(Warning: This chapter contains an endorsement for Phish Food, possibly the finest flavour ice-cream ever invented. All hail Ben and Jerry! Enjoy)
Part 4
During the ride home Carter remained silent. Every now and then Abby would give his hand a reassuring squeeze and he would turn his head to give her a slight smile, but he would quickly retreat into his thoughts. He couldn't believe this was happening to him. Before he'd met Abby he had never really thought about having children, but at the same time he had assumed that he could have them if and when he decided to. Now here he was, married to the woman of his dreams, the only thing needed to make their relationship complete a child, and he found he couldn't give that to Abby. He felt powerless and he didn't like the feeling. Sighing heavily he pulled the car up outside their apartment building and turned off the engine, then walked to the passenger side to hand Abby out.
They walked up the stairs to their apartment hand in hand, breaking contact only when Carter took his keys out of his pocket to open the door. He turned the key in the lock and turned the handle, but as usual the door stuck. He tried jiggling the handle a couple of times and kicking the bottom as Abby had told him but the door refused to move, causing him to become more and more irate. He was about to attack it with his shoulder when he felt Abby's hand on his arm stopping him.
"Give it here," she said calmly, taking the keys out of his hand and easing her way in front of him. She turned the key in the lock and kicked the door slightly in the bottom corner, causing it to open easily. She held the door open and stood aside for him to enter.
"You didn't have to do that, you know, I had the situation under control," he said sulkily, brushing past her and throwing his coat over the back of the couch and flopping himself down on it.
"I know you did sweetie," she said indulgently as she put the keys on the hall table and joined him on the couch. "You were just about to kill the nasty door!"
"Well maybe if I did we could finally get around to buying a new one," he said pointedly. "How many times do I have to tell you I'll call somebody in to fix a new door?"
"And how many times do I have to tell you that there's no point in fixing a new door when we're not going to be in this apartment long-term. We don't want to be living in a second-floor apartment when we've got loads of kiddies running around our feet...and before you say anything we are *not* moving in with your grandmother," she added quickly.
"I wasn't going to say anything about moving in with Gamma...although she has offered, and it is closer to the hospital..."
"Dinner twice a week is more than enough for me. Don't get me wrong, I love Gamma to death, but for the sake of our marriage I think it's probably best that we keep exposure to your mother to a minimum. The woman just doesn't like me." She leaned against his shoulder and he lifted his arm to put around her, the tension between them slipping a little with the return of their usual banter.
"Sure she does," he began, "she's just a little upset that she didn't get to throw one of those big society weddings she'd always dreamed about. Plus I think she might probably have liked to have found out from us rather than from a newspaper article."
"She thinks I'm a gold-digger. I'm not good enough for her baby boy," she teased, turning her head to kiss the tip of his nose.
"That's not true..." he defended his mother, although a little part of him acknowledged that this might be the case, so he quickly gave up and joined in Abby's laughter.
"It *so* is," she laughed. "I bet she thought you only married me because you had to, and now she hates me because we're still married and she doesn't even have a grandchild to show for it!"
Carter quickly sobered up at the mention of grandchildren. For a few minutes he had forgotten how sorry he felt for himself and had enjoyed his normal life with Abby, but now he was returned to his thoughts of how he had failed in his primary role as a man. He stopped laughing and stood up from the couch.
"I'm going to make some coffee, you want one?" he asked, pulling himself free from her arms and walking over to the kitchen to put the kettle on to boil.
"No thanks," she called after him, a little confused at his sudden change in behaviour. "I'm going to have to give up caffeine anyway when we get pregnant, and besides, these books say that high caffeine intake can slow down the chances of conceiving by up to 15 per cent..."
Carter had been reaching into the cupboard to pull out two mugs whilst she had been speaking, and when she started reading the statistics from the booklets he slammed them down on the counter with such force that they shattered. "Do you think that we can ignore all that crap for one night and just get on with our lives???"
Immediately ashamed by his outburst he slumped into a chair at the kitchen table and hid his face in his hands. Abby, equally concerned, put down the book she was flicking through and walked over to where he was sitting. She knelt down beside his chair and put her arms around him.
"John, honey, what's wrong?"
"I'm sorry Abby," he said, not taking his head out of his hands. Abby wasn't sure if it was this that made his voice sound muffled, or maybe the possibility that he was holding back tears.
"What for?" she asked, putting her hand on his cheek and bringing his head around to face her. There were definitely tears in his eyes, and her heart went out to him.
"For not being able to give you a baby. More than anything I want to be able to have children with you, and here we are talking to doctors, organising dieting schedules, quoting statistics..."
"Yeah, well don't forget that 90 per cent of all statistics are made up," she joked softly, trying to lighten the mood.
"Abby, I'm being serious!"
"Okay, I won't joke." She looked away in thought for a moment and then turned back to face him. "Is that what all this was about?"
"All what?"
"All this pouting and ignoring me and slamming things around. You think that I'm upset because we haven't been able to have a baby right away?"
"I guess I just assumed that since we were both ready it would happen," he confessed. "I mean, before you came along I never even considered the possibility of having children, but I never considered the probability of *not* having them either. They were just something that would happen when the time was right, and it just feels so right now and I can't believe we can't have them because of me...Am I making any sense?"
"You are, but you're also being ridiculous as well. Did you go to see a different doctor than I did? Because the one I saw said that the only thing stopping us from conceiving was a bad habit and poor diet. If she had said that you had nothing swimming around in there then I would admit we have a problem," she joked, eliciting a little smile from him, "but these are all things that can be fixed. I'm going in next week to talk about my fertility schedule, learn how to take my temperature properly to find my most fertile periods and construct the charts, and I bet you within no time we'll have a gaggle of little Carters running around and driving us crazy...and even if we don't, do you honestly think that it would change the way I feel about you? I love you John Carter," she said forcibly, "and all the lazy sperm in the world aren't going to change that!"
He laughed outright at this. Somehow Abby always seemed to have the right words to make him see how ridiculous he was being. There was a time when it was always him who had to talk Abby into being more open, but over the past year their relationship had grown so much more equal. They complemented each other, each one's strengths making up for the other's weaknesses. As he was musing on this Abby rose from her kneeling position and held out her hand to him.
"Come on," she said, pulling him up from his seated position and dragging him back over to the couch. "What you need is a tub of ice cream and a mindless night in front of the television watching total rubbish to take your mind off things." She pushed him down onto the couch and went to the kitchen, returning moments later with a tub of Phish Food and a spoon.
"Only one spoon?" he questioned, raising an eyebrow.
"Did I forget to mention that part of the fun would be feeding your beautiful wife?" she said suggestively, cuddling up close to him on the couch and holding out the spoon and ice cream.
"As long as my 'beautiful wife' returns the favour."
"I think that can be arranged!"
They shared the ice cream as they watched some quiz show, occasionally shouting out the answers to a guy who obviously had no clue and eventually guessed wrongly that the capitol of Scotland was London.
"How can people this dumb get onto television?" Carter asked, exasperated.
"Hmm?" Abby was too busy planting soft kisses on his cheek and along his jaw line. The ice cream had long been neglected.
"I mean do they not even watch the news?" Carter continued with his rant. "They had to have studied Geography in High School, right?"
"Whatever you say." She opened the top buttons of his shirt and ran her hand down his chest. "So you want to go make a baby, Dr Carter?" she asked seductively, kissing down his neck and continuing to slowly unbutton his shirt.
"Abby," he groaned, "it's not that I'm not enjoying what you're doing...very much in fact...but I'm not in the mood for all that elevated, angled mumbo-jumbo. Couldn't we just crash and read all the stuff in the morning?" He tried unsuccessfully to pull away from her but she was not to be put off.
"Well then, how about we look on this as a trial-run?"
"A trial-run?" he asked breathlessly. It was hard to concentrate when Abby was running her hand down his chest like that.
