A doctor in pink scrubs enters, tailed by my dad. She approachesthe bed in brisk strides. “My name is Dr. Lechie. How are you feeling, Blake?”
“Confused,” I admit. “A bit woozy.”
“Yes, that’s the anesthesia wearing off.” She examines my pupils, making me follow the penlight she pulls out of her pocket. “I’m sure your parents told you, but you experienced an ectopic pregnancy. We had to perform a salpingostomy, which means we repaired your tube rather than removing it. You were lucky. The rupture wasn’t severe, and while there was internal bleeding, it wasn’t heavy.”
She keeps talking, explaining she made an incision in my fallopian tube in order to “remove the pregnancy,” and her tone is so clinical and matter-of-fact that it makes me want to cry. Then she assures me they were able to preserve the tube, and as long as the scarring isn’t extensive, natural conception shouldn’t be an issue in the future since both tubes are intact.
“You’ll be discharged tomorrow,” she finishes with a smile.
As if that’s the takeaway from all this. Good news! No baby! Now go home.
When she notices my expression, her tone softens. “I know this is a lot to process.”
“I…don’t get it. Was there something I could’ve done or… Did I overdo it?” My pulse is racing now.
“You didn’t do anything wrong,” Dr. Lechie says firmly. “Unfortunately, this is just something that happens sometimes. It occurs in about one in fifty pregnancies, and ninety percent of the time, it’s a tubal ectopic. You usually can’t even detect it until your first scan. If you’d found out next week at your ultrasound, we could’ve given you medication to clear the pregnancy, but the rupture gave us no choice but to remove it surgically.”
She talks me through the post-op, telling me to expect somesoreness from the small incision in my abdomen but that any pain should improve within a week. I’m allowed to return to light activities in a week, heavier activities in about a month. It’s all very technical, and my head is starting to hurt. As she drones on, tears prick my eyes, and my hands begin shaking.
I don’t want this. I don’t want to be here. I want to go back to this morning. Before that dull ache and before the fear, when I still had a future to picture.
Instead, I’m listening to this doctor and to the stupid beeping of this monitor. It’s supposed to remind me that I’m alive, but all it’s doing is reminding me that my baby is not.
The thought unleashes the tears. Mom instantly clutches my hand and strokes my hair while Dr. Lechie gently touches my arm before leaving to continue her rounds. I barely notice she’s gone. Or that she was there in the first place.
“I want to see Wyatt,” I choke out.
“Are you sure?” Mom asks.
“Please, can someone go get him?”
Dad nods and disappears from the room. He’s only gone for five minutes, but it feels like an eternity before Wyatt appears in the doorway. Relief catches in my throat at the sight of him. He looks beautiful, even in the harsh glare of hospital lighting. And his hair is beyond messy, which tells me he’s been dragging his hand through it in that waiting room.
“Freckles,” he says, his eyes full of concern.
My parents give us privacy as he approaches the bed. He cups my cheeks and urgently searches my face.
“Are you okay?”
“No,” I whisper. “The baby’s gone.” My throat closes up. “Well, technically, the baby was never even there. It had zero chance of survival.”
“I know. The doctor explained it to us.” He strokes my cheek, his thumb brushing over my cheekbone, and a few tears spill out. “Hey, it’s okay. You’re gonna be okay.”
Now I’m crying in earnest. Dr. Lechie had said something about hormones and that I still have high levels of HCG in my system. Apparently they’ll need to monitor my levels until they return to zero to make sure no “tissue” remains. And I’m going to be a hormonal basket case for at least a few weeks, if not longer. Awesome.
“Oh, baby, please don’t cry.”
Wyatt sits on the bed, infinitely gentle as he pulls me into his arms. I feel a twinge of pain in my side, but I don’t care. I bury my face against Wyatt’s chest, breathing in his familiar spicy scent, filling my lungs with it so I don’t have to smell that horrible antiseptic anymore.
“I’m so sorry this happened,” he murmurs in my hair. “And I know you’re upset. But you’re young, and you’re healthy, and the doctor said you still have both tubes—”
“I wanted it.”
He stiffens in surprise.
I lift my head, wiping my tears. “I didn’t even realize how much I wanted it until right now, and now it’s just gone.”
“I think…maybe I wanted it too,” Wyatt says, and for some reason, that triggers a jolt of anger.
