Season 1 Theme: A Pirates Life For Me. Episode 7: The Charming Syndrome.
The drive to New York was a long one, but much better than walking. Erin felt she had a new respect for cars, and after spending a year on a rocking ship; hardly felt car-sick anymore. The driving wasn't too bad, however the company was; Not so much Henry, who was sitting next to her in the backseat, and how exactly he finagled himself into going Erin would never understand, he was alright though. It was the two in the front that got on her nerves. Hook barely said a word to Emma, and even less than that to Erin. And Emma...well, she was just being far too understanding about this. Erin was litterally carrying her boyfriends baby and SHE was driving her to a doctor's appointment, how did that make sense at all? Erin was now taking to calling it 'The Charming Syndrome.' The Charming's were just too nice for their own good.
It was quite alarming to Erin that they had made it on time for the appointment, it was even more alarming that everyone decided to go in with her when the nurse called her. Henry sat next to her in clearly 'The Husbands' Chair, and Emma and Hook stood by the window. The nurse ticked a few things off of a list.
"How far along do you think you are?"
Erin shrugged. "I don't know...I'm not having any symptoms. So, not very far along?"
"No morning sickness, fatigue, or distaste in foods you normally like?" The Nurse asked. Erin shook her head no. "What makes you think you're pregnant then? A gain in weight?"
"No, I've actually lost weight lately..." Erin said, as the women looked up at her, with an odd expression on her face.
"Okay..." The nurse said, in a weird voice. "The doctor will be in in just a few minutes to give you your pregnancy test results."
Erin nodded, that hadn't been a fun experience in the bathroom, almost worse than the time she had to take a drug test to work at Wal-Mart. The Nurse walked out and Erin sighed, she knew The Nurse thought she was crazy, but how could Erin exactly say someone had told her she was pregnant? That would alert the crazy meter a lot faster. The Doctor walked in just moments later, as predicted by The Nurse, and smiled at her.
"Good news!" he announced. "You certainly are pregnant." He put on gloves and walked over to a machine and flicked it on. "Now we just have to figure out how far along you are, my notes say you're not sure. That's perfectly understandable for your first pregnancy." He muttered on, as he picked up a wand-like-thing and turned on the screen next to Erin's head. This was the first time, while waiting for everything to boot up, that he had looked around the room. His eyes landed on Henry. "Is this the father?"
"NO!" it was like a choir, everyone, excluding Henry, had yelled, very loudly. The Doctor looked alarmed and then turned toward the machine. He hit a few buttons and then turned toward Erin once more.
"Expose your abdomen for me, please," he said, in almost the same weird voice as The Nurse. "This might be a little cold." She pulled up her shirt, feeling weird about it, as The Doctor poured some jell onto her and pressed the wand to her stomach. It took a moment, in that time she had a chance to look at the others in the room. Henry looked excited, as he would, looking at the screen in anticipation. Emma kept her expression blank, looking down at her crossed arms. And Hook, he looked both confused and curious as he watched The Doctor, and every so often his eyes would flash to the screen in worry, almost like he expected a baby to jump out at him. "Ah! There it is..." Erin looked over quickly, heart suddenly jumping at his words. On the screen was a thing...a thing that didn't have a shape but also several little ones all put together. "It appears you are farther along than we all thought, I would say a good three, maybe nearly four months. And you never had any symptoms?"
"No..." Erin said again, this time in a small voice. The Doctor smiled at her.
"Very few don't, you must be one of the lucky ones."
"My mom never had any either..." Erin muttered, more to herself, now that she was thinking about it. "It must run in the family."
The Doctor continued to smile. "Maybe. Would you like a printed picture of your first ultrasound?" he asked then. "We put it in a lovely little frame."
"Yeah, sure," Erin nodded. The Doctor pressed a button on the screen and continued to move the wand along her belly.
"I would say...give it a few weeks we will be able to see a gender."
XXX
The trip back to Stroybrooke was even more quiet than the trip out, it was spent, for Erin at least, with her hand over the patch of sticky residue from where the jell had been, and her mind fermly on the thing that was growing inside of her. The idea felt so strange, not good...but definitely not bad either. It was just knowing. And that made everything more profound somehow. It was as they breached the town that Erin realized she wasn't the only one effected by this. Emma asked if they all wanted to eat lunch, and it was the tone of Hook's voice that told her that he too was thinking a lot about what was growing inside of her.
"I want to go to my ship," he said. "I need...time to think."
"Okay, I'll drop you off," Emma said, looking over, worried, at him. Erin said nothing, as Hook insisted he walk, but Emma drove down the street anyway. "When will you be home?" She asked, as she stopped the car. "Do you want Henry to stay with you?"
Hook didn't answer, instead, leaned, or more like lunged, himself over the middle console and pressed a hard kiss to Emma's mouth. Erin repressed the need to gag, and it seemed to be her, on Emma's mind, as she pushed Hook off. He got out of the car then, and Emma sat rooted for a second, before getting out of the car quickly, and followed him up the dock.
Erin watched out of the window as the two carely argued back and forth, however Henry was obviously less than concerned, as he announced, "I call front!" And climbed into the front seat Hook had just vacated.
"They're fighting..." she told him, and he looked over at them.
"Yeah...it's probably good for them." Just as Erin wondered about that, Henry leaned over and honked the horn, and made a 'hurry-up' motion with his hand to his mother, who looked back in fright. "I'm hungry..."
(A/N: I realize that maybe that's not how a true first baby-doctors appointment would go, but it is a TV show and Fanficition, so I'm just going to stick with what is more entertaining. Also, very soon we will find out what the baby's gender is, please let me know what you think it is? I mean...I already know, but it's fun to see you all guess. Also, I made a Tumblr (I know, I'm very sad,) for...promotion of this story, and there you will find a bit about Erin and what she looks like (an FC) as I have not been overly descriptive here. I will put the Tumblr link in the comments, so look there if you're interested, and if you have Tumblr, follow that blog and be "alerted" whenever I do an update here!)
