’d wanted.
I’d been the one to insist that knowing one way or the other was important to me. Noah was going along with whatever I wanted.
Dr. Kramer did a quick exam while Noah waited in the other room. I wasn’t there yet, and he didn’t seem slighted in the least. Once my exam and appointment were over, Dr. Kramer told me an ultrasound would be booked for when I was between eighteen and twenty weeks.
“We’re mostly checking for growth markers and development, and during this ultrasound, we’ll be able to determine the sex of the baby, and we can either tell you, or you can keep it a secret until the delivery.”
Then Noah came in, and we did the DNA test. A nurse took a sample of my blood and then swabbed his cheek, and we were told we’d get the results in a week or two. We’d probably get the results the day of my ultrasound.
After the appointment, we walked to Noah’s truck in a heavy silence. My thoughts were wrapped up in the DNA test and the upcoming ultrasound. I barely noticed the darkening sky with the impending storm until Noah pointed it out.
“I was hoping to take you out for dinner, but I think we should try to get back to Hartwood Creek before the storm hits.”
“I agree,” I said, glancing up at the ominous sky. The baby moved about in my stomach, as if dancing with anticipation. I’d been feeling movements more and more lately, usually when Noah was around, or when I was thinking about him.
He held his truck door open for me and I climbed up, with him assisting by placing his hand on the small of my back. I could barely feel it through my winter jacket, but I was aware of his presence.
It was as if I was completely tuned in to his every movement. He could be about to enter the room, and the awareness would hit. I’d know that he was close. The baby seemed to know, too, which was disconcerting.
I’d been so perplexed by it that I’d started to feel a little crazy, and had texted to ask Sage and Tabitha if they’d ever experienced the same thing. To my surprise, they both had. Tabitha said all her babies had danced in utero for Parker.
Sage told me she was experiencing it with Nix, but admitted she didn’t have that awareness or that reaction to Daphne’s sperm donor. Not that he’d been around enough to test the theory, nor had she paid attention the way she was now.
Sage had expressed how much she regretted blocking out a lot of her pregnancy with Daphne. She’d been scared and uncertain and had never felt so alone. This time, with Nix, was an entirely different experience for her, and she wanted to soak up every minute of it.
It was an indescribable relief to have both Sage and Tabitha to talk to about the pregnancy stuff, and the feelings stuff. I’d recounted the meeting with Noah and his brother, and the interaction in the laundry room after, when Noah had put his hand on my stomach and felt the baby moving. They both seemed to be cheering hard for Noah.
I expected to self-sabotage, because that’s what I’d done in the past every time I felt myself catching feelings, but there was something about Noah that kept me from blowing everything between us up. Or maybe it was the baby.
Maybe I didn’t want to do everything alone, not if I had Noah by my side—not when he seemed to want to be there as much as I wanted him there.
* * *
Noah
* * *
It started snowing the moment we left Springwood, but the flurries got heavier and thicker the closer we got to Hartwood Creek. The roads were getting slick, and I gripped the steering wheel tightly, trying to keep control of the truck through each snowdrift on the highway back to town.
“It’s a good thing you insisted on taking your truck,” Nellie said. “You were right. I don’t think my car would have made it through these drifts.”
“I don’t think it would have, either,” I replied, keeping my eyes on the road despite the urge to look at her. My truck could handle the drifts easily, but her car was so low to the ground, it’d likely get stuck.
“It’s really coming down.”
I could sense the uncertainty in Nellie’s voice, like she was scared. It wasn’t just the amount of snow we were getting, it was the winds, too. A hundred and sixty kilometres per hour winds were no joke, especially when coupled with heavy snowflakes. I grew up in the north, I was used to driving in snowy conditions, but this was quickly turning into an all-out blizzard.
“Yeah, it’s not great to be out in. My place is closer, how about we head there?”
We were about fifteen minutes out from my road, and another twenty-five from town.
“But it’s going to keep snowing, we could end up snowed in.”
“That’s true.” I didn’t mind the prospect of being snowed in with Nellie. I welcomed it over being out in this. “But Damien could make sure the road and my driveway are clear enough for us to get in safely. I don’t know how quickly the township will be able to clear the roads.”
“Okay, yeah. You’re right,” Nellie said, as another gust of wind rattled the windows of my truck. I called Damien, thankful for Bluetooth.
“Hey, you guys get back to town yet?” Damien asked as soon as he picked up, the concern evident in his tone. “It’s getting hairy out there.”
