Status: just starting
Forget
01
"Have you even given it some thought?" Sheila is perched on the edge of the porcelain bath tub, her blond hair pulled over one shoulder.
Turning away from the toilet bowl, I flush its' contents and get slowly to my feet. My head spins a little but apart from that, and the thrown up breakfast that's making it's way to the river Styx of sewerage, I feel fine. Perfectly and completely fine.
"It's just some bad sea food I must have had or something, is all." I don't give my sister the benefit of a glance. I already know what her expression is going to be set into - a scowl and an eye roll. Really Sheila, you should be more creative when you're mad, not dimmer. Lazily, I figure if that is at all impossible. When I hear my sister's frustrated hiss behind me, I decide that it's not. "Oh sure, and I'm the bloody queen."
"Oh why don't you just shut up!" The high pitched scream that fills the small bathroom scares me. It takes me a few minutes to realise that it is my own. When I turn to face my sister, her face is pallid. She looks terrified. Instantly regretful, I shake the fog that had gathered in my head and take a deep breath. I hadn't meant to be so loud, so angry. I hadn't meant to be so upset. Blinking at Sheila, I reach out a hand. She takes a step back.
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to..."
Sheila cuts me off. Her brown eyes flash and she is, once again, my annoying twin sister. "You need help, Jodie. What's happening to you isn't normal - fish poisoning or not."
I try not to let the irrational anger seep into my voice. It insults me, my intelligence, that Sheila would even presume such a thing. I am not pregnant. I can't be. To be pregnant would mean to have had sex within the past three months, and I'm pretty sure that I haven't. I haven't seen Gordo - my boyfriend, in six months, and he's the only man I've really ever spent a night with.
"I'm late for work," I say instead. Marching out of the bathroom, I grab my coat from the sofa in the corner and give my parents a small wave when I cross the manicured lawn. I'm upset. As much as I love Sheila - she is my sister after all, she tests my patience. She jumps to conclusions too quickly, makes all the wrong decisions at all the wrong times. I know that doing so makes me a terrible twin but Sheila is literally everything that I hope to never be. She is also a twenty year old mother to a three year old child. An affair with a married high school teacher earned her the little blonde Samantha that's running around my parents' as they garden, and Sheila's been off kilter with her choices ever since.
My sister is now a waitress at Jumping Ed's.
It's a job, I know, but not one that I would ever want for myself. I have dreams, aspirations. I'm one of the few women to have been admitted into Oxford's medical school. There was no way, no way at all, that I would let Sheila's silly preposition even be considered. I am, and I say this with complete modesty, simply not that stupid. Sheila's made enough mistakes to last the both of us a lifetime.
Despite this reasoning, though, I find myself taking the bus down to town - a few minutes away from where I worked part time (Dr. Jones' Private Practice), to the small family health clinic that's in the smallest corner of the furthest street. When I step off the bus and onto the curb, I'm shaking. Checking, I tell myself, won't hurt. If I am sick with a stomach flu, an early diagnosis should help. With finals around the corner, I cannot afford to be sick. It occurs to me that Dr. Jones would have been perfectly able to check me over but I don't want that. He is my employer, not my doctor. He is also a member of the Board of Directors of the college I'm presently attending before I go off to med school.
The building that the family health clinic is situated in is old and dingy. There are no street lamps here, I notice, and little foot traffic. I take it that government funded hospitals run on much less than private health care. The doors into the clinic are unassuming; a faded red in colour, with rusty brown things for knobs. Sneering at it, I take out a handkerchief from my pocket ('Never leave home without one, Jodie'), cover the knob with it and turn. The hinges creak loudly when I swing the door open.
The room I enter is small, to say the least. There is something that resembles a park bench to one side and a dying pot plant in the other. A woman, dressed in a starch white uniform, sits behind what I can only assume as the receptionists' desk. Against the grayness of the room, her uniform is a startling contrast. She is wearing glasses - the half moon kind, you know - and her dark hair is made up into a small bun. I wonder why she doesn't keep it in the fashionable braid of this season. When she sees me, a small smile pulls at her ruby red lips.
"Hello, how may I help you?"
Suddenly nervous, I run a quick hand over the flat of my coat and swallow. How do I say this? How do I even start?
