Chapter 8: The Appointment

I went to the appointment on Wednesday, because I wanted to see who had made it.

Marcy took the morning off and sat beside me in the waiting room with a magazine she did not read.

Westbrook Women's Health was on the third floor of a glass building across the river.

The walls were pale green, and the chairs were soft, and there was a fish tank full of orange fish that moved in slow circles.

A woman at the desk looked at her screen and then at me.

"Linnea Marsden," she said, warmly. "Welcome back."

"Back?"

"You're in the system, hon. We have your whole file."

"I've never been here."

She smiled and told me to take a seat.

"The doctor's ready for you."

Marcy squeezed my wrist and let go.

I followed a nurse down a corridor lined with photographs of mothers holding sleeping babies.

The exam room was small and cool.

I sat on the paper-covered table with my coat folded in my lap, and I waited for ten minutes, counting the ceiling tiles.

The doctor was a brisk, pleasant woman with silver hair and a tablet.

"Linnea. Good to see you again," she said. "And congratulations. I hear it's early."

"You hear?"

"Mr. Ludlow called to say you'd be coming in."

"He's not my husband."

"Of course, of course."

She nodded, and I could tell she did not believe me.

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