Chapter Text
The routine was all too familiar. It felt like the 20th time she’d done it, maybe just maybe it would turn out different this time. One more minute. Priyanka paced around the bathroom wringing her hands. The minute passed. Anxiety rang through her, she was scared to look. Another minute passed as she calmed down, she just had to do it. The doctor looked down at the pregnancy test. Negative. Again. Why should she of expected anything different?
There was a knock on the door. “Are you okay in there? What does it say?” She tossed the stick in the trash can, and wiped the tears starting at her eyes.
Priyanka opened the door, “I’m fine, it was negative again that’s all,” she said trying to come off nonchalant. She couldn’t even look at her husband. “So uh, dinner?” She walked off down the hall to the kitchen.
Doug watched his wife leave, and glanced back in to the bathroom, noticing the test in the trash. He headed over to the kitchen, stopping in the doorway. She was washing the dishes. “Priyanka,” he said softly.
“I’m just getting them clean for dinner,” she said voice cracking.
He walked over to her, “They were already clean,” Doug grabbed a plate she was about to dunk in water.
“Well now they’ll be extra clean.” She shook slightly picking up a knife, scrubbing the blade. The water was slick. Her hands couldn’t grip anything. He was shaking. The knife slipped, slicing her thumb open. She swore withdrawing her hand, looking at the cut.
Priyanka sighed, shutting her eyes tightly, she wasn’t going to cry. “It’s okay, to not be okay,” Doug said softly reaching out to his wife. He took her bloodied hand, grabbed a cloth and applied pressure to the wound.
She opened her eyes tears spilling out, “Thank you,” she said softly. They sat in silence for a few minutes, Priyanka trying hard to maintain control of her emotions, while Doug addressed her wound. “I-I’m sorry-”
“Stop. You don’t need to apologize. This isn’t your fault-”
“It’s just…” She sniffles and sunk to the ground, back against the counter. “I’ve helped bring life in to this world. Yet I can’t. I can’t experience for myself. We’ve been trying for a year plus now, and nothing.” Her husband had sat down next to her, “I’m just afraid we’ll never have a family,” she concluded.
His heart was breaking, seeing his wife in pain like this. “We’re already a family,” he said wiping her tears away and brushing the hair out of her face.
Priyanka smiled faintly then looked away, “I know that… I just want-” she was silenced by a tender kiss.
“We just have to keep trying. It’ll happen one day. You just have to believe it.”
The doctor laughed softly and rolled her eyes, “That’s so, sappy. Not to mention complete bullshit. Believing won’t change anything.” It was so like him too, to be sappy like that, and she loved it.
As soon as she laughed, Doug smiled. He ignored his own tears brimming in his eyes. “It might help, you never know until you try. In addition to believing, we’ll go to the doctors. Find out the root of the problem. There’s always other ways too, like adoption. We’re going to be just fine.”
Priyanka rested her forehead against Doug’s and sighed happily. “Just fine,” she repeated, closing her eyes. She felt her stomach flutter, filling with familiar butterflies. That’s what she loved, the nervous butterflies she still got around her husband. He kissed the tip of her nose making her nose scrunch in the process. Doug smiled then kissed her.
“It’s a good thing you’re a doctor,” he said pulling away. “Because I think I’m love sick.”
The doctor blushed and laughed, shaking her head, “You’re ridiculous.” Her laugh was enchanting. Everything about her was. “Lucky for you, glasses guy, I think I know how to cure your illness,” she pulled him in for another kiss.