I'm sorry to disturb you, really, but I'd like to know the chances of a woman being impregnated by her boyfriend who lives twenty two thousand miles away. I know it's a little far fetched but you see, my sister swears on her daughter's life that I'm pregnant and I'd really very much like not to be. I'm going to cure cancer so having a child before that would not be the best career choice for me right now. Oh and also, was that an old man I saw lying on your front step? He doesn't look too good. Perhaps you'd like to serve him a bowl of soup.
Yes, that sounds simple enough.
Shaking my head at myself, I suck in a deep breath and decide that honesty doesn't always need to be served in complete lots. "I'd like to see a doctor, if that's alright."
The woman comes around the table to stand before me and nods slowly. I think she can tell that I'm nervous.
London could tell you're nervous by the way you're sweating.
"Of course, Ms...?"
"Lyons." The name pops out before I can even think. Anonymity sounds like a good idea.
"...right this way."
Her hand on mine, pretty white uniform walks me to a back room where an overworked civil servant awaits.
- - -
I count slowly in my head.
One, two, three, four, five.
"Ms. Lyons, good to see you again." Dr. Hamish Kitchener takes the seat next to the examination table I'm sitting on and pats my knee affectionately. Hamish is old, around my father's age, with a shock of white hair and sparkling blue eyes. As far as body shapes go, he resembles a stretched round ball, to be honest. He is tall, a whole head taller than me, but his middle pouch hangs over the top of his pants like a trophy. His head is long and angular.
"You too, Doctor."
My voice isn't as cheery as his is. I am nervous, obviously. The last time I was in this office, I'd had to pee into a cup in the corner bathroom. Despite knowing this to be the standard pregnancy test ritual, it was humiliating to have to present the clear plastic thing to Dr. Kitchener.
"Well, I have some rather interesting news." The file he is holding comes up and the kind doctor looks up at me.
Dread fills me, takes over. I can see my life flash before my eyes. There I am, on a podium, receiving my doctorate, proud as a lion. In another, grimmer vision, I am sitting in a nursery, a child in my arms.
"What is it?" I murmur, terrified to know.
Dr. Kitchener grins up at me and squeezes my knee. "Well, you're pregnant, it seems. Three months in, to be exact."
I think I might have fainted.
Turning away from the toilet bowl, I flush its' contents and get slowly to my feet. My head spins a little but apart from that, and the thrown up breakfast that's making it's way to the river Styx of sewerage, I feel fine. Perfectly and completely fine.
"It's just some bad sea food I must have had or something, is all." I don't give my sister the benefit of a glance. I already know what her expression is going to be set into - a scowl and an eye roll. Really Sheila, you should be more creative when you're mad, not dimmer. Lazily, I figure if that is at all impossible. When I hear my sister's frustrated hiss behind me, I decide that it's not. "Oh sure, and I'm the bloody queen."
"Oh why don't you just shut up!" The high pitched scream that fills the small bathroom scares me. It takes me a few minutes to realise that it is my own. When I turn to face my sister, her face is pallid. She looks terrified. Instantly regretful, I shake the fog that had gathered in my head and take a deep breath. I hadn't meant to be so loud, so angry. I hadn't meant to be so upset. Blinking at Sheila, I reach out a hand. She takes a step back.
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to..."
Sheila cuts me off. Her brown eyes flash and she is, once again, my annoying twin sister. "You need help, Jodie. What's happening to you isn't normal - fish poisoning or not."
I try not to let the irrational anger seep into my voice. It insults me, my intelligence, that Sheila would even presume such a thing. I am not pregnant. I can't be. To be pregnant would mean to have had sex within the past three months, and I'm pretty sure that I haven't. I haven't seen Gordo - my boyfriend, in six months, and he's the only man I've really ever spent a night with.
"I'm late for work," I say instead. Marching out of the bathroom, I grab my coat from the sofa in the corner and give my parents a small wave when I cross the manicured lawn. I'm upset. As much as I love Sheila - she is my sister after all, she tests my patience. She jumps to conclusions too quickly, makes all the wrong decisions at all the wrong times. I know that doing so makes me a terrible twin but Sheila is literally everything that I hope to never be. She is also a twenty year old mother to a three year old child. An affair with a married high school teacher earned her the little blonde Samantha that's running around my parents' as they garden, and Sheila's been off kilter with her choices ever since.
