More Than A Feeling PT 2
Chapter Nine
ARIZONA'S POV
I haven't slept. Not because Eliza and I are on bad terms right now, but because I'm worried. I'm worried that something is wrong and I don't like it. I don't like this feeling of once again being helpless. I was doing better when my wife reassured me that she was feeling okay, but last night she didn't look good. Last night she didn't seem herself. I know that's probably because of the issues we have going on right now, but she looked grey. Her skin...it was pale. I'm sure I'm worrying for nothing, but her dizziness scared me and now I've lay awake thinking about it all fucking night. Why can't things just be simple for us? Why can't we have a normal marriage? A normal pregnancy? Why can't my life just be that little less stressful for once? Honestly, I'm over the cheating accusation right now. I don't like it, but I have more important things to worry about. I have a wife who is pregnant and no matter what she has said, it's irrelevant. She is who matters. Her body. Her mind. Her emotions. I know she is a hormonal wreck and that is why she behaved the way she did, but I'm allowing it. Just this once…I'm letting it go.
Okay, maybe it isn't the first time we've found ourselves here, but as my wife it is. We promised each other that it was a fresh start last time and we stuck to that. It's why I haven't thought too hard about the past. The past accusations and the fights. The endless nights of struggling to find sleep because we weren't in a good place. We are better than that, now. We are so much more than all of this. The both of us. Our baby needs us both and after I'd spoken to Tim last night, I knew he was right. I knew he would help me to see reason with all of this. Eliza is the woman I want to spend my life with, and that still stands. I may feel a little wounded in terms of how she sees me, but I'll get over it. I did in the past and I can again. Why? Because I love her. I love her so much that it physically hurts. Okay, that physical hurt could be my knee right now. I'm not sure.
Feeling Eliza stir beside me, I turn my head a little and find her watching me. I can see that uncertainty in her eyes but we're okay. We have to be. If we're going to survive this pregnancy…we have to stick together. "Hey…" I give her a small smile.
"Hi…" She shifts a little closer to me. "I really need to pee but I can't move yet."
"You feeling okay?" My wife senses the worry inside of me and settles her hand over my own that is resting on my stomach. "I mean, your body?"
"Yeah, I think so." She gives me a small tired smile. "I needed to sleep…"
"Yeah, you did." I agree. "I don't think you moved from that position all night."
"Just felt good to have you beside me." She rests her head on my pillow and studies my face. "I love you, Arizona."
"I know you do." I nod, slowly. "I love you, too."
"The past couple of days haven't been good but I promise to make it up to you."
"I don't want you to make it up to me." I sigh. "It's forgotten about."
"But how?" She furrows her brow. "How can you just forget about it? Forgive me?"
"Because I love you and that is more important." I turn and face her fully. "Our baby and your health mean so much more to me than anything else."
"We love you." She leans in and hesitates. I know she wants to kiss me but I think she may be unsure if we're at that place yet.
"So, kiss me…" My lips ghost over her own. "Just kiss me so we can forget about all of this." Her lips pressing against my own, my stomach flutters and I know that her accusations no longer matter. I guess I can see why she thought something was happening in my office, but I still thought she knew me better than that. If the tables had turned, I would've listened. Allowed her to explain. She didn't though, and I cannot change that.
"I really gotta pee." She sighs. "Stay here, I'll be back."
"I'm not going anywhere." Smiling as she climbs from the bed, my wife disappears into the en-suite and closes the door. Relaxing back into the mattress, my eyes close and a small smile settles on my mouth. Eliza knows I'm here. She knows I'd never hurt her. I just hope we can get her hormones under control and enjoy this pregnancy. I just know that above all else, we are the ones who matter in all of this. If I have to be here every minute of the day taking care of her, I will. I will close the bar down until this is all over if I have to. Listening to my wife move around in the bathroom, the dull ache in my knee doesn't feel so bad today. Maybe my body is more relaxed and calm than it has been since this happened, I don't know.
The bathroom door opening, my eyes remain closed but I don't feel Eliza's presence anywhere near me. Furrowing my brow and glancing over towards the door, she has a strange look on her face and my heart sinks into my chest. "W-What?" I sit up on my elbows.
"I-I, uh…" She shakes her head and drops her gaze. "I-I, I'm bleeding, Arizona."
"No." My voice barely audible, My head drops between my shoulders and I try to fight back the lump in my throat. The tears in my eyes. "N-No…"
"I don't know what to do…" She cries. "If I'm losing our baby, I-I don't know what to do."
Climbing from the bed, the brace on my knee prevents me from moving freely. I don't want to wear it, but I have no choice. If I'm going to be fit again in a couple of weeks, I need to follow the doctor's instructions. There is no use in us both struggling. No use at all. "Hey…" I approach my wife. "How about we get you checked out before we worry?" Her eyes finding mine, she grips my body and pulls me against her. "Come on, I've got you."
"Don't leave me." She cries. "If you're only here because of our baby, please don't leave me if I lose it."
"Not gonna happen." My hand runs up and down her back. "Never gonna happen."
I'm not sure I've ever been so scared in all of my life. Even when I had a gun pointed at me at the bar, it was nothing compared to this. It was nothing compared to this feeling that my life is about to crumble around me. I mean, we don't know what is happening right now but I'm totally preparing myself for the worse. I know I shouldn't think like that but it's hard not to. It's hard to imagine that we will come out of this room with a good feeling. Why? Because my wife is bleeding and I can't help but feel like our fighting over the past couple of days is to blame. Sure, it could be totally unrelated, but I've got a terrible feeling nonetheless. Yes, I've been feeling helpless over the last month or so, but this? This is way beyond feeling helpless. This is way beyond anything I could even begin to imagine. To put words to.
Her hand is gripping my own and she is lying on a bed waiting to be given a sonogram. Honestly, I'm not sure I can be here when we hear those awful words. I'm not sure I can be here when my heart twists in my chest and my breathing stops. Because it will. That is exactly how this is going to go. I'm trying to remain calm for the sake of Eliza but she knows I'm worried. She isn't stupid and she knows me better than I know myself. "I'm scared." She squeezes my hand tighter. "I'm so scared, Arizona."
"Everything is going to be okay." I press a kiss to the back of her hand. "We've got this, okay?" I don't exactly know what it is we've got but I feel like I just need to tell her everything is okay. She knows I'm lying but it seems to be calming her nerves anyway. "You want a boy or a girl?" Those words breaking my heart because I know we are likely to end up with neither, I clear the emotion from my voice and settle back in my seat a little. "Any particular preference?"
"Healthy…" She breathes out, her eyes closing. "Just…healthy."
"Me too, baby." I lace our fingers together. "Me too."
"This is my karma, isn't it?" She turns to face me. "For how I've treated you…this is my karma."
"No." I give her a sad smile. "This is just us checking that everything is okay…"
"But I'm bleeding, Arizona." She studies my eyes. "And I know exactly what you're thinking."
"You do?" I raise an eyebrow. "Psychic, huh?"
"I know you well enough to know that you believe me." She sighs. "You believe me when I say I'm losing our baby."
"That's not true." Except it totally is. "You could be bleeding for any number of reasons."
"Name one…" She stares intently. "Name one…other than a miscarriage."
"I can't right now." I close my eyes and pinch the bridge of my nose. "Let's not speculate…"
"Hard not to when I'm carrying a baby that doesn't want to be inside of me." She cries and I stand from my seat. Leaning over my wife, my lips press against her forehead and my own tears threaten to fall from my eyes.
"Whatever happens…or is happening, you've got me," I whisper. "This isn't karma and this isn't your body's way of rejecting our baby because we've had a disagreement. We don't know what is happening but I need you to stop stressing yourself out, Eliza." Closing my eyes, her breathing settles a little and I'm hoping that will keep her calm for just another five minutes.
My heart sinking deeper into my stomach when the door opens, I glance over my shoulder and find a woman approaching us. She seems nice and she seems like she will be honest about what is going on, but that doesn't mean I want either of us to be here right now. I wish I could just wrap my wife up and lock her away until this is all over. I wish I could take away her worries and nothing would ever go wrong. I cannot do that, though. I cant and it's killing me inside. Slowly, but surely.
"Okay, Eliza." She takes a seat on the stool around the other side of the bed. "You said you've experienced some bleeding this morning?"
"Y-Yeah." She chokes out. "Not a lot, but enough to worry me."
"Okay, let's take a look at what is going on…" The nurse gives us a sweet smile and it calms me some. "Have you been experiencing any other issues with your pregnancy?"
"Just…sickness."
"And she was dizzy last night." I cut in. "We put it down to tiredness but now this has happened…"
"You did the right thing coming here." She smiles. "This may be a little cold." Squirting some jelly looking thing on my wife's lower stomach, I close my eyes and give myself a moment to breathe. The sound of a heartbeat filtering through a few seconds later, my eyes shoot open and I focus on the screen in front of me. "Heartbeat is strong." The nurse smiles. "Measurements look good." She nods. "Great, even."
"But why the bleeding?" I furrow my brow. "The dizziness?"
"How well are you sleeping, Eliza?"
"Not too good the past couple of nights but it's getting better." She glances at me and squeezes my hand. "Just…had some things on my mind lately, is all."
"But you usually sleep well?"
"Yeah, I guess so." She nods. "Maybe I did too much?" She raises an eyebrow.
"Could be." The nurse agrees. "Bleeding can occur, Eliza. Your body is changing and it isn't always a sign that you should worry about. You still did right in coming here, though." She prints off a copy of the blob on the screen and my eyes brighten. "Your baby looks and sounds healthy." Wiping the goo from Eliza's stomach, I breathe a sigh of relief I've been holding since we left our place. Glancing at my wife, she looks relieved. She looks...better.
"Y-Yeah?" We both say in unison.
"Y-You're sure?" I sit forward a little, my elbows resting on the bed beside my wife.
"I am." She nods. "I'll have your blood pressure checked before you leave, but there is no reason...from what I can see, to worry. Just continue to take it easy." Taking a file from beside the screen, she flicks through it and drops her glasses over her eyes. "I notice you had an NIPT done almost three weeks ago?"
"Yes, we received the results last week." Eliza makes herself a little more comfortable and relaxed. "Everything came back good."
"It did." The nurse nods in agreement. "You know you can find out the gender of your baby from this test?" She glances between us and my eyes immediately find my wife's. "Of course, you don't have to know, but the option is there should you want it…"
"Arizona…" She narrows her eyes. "W-What should we do?"
"I-I, uh…" Furrowing my brow, I have the sudden urge to know if I'm going to have a son or a daughter. "D-Do you want to know?"
"Yes." She smiles. "I mean, I just think with this scare…it may give us something to focus on."
"Yeah, I agree," I reply. "But I want you to be sure."
"We've never discussed if we would find out or not." She shrugs. "I guess I haven't really thought about it…have you?"
"Once or twice," I admit. "But nothing was concrete in my mind."
"So, what do we do?" She lowers her voice. "What do you think is best?"
"Let's do it." I smile. "I can get everything ready for you both and you won't have to worry if we've made a mistake in not knowing."
"Okay." Eliza seems pretty happy with our decision. "Okay…we want to know." She fixes her eyes on the nurse who has a huge smile on her face. A smile I'm assuming is from watching our interaction. I'm sure she hears this every day but she has totally put us at ease and now I need to know what is going to be coming into our lives in some six months. "For sure." She sits up and releases a deep breath.
"Okay." The nurse studies the file in her hand. Slipping the sonogram into the file, she hands it over to my wife and steps away. "I'll let you ladies get finished up here. Third line down." Throwing us a wink, she disappears out of the room and I feel like I can breathe again.
"Are you okay?" I run my thumb over Eliza's wrist. "Do you feel okay?" I'm so happy I didn't show her how worried I was before. This is a wake-up call, though. For sure.
"Yeah." Her hands shake.
"You want me to do it?" I ask.
"N-No…" She shakes her head. "I want to tell you."
"Okay." I puff out a deep breath. "But you're going to have to hurry up because I'm not sure my heart can take the waiting."
"Wow…" She opens the file on the page with the sonogram attached.
"What?" I shift uncomfortably. "Eliza?"
"We're having a boy…" She breathes out, unshed tears in her eyes.
"Yeah?" My voice breaks. "A boy?" Oh god, we're having a boy. I don't even know how to feel about that but I need to get home and get this fucking brace off my leg so I can prepare our son's room for him. Our son. Sounds crazy. I know we were having one or the other, but now that it's been finalized, I feel different. This all feels different. The previous two days didn't even happen as far as I'm concerned. I can't believe we walked in here a short time ago expecting to hear the worst…and now, we're about to walk out of here with the knowledge that we will have a baby boy in six months.
"A boy…" My wife smiles as she runs her thumb over the image in front of her and I take a seat on the edge of the bed, my hand settling over her small bump. "Baby Daniel Robbins." My entire body shivering at her words, my eyes close and I break down. I break down like I haven't done in a long time. "Sounds kinda perfect to me." She pulls me against her.
"My dad…" I cry against her chest. "Y-You mean…"
"I think it would be perfect, Arizona." Her voice holding no hesitation, I simply nod.
"Baby Daniel Robbins." I breathe out. "Wow…"
Thanks for reading, guys. Reviews are welcome and appreciated as always.
