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Coriolanus settled himself back against the pillows in his and Sejanus’s bed, clenching his muscles as his restless baby seemed to do a somersault inside of him. He took a few deep breaths – or as deep as he could given their child seemed to be currently taking up most of the space inside of him – and willed himself not to heave.
He shouldn’t have eaten dinner. Admittedly, he’d only managed a few mouthfuls of plain pasta and that was only partly because he was starting to feel a little light-headed and mostly because at his last appointment his obstetrician had expressed serious concern at how little weight he’d gained during his pregnancy and Sejanus was now fluttering around him like an extremely anxious bird who was obsessed with his eating habits.
Still, he was paying for it now. His stomach was churning, he felt like he was swallowing down retches, and he still needed to read the rest of the proposal for the upcoming Hunger Games. He’d already perused the summary and at first glance he was worried that these games were a little too reminiscent of a games they’d held seven years ago. He needed to finish reading the document and make notes on it in preparation for his meeting at 9am tomorrow morning.
‘What do you think we’re having?’ Sejanus asked, sliding into bed beside him and resting his hand over the pregnant swell of Coriolanus’s belly. ‘A precious little boy or a darling baby girl?’
Coriolanus repressed the urge to sigh loudly. After thirty-five weeks, he was so, so sick of this conversation, especially given that they would know what they were having if Sejanus hadn’t insisted on being so stupid about the whole thing.
He could still remember their twelve-week ultrasound. Coriolanus had lain on the examination table feeling queasy and bloated while Sejanus and the obstetrician ooohed and ahhhed over the tiny life forming in his belly. Just when the ordeal was finally almost over, the doctor had asked if they’d like to know the gender. The word yes had already been forming on Coriolanus’s lips when Sejanus jumped in first.
‘No,’ Sejanus had said fondly, reaching out and tenderly holding Coriolanus’s hand. Maybe it wasn’t out of tenderness. Maybe it was out of self-preservation instincts because if his hands weren’t preoccupied, Coriolanus may have slapped him for the nonsense he came up with next. ‘We already know what we’re having,’ he continued. ‘We’re having a whole new life with the kind of love that I didn’t even know existed until Coryo told me we were going to be having a baby. The gender doesn’t matter.’ He turned to Coryo and smiled. ‘I just can’t wait to meet the soul who’s quietly growing inside of you right now.’
Coriolanus was not being facetious or dramatic when he said he almost projectile vomited right then and there in a way that he didn’t think had anything to do with morning sickness.
Now, as