My sister is now a waitress at Jumping Ed's.
It's a job, I know, but not one that I would ever want for myself. I have dreams, aspirations. I'm one of the few women to have been admitted into Oxford's medical school. There was no way, no way at all, that I would let Sheila's silly preposition even be considered. I am, and I say this with complete modesty, simply not that stupid. Sheila's made enough mistakes to last the both of us a lifetime.
Despite this reasoning, though, I find myself taking the bus down to town - a few minutes away from where I worked part time (Dr. Jones' Private Practice), to the small family health clinic that's in the smallest corner of the furthest street. When I step off the bus and onto the curb, I'm shaking. Checking, I tell myself, won't hurt. If I am sick with a stomach flu, an early diagnosis should help. With finals around the corner, I cannot afford to be sick. It occurs to me that Dr. Jones would have been perfectly able to check me over but I don't want that. He is my employer, not my doctor. He is also a member of the Board of Directors of the college I'm presently attending before I go off to med school.
The building that the family health clinic is situated in is old and dingy. There are no street lamps here, I notice, and little foot traffic. I take it that government funded hospitals run on much less than private health care. The doors into the clinic are unassuming; a faded red in colour, with rusty brown things for knobs. Sneering at it, I take out a handkerchief from my pocket ('Never leave home without one, Jodie'), cover the knob with it and turn. The hinges creak loudly when I swing the door open.
The room I enter is small, to say the least. There is something that resembles a park bench to one side and a dying pot plant in the other. A woman, dressed in a starch white uniform, sits behind what I can only assume as the receptionists' desk. Against the grayness of the room, her uniform is a startling contrast. She is wearing glasses - the half moon kind, you know - and her dark hair is made up into a small bun. I wonder why she doesn't keep it in the fashionable braid of this season. When she sees me, a small smile pulls at her ruby red lips.
"Hello, how may I help you?"
Suddenly nervous, I run a quick hand over the flat of my coat and swallow. How do I say this? How do I even start?
I'm sorry to disturb you, really, but I'd like to know the chances of a woman being impregnated by her boyfriend who lives twenty two thousand miles away. I know it's a little far fetched but you see, my sister swears on her daughter's life that I'm pregnant and I'd really very much like not to be. I'm going to cure cancer so having a child before that would not be the best career choice for me right now. Oh and also, was that an old man I saw lying on your front step? He doesn't look too good. Perhaps you'd like to serve him a bowl of soup.
Yes, that sounds simple enough.
Shaking my head at myself, I suck in a deep breath and decide that honesty doesn't always need to be served in complete lots. "I'd like to see a doctor, if that's alright."
The woman comes around the table to stand before me and nods slowly. I think she can tell that I'm nervous.
London could tell you're nervous by the way you're sweating.
"Of course, Ms...?"
"Lyons." The name pops out before I can even think. Anonymity sounds like a good idea.
"...right this way."
Her hand on mine, pretty white uniform walks me to a back room where an overworked civil servant awaits.
- - -
I count slowly in my head.
One, two, three, four, five.
"Ms. Lyons, good to see you again." Dr. Hamish Kitchener takes the seat next to the examination table I'm sitting on and pats my knee affectionately. Hamish is old, around my father's age, with a shock of white hair and sparkling blue eyes. As far as body shapes go, he resembles a stretched round ball, to be honest. He is tall, a whole head taller than me, but his middle pouch hangs over the top of his pants like a trophy. His head is long and angular.
"You too, Doctor."
My voice isn't as cheery as his is. I am nervous, obviously. The last time I was in this office, I'd had to pee into a cup in the corner bathroom. Despite knowing this to be the standard pregnancy test ritual, it was humiliating to have to present the clear plastic thing to Dr. Kitchener.
"Well, I have some rather interesting news." The file he is holding comes up and the kind doctor looks up at me.
Dread fills me, takes over. I can see my life flash before my eyes. There I am, on a podium, receiving my doctorate, proud as a lion. In another, grimmer vision, I am sitting in a nursery, a child in my arms.
"What is it?" I murmur, terrified to know.
Dr. Kitchener grins up at me and squeezes my knee. "Well, you're pregnant, it seems. Three months in, to be exact."
I think I might have fainted.