November 21, 1989

Manhattan, NY

Alexis Davis awoke overcome with overwhelming all-encompassing nausea. Barely awake she stumbled from her bed and crawled into the bathroom where heaving, panting, and sweating, she was able to empty the contents of her stomach into the porcelain bowl before she collapsed onto the cold tiles. As she lay prostrate waiting for the world to stop spinning, she recalled the last time she had felt quite so miserable.

December 15, 1979

Alexis Davidovitch awoke feeling nauseated and clammy. This was not a new sensation as she had been feeling poorly most of the term and each morning seemed worse than the one before. As she attempted to climb out of bed she was overcome with overwhelming dizziness that brought her down to her knees and then crawling into the bathroom where she held onto the porcelain bowl to steady herself as she heaved and panted while emptying the contents of her stomach.

A gentle hand on her shoulder startled Alexis. First, she recoiled in fear and then felt her cheeks grow even warmer when she realized that her suitemate, Celia Quartermaine, had entered their shared bathroom.

"I can summon the infirmary nurse," Celia offered.

Alexis struggled to raise her head all the way even though it just made her feel more unsteady and weak. "That is hardly necessary. I'm just a little under the weather."

Celia shook her head. "I'm not exactly deaf, Alexis, I know you've been throwing up basically every morning for months. That goes a bit beyond under the weather. As I see it either you have some major digestive problem, you're bulimic, or you're pregnant. I know we aren't really best friends but I can't just let you continue to suffer here."

Alexis gasped. "I assure you I'm not making myself sick on purpose and I couldn't possibly be pregnant!"

"Are you sure you couldn't be pregnant because you're getting sick just the way my cousin Alan's wife, Monica, was the Christmas I was thirteen. Their son AJ will be three next May. Everyone was saying that she was having a worse time of it because she was a way overworked medical resident throughout the whole pregnancy, but my mom said that some women just don't have easy pregnancies. I think she was referring to herself, which is probably a big part of why I'm an only child," Celia said.

"Was that lonely?" Alexis asked.

The question seemed to catch Celia off guard. There was at least a solid minute of silence before Celia started to speak. "If you're asking if it was lonely to be an only child, not really. However, in many ways, I was much less a real only child because I grew up with my cousins. Hugh, Aaron, and I were all born within a fourteen-month period and we basically had each other's backs. I guess an older sister would have been nice, but my cousin Alexandria is five years older just enough to scope everything out and let me learn from her experience. I'm going to go visit her at Stanford over spring break and I'm sure she will help me with my applications next year. Are you really interested in my cousins or are you just trying to distract me from the topic at hand, so you can persist in your denial?"

Truth be told, Alexis wasn't quite sure why exactly the words had slipped out. She had noted how Celia had smiled as she spoke of her cousins and she suspected that her memories were much happier than her own remembrances of torture by Stavros's hands. She wasn't about to explain any of that to Celia. "I told you, I'm fine," she said simply.

Celia rolled her eyes. "Well, unfortunately, Alexis, as my cousin Alexandria would say, I don't believe you!" she said.

"Your cousin doesn't believe you?" Alexis asked. Perhaps she and Celia had more in common than she had imagined.

"Alexandria was referring to this guy she met on one of her Co-op experiences over the summer. He was kind of a jerk and he didn't exactly excel in personal responsibility, so he spent most of the summer blaming various interns for his own shortcomings. He was rather pathetic. I think she actually felt sorry for him in a way. I guess when you grow up a Quartermaine you kind of buy into the excellence is standard motto and you hold yourself much more accountable than any superior really could."

Alexis decided not to consider what the Cassadine motto might be.

"Anyway, we're getting way off topic. Have you considered taking a pregnancy test?"

"What? Why would I take a pregnancy test?" Alexis asked.

"Because I'm pretty sure the test will be positive and the sooner that you accept that reality the sooner you can deal with it. The longer you insist on living in denial the less options you could possibly have. Personally, I don't believe I could ever have an abortion, but we aren't talking about me, and if that is something you might consider then denying the pregnancy until you get into the second trimester will essentially take that option off the table and lack of prenatal care can put both you and the baby at great risk."

"You're being ridiculous!" Alexis screamed.

As the memory faded, Alexis was left with the same overwhelming loneliness she had felt a decade earlier when Celia had eventually given into frustration and went off to go have breakfast at a local coffee shop with Holly. As she lay on the cold tile, she tried to convince herself that her sense of déjà vu

stemmed from that overwhelming, all-encompassing loneliness not the familiarity of morning sickness.