"Yes, a trial-run...a bit of practice...how else will we know if we're doing it right when we actually do start trying?"
"You mean we haven't been doing it right the last fifteen months?" he laughed softly against her lips. She had raised herself on her knees so that she was straddling him at this point, hands on his shoulders as she kissed his forehead, his nose, his lips.
"Are you questioning my logic?" she asked, pulling back to look at him mock-sternly.
"Now why would I do that?" He pulled her back down to his chest and kissed her softly. They remained on the couch for a few minutes just kissing and cuddling before they both subconsciously started to deepen the kiss, each wanting something more. Carter rose from the couch and lifted Abby in his arms, never breaking contact with her lips as he carried her to their bedroom and laid her on the bed. He let go of her only long enough to remove the rest of his clothes, and then he quickly rejoined her on the bed to continue where he left off...
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"Feeling better now?" she asked as she lay against his chest. Carter tightened his arms around her and planted a kiss on the top of her head.
"Absolutely wonderful," he sighed contentedly, "and not just because of what we've just done!" he added when he heard her laugh. "The last 24 hours have just been so...*surreal* I guess...and it's nice to have the pressure off for a little while. Thank you."
"For what?"
"For calling me on being such an idiot." He felt her smile against his chest and he snuggled closer against her.
"You're welcome," she said quietly. "Just don't let it happen again."
"I won't." He kissed her forehead, and felt her breathing begin to slow.
"Don't forget we both have early shifts tomorrow," she mumbled tiredly.
"I won't."
"And we have to hand the invitations out." Her last words were barely audible, and as soon as they were out of her mouth Carter knew that she was asleep.
He lay there for a few minutes just watching her. She looked so beautiful and peaceful, as if she had never had any worries in her life. Maybe she was right. Maybe it wasn't going to be so bad after all. They were together, they were in love, and if they had a baby all the better. In the meanwhile he would carry on as normal, and enjoy the trying.
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(I don't want to speak too soon, but I think I may have found my flow again. Fingers crossed. Please review if you've enjoyed it, or if there's anything you'd like to see happen. Em)
Part 4
During the ride home Carter remained silent. Every now and then Abby would give his hand a reassuring squeeze and he would turn his head to give her a slight smile, but he would quickly retreat into his thoughts. He couldn't believe this was happening to him. Before he'd met Abby he had never really thought about having children, but at the same time he had assumed that he could have them if and when he decided to. Now here he was, married to the woman of his dreams, the only thing needed to make their relationship complete a child, and he found he couldn't give that to Abby. He felt powerless and he didn't like the feeling. Sighing heavily he pulled the car up outside their apartment building and turned off the engine, then walked to the passenger side to hand Abby out.
They walked up the stairs to their apartment hand in hand, breaking contact only when Carter took his keys out of his pocket to open the door. He turned the key in the lock and turned the handle, but as usual the door stuck. He tried jiggling the handle a couple of times and kicking the bottom as Abby had told him but the door refused to move, causing him to become more and more irate. He was about to attack it with his shoulder when he felt Abby's hand on his arm stopping him.
"Give it here," she said calmly, taking the keys out of his hand and easing her way in front of him. She turned the key in the lock and kicked the door slightly in the bottom corner, causing it to open easily. She held the door open and stood aside for him to enter.
"You didn't have to do that, you know, I had the situation under control," he said sulkily, brushing past her and throwing his coat over the back of the couch and flopping himself down on it.
"I know you did sweetie," she said indulgently as she put the keys on the hall table and joined him on the couch. "You were just about to kill the nasty door!"
"Well maybe if I did we could finally get around to buying a new one," he said pointedly. "How many times do I have to tell you I'll call somebody in to fix a new door?"
"And how many times do I have to tell you that there's no point in fixing a new door when we're not going to be in this apartment long-term. We don't want to be living in a second-floor apartment when we've got loads of kiddies running around our feet...and before you say anything we are *not* moving in with your grandmother," she added quickly.
