Chapter 6

The next several weeks were full of different activities for me, I was settling down at a new place and getting my life back together. Every single person around me was extremely helpful and welcoming, my mood was getting better with each minute. Dianna has placed me in the same room I had the first night, which I liked very much. She and Jonathan decided, that since I’m staying for a longer time, I needed a closet, so they brought me one from the attic. It was huge and frankly I did’t have enough clothes to fill even the half of it, but just having it in my room made me feel more at home. It was grand, made of dark wood with floral carvings on the doors, gorgeous.

My work at the clinic was also becoming more systematized – during the first week I was getting acquainted with the way Doc Evans handled things, and boy he had his own ways for sure. At the beginning I was mostly observing, but on my second week I was trusted with vaccinating towns pets, a couple of castrations and had even done a solo operation – sterilizing a cat. The more major cases we were handling together, like patching up some dog’s leg that got caught in a bear trap, or helping a horse give birth. All in all I could see how Doc needed help in the clinic, since there was always something to do. I can’t imagine how he did it on his own, since as I’ve been told by Jonathan, he has never hired help, apart for the receptionist named Daisy, who was also a kind old lady. Soon Doc Evans became pretty relaxed in my company and I found the time spent with him very entertaining, he was a nice old guy. I also got to meet a lot of people, and everyone seemed pretty awesome, I began growing on to this town.

It was the end of the third week when Dianna insisted to take me to the hospital for a check up on my pregnancy. I have taken a half day off from the clinic, Doc Evans didn’t seem to mind, we didn’t have any visitations scheduled anyway and he also was planning to go out of town for the weekend to visit his sister in a neighboring town, that would leave me on emergency calls in case something happened. Apparently I was trustworthy enough to leave me the keys to the clinic, but it also forced me to get a new phone, so that people who needed urgent vet help could reach me. We decided to kill two rabbits with one shot and drive by the mall after the check up.0

Dianna seemed way more excited about this checkup, than me, but I knew it was necessary. I didn’t care about the way this baby was conceived, I loved him or her already and had no intentions on giving it up or getting rid of it, so I agreed to go and get some medical proof that everything was going fine.

The hospital wasn’t very crowded when we arrived, so it didn’t take long to get an appointment with the gynecologist. The doctor was a nice middle aged lady with long blonde hair, big blue eyes and plumb lips. Her handshake was firm and confident and the look in her eyes was warm and caring. Apparently it was a common thing for the people in this town, which I found pretty appealing.

“Hello, Evelyn. My name is Dr. Green, I will be your doctor.”, she said in a soft melodic voice.

“Nice to meet you, doctor.”, I replied politely.

“Dianna, nice seeing you again!”, she gave Dianna a warm hug.

“Same, Lara! Now come, take care of my girl here!”, Dianna turned on her mother mode.

“Off course,”, Doc smiled and then turned to me. “Follow me. Is Dianna joining us?”

“Yes, sure, if she wants too”, I replied. I didn’t want to drag her in there with me, but honestly I would feel more comfortable with someone to hold my hand. Usually it’s the father, which in my case was impossible.

“What are you talking about! How can I not want to join!”, Dianna said with an offended look to which I laughed lightly, but rather nervously.

We went into a nice pale pink painted room with a medical table in the middle, a chair right next to it and some machines near the walls.

“Evelyn, please lie down on the table and lift your shirt up.”, said the doc and I did what she said, with a little help from Dianna, since my leg didn’t allow me to be very skilled at this kind of gymnastics. Dianna placed herself on the chair near me, took my hand and gave it a reassuring squeeze.

“Ok, I’m going to smear some gel on your stomach, it’s going to feel a bit cold, ok?”, she asked, and I just nodded, I was suddenly too nervous to speak. This would be my first ultrasound and different thoughts started racing through my mind. What if my baby was sick? What if it’s not a baby, but a tumor? What if he has three hands instead of two? Or worse, what if he has only one leg? One cripple in the family is enough…

Dianna noticed my erratic breathing and gave my hand another squeeze.

“It’s going to be fine, sweetie, don’t worry!”, she whispered. Again, I just nodded.

The doc smeared some gel on my stomach, and indeed it was chilly, but I didn’t pay a lot of attention to it, because then she wheeled some machine to the table, turned it on and the room filled with a low humming sound. She took some joystick and placed it on my stomach, then started moving it back and forth, until she stopped and we heard… a heartbeat. Yep, definitely not a tumor…

“Well, the heartbeat is steady and strong, congratulations!”, she cheered, a huge grin appeared on my face when I looked at Dianna.

“Steady and strong…”, I repeated doc’s words with a stupid look on my face. Dianna laughed brightly and patted me on my cheek. Then the doc turned the machine to us and we saw a black & white screen.

“The baby looks healthy, but I can’t see the private parts yet, I think we will be able to tell the gender in a month or so.”, she said smiling.

“It’s ok, I don’t want to know the gender anyway,” I told her, a grin still hanging there, “I want it to be a surprise!”

“Ok then,” she laughed. “I’ll print out the picture for you then.”

I looked over at Dianna and she had tears in her eyes.

“Aaaaaw, Dianna! I’m the one that’s supposed to be crying here!” I laughed. Dianna didn’t seem to mind her tears, but instead gave me a tight hug.

“Sweetheart, I’m so glad for you!”, she said still hugging me.

“Thank you…”, now I was on the verge of crying.

“Ok, ladies. Let me take some blood for tests and then I’ll leave you to clean up and will be waiting at the receptionists desc to go through some paperwork, ok?”, she smiled at us once again, took some blood and then handed us a small 10x15cm black&white picture and quietly closed the door behind her.

“I don’t know about you, but I can see clearly, that this little one will be a heart breaker!” said Dianna, putting her hands on her hips. I just continued staring at the picture. This is my baby. A child. It’s real. How am I going to pull it off?

I sat there for a couple of minutes more, Dianna waited patiently, then I took a couple of napkins, wiped the gel from my stomach and climbed down from the table, again with a little help of Dianna.

“Let’s go deal with the bureaucracy?”, she said with a gentle smile and handed me my cane.

“Let’s do it”, I smiled back at her and together we walked out of the room.

***

It took us almost half an hour to settle all the papers, since we needed to request a transfer of my medical records from my previous hospital. I thought crossed my mind, that due to this transfer people in my old town would know where I was, but I was reassured, that all the medical information is strictly private and falls under the doctor/patient confidentiality, so I calmed down and figured I was safe. Dianna then insisted we stopped at the diner to get some food, but I knew too well, that her main goal was to show Riley the picture. Not that I minded both of the agendas – my appetite has increased, I started gaining weight already, so yes, I was feeling hungry. And I also wanted to share the good news with Riley, since she was the first person to show me kindness in this town and I felt I owed it to her, in a good way.

After a not so quick meal we went to the mall, bought me a simple phone, since I wasn’t to keen on all this fancy stuff and wasn’t really planning on using any of the social media. I was fine without the internet, only checking my emails once in a while, rarely watched television, all the news I needed to know came from the newspapers Jonathan read while sipping his morning coffee. Having close to no interaction with the outside world brought me peace and made me feel content.

I should have known that the trip to the mall will not end with just me buying a phone. Soon enough Dianna dragged me to several maternity shops to get some new clothes. In truth, it was already needed, since it was getting hard to button my jeans, my belly was growing rapidly and I was mostly wearing my yoga pants. So we bought a few pairs of jeans with a special material on the waist, new jumpers, long t-shirts and a couple of summer dresses. Dianna insisted on paying for half of the stuff, I fought hard, but lost. As Jonathan said – this woman always gets what she wants.

When we finally got back home, I was exhausted. After a quick dinner I have texted Doc Evans my new phone number, so that he could record a new message on an answering machine in the clinic, and went to bed. Jax decided a week ago, that from now on he’s sleeping with me, and it’s been really nice, I enjoyed cuddling with my new furry friend at night. We’ve became pretty close with this huge monster of dog. The next few days I’ll have to be ready any minute to tent to those in need if something happens.

Friday was uneventful, I just stayed home, watched some movies with Dianna, baked a pie, framed the picture of my unborn baby, which Jonathan proudly put up on a wall in the living room. These guys became like second parents to me, which constantly brought tears to my eyes, but I mostly blamed the hormones.

Then came Saturday. I received zero calls from the clinic and the day was slowly dying, so I decided to take a walk with Jax . I grabbed a light jacket in case it got chilly in the evening, a treat for Jax and limped into the woods.

I liked the woods. Squirrels were hopping from one tree to another, birds were chirping, Jax was having fun running around. The evening air was warm, but refreshing. The nature here was impressing – tall trees with moss, soft grass under my feet, some bushes with different colorful berries, it looked very beautiful in the light of soon to be setting sun. I don’t know how long I have been walking around, but I guess not less then a couple of hours, because my leg was pretty tired and my walking pace was now close to zero. A good thing that I never went too far from home, so it will not take long to get back. I whistled for Jax to come back and slowly we started walking towards home. The sun was almost down, it’s last rays were shining through the trees with a bright reddish light. As we were about to step out of the tree line I suddenly heard some weird noises. I turned my head towards the sounds and the sight in front of me made my heart stop for a second. A saw a huge grey wold all covered in blood heading slowly my way. It was huge, really, it’s head reached right to my breast, I have never seen a wolf this big, and I’ve seen plenty of different animals. I was pretty sure, that i haven’t even read anything about a wolf being this big. If it wanted, it could kill me with one hit of it’s paw. But the moment I looked it in the eyes, all my fear suddenly vanished. It was and odd sensation, the eyes of that wolf were… intelligent. And they held no cruel intentions. On the contrary, the look in the wolfs eyes was more pleading, and the second I realized it, a small whine escaped it’s mouth and the wolf collapsed to the ground.