"I wasn't going to say anything about moving in with Gamma...although she has offered, and it is closer to the hospital..."
"Dinner twice a week is more than enough for me. Don't get me wrong, I love Gamma to death, but for the sake of our marriage I think it's probably best that we keep exposure to your mother to a minimum. The woman just doesn't like me." She leaned against his shoulder and he lifted his arm to put around her, the tension between them slipping a little with the return of their usual banter.
"Sure she does," he began, "she's just a little upset that she didn't get to throw one of those big society weddings she'd always dreamed about. Plus I think she might probably have liked to have found out from us rather than from a newspaper article."
"She thinks I'm a gold-digger. I'm not good enough for her baby boy," she teased, turning her head to kiss the tip of his nose.
"That's not true..." he defended his mother, although a little part of him acknowledged that this might be the case, so he quickly gave up and joined in Abby's laughter.
"It *so* is," she laughed. "I bet she thought you only married me because you had to, and now she hates me because we're still married and she doesn't even have a grandchild to show for it!"
Carter quickly sobered up at the mention of grandchildren. For a few minutes he had forgotten how sorry he felt for himself and had enjoyed his normal life with Abby, but now he was returned to his thoughts of how he had failed in his primary role as a man. He stopped laughing and stood up from the couch.
"I'm going to make some coffee, you want one?" he asked, pulling himself free from her arms and walking over to the kitchen to put the kettle on to boil.
"No thanks," she called after him, a little confused at his sudden change in behaviour. "I'm going to have to give up caffeine anyway when we get pregnant, and besides, these books say that high caffeine intake can slow down the chances of conceiving by up to 15 per cent..."
Carter had been reaching into the cupboard to pull out two mugs whilst she had been speaking, and when she started reading the statistics from the booklets he slammed them down on the counter with such force that they shattered. "Do you think that we can ignore all that crap for one night and just get on with our lives???"
Immediately ashamed by his outburst he slumped into a chair at the kitchen table and hid his face in his hands. Abby, equally concerned, put down the book she was flicking through and walked over to where he was sitting. She knelt down beside his chair and put her arms around him.
"John, honey, what's wrong?"
"I'm sorry Abby," he said, not taking his head out of his hands. Abby wasn't sure if it was this that made his voice sound muffled, or maybe the possibility that he was holding back tears.
"What for?" she asked, putting her hand on his cheek and bringing his head around to face her. There were definitely tears in his eyes, and her heart went out to him.
"For not being able to give you a baby. More than anything I want to be able to have children with you, and here we are talking to doctors, organising dieting schedules, quoting statistics..."
"Yeah, well don't forget that 90 per cent of all statistics are made up," she joked softly, trying to lighten the mood.
"Abby, I'm being serious!"
"Okay, I won't joke." She looked away in thought for a moment and then turned back to face him. "Is that what all this was about?"
"All what?"
"All this pouting and ignoring me and slamming things around. You think that I'm upset because we haven't been able to have a baby right away?"
"I guess I just assumed that since we were both ready it would happen," he confessed. "I mean, before you came along I never even considered the possibility of having children, but I never considered the probability of *not* having them either. They were just something that would happen when the time was right, and it just feels so right now and I can't believe we can't have them because of me...Am I making any sense?"
"You are, but you're also being ridiculous as well. Did you go to see a different doctor than I did? Because the one I saw said that the only thing stopping us from conceiving was a bad habit and poor diet. If she had said that you had nothing swimming around in there then I would admit we have a problem," she joked, eliciting a little smile from him, "but these are all things that can be fixed. I'm going in next week to talk about my fertility schedule, learn how to take my temperature properly to find my most fertile periods and construct the charts, and I bet you within no time we'll have a gaggle of little Carters running around and driving us crazy...and even if we don't, do you honestly think that it would change the way I feel about you? I love you John Carter," she said forcibly, "and all the lazy sperm in the world aren't going to change that!"
He laughed outright at this. Somehow Abby always seemed to have the right words to make him see how ridiculous he was being. There was a time when it was always him who had to talk Abby into being more open, but over the past year their relationship had grown so much more equal. They complemented each other, each one's strengths making up for the other's weaknesses. As he was musing on this Abby rose from her kneeling position and held out her hand to him.
"Come on," she said, pulling him up from his seated position and dragging him back over to the couch. "What you need is a tub of ice cream and a mindless night in front of the television watching total rubbish to take your mind off things." She pushed him down onto the couch and went to the kitchen, returning moments later with a tub of Phish Food and a spoon.
"Only one spoon?" he questioned, raising an eyebrow.
"Did I forget to mention that part of the fun would be feeding your beautiful wife?" she said suggestively, cuddling up close to him on the couch and holding out the spoon and ice cream.
"As long as my 'beautiful wife' returns the favour."
"I think that can be arranged!"
They shared the ice cream as they watched some quiz show, occasionally shouting out the answers to a guy who obviously had no clue and eventually guessed wrongly that the capitol of Scotland was London.
"How can people this dumb get onto television?" Carter asked, exasperated.
"Hmm?" Abby was too busy planting soft kisses on his cheek and along his jaw line. The ice cream had long been neglected.
"I mean do they not even watch the news?" Carter continued with his rant. "They had to have studied Geography in High School, right?"
"Whatever you say." She opened the top buttons of his shirt and ran her hand down his chest. "So you want to go make a baby, Dr Carter?" she asked seductively, kissing down his neck and continuing to slowly unbutton his shirt.
"Abby," he groaned, "it's not that I'm not enjoying what you're doing...very much in fact...but I'm not in the mood for all that elevated, angled mumbo-jumbo. Couldn't we just crash and read all the stuff in the morning?" He tried unsuccessfully to pull away from her but she was not to be put off.
"Well then, how about we look on this as a trial-run?"
"A trial-run?" he asked breathlessly. It was hard to concentrate when Abby was running her hand down his chest like that.
"Yes, a trial-run...a bit of practice...how else will we know if we're doing it right when we actually do start trying?"
"You mean we haven't been doing it right the last fifteen months?" he laughed softly against her lips. She had raised herself on her knees so that she was straddling him at this point, hands on his shoulders as she kissed his forehead, his nose, his lips.
"Are you questioning my logic?" she asked, pulling back to look at him mock-sternly.
"Now why would I do that?" He pulled her back down to his chest and kissed her softly. They remained on the couch for a few minutes just kissing and cuddling before they both subconsciously started to deepen the kiss, each wanting something more. Carter rose from the couch and lifted Abby in his arms, never breaking contact with her lips as he carried her to their bedroom and laid her on the bed. He let go of her only long enough to remove the rest of his clothes, and then he quickly rejoined her on the bed to continue where he left off...
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"Feeling better now?" she asked as she lay against his chest. Carter tightened his arms around her and planted a kiss on the top of her head.
"Absolutely wonderful," he sighed contentedly, "and not just because of what we've just done!" he added when he heard her laugh. "The last 24 hours have just been so...*surreal* I guess...and it's nice to have the pressure off for a little while. Thank you."
"For what?"
"For calling me on being such an idiot." He felt her smile against his chest and he snuggled closer against her.
"You're welcome," she said quietly. "Just don't let it happen again."
"I won't." He kissed her forehead, and felt her breathing begin to slow.
"Don't forget we both have early shifts tomorrow," she mumbled tiredly.
"I won't."
"And we have to hand the invitations out." Her last words were barely audible, and as soon as they were out of her mouth Carter knew that she was asleep.
He lay there for a few minutes just watching her. She looked so beautiful and peaceful, as if she had never had any worries in her life. Maybe she was right. Maybe it wasn't going to be so bad after all. They were together, they were in love, and if they had a baby all the better. In the meanwhile he would carry on as normal, and enjoy the trying.
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(I don't want to speak too soon, but I think I may have found my flow again. Fingers crossed. Please review if you've enjoyed it, or if there's anything you'd like to see happen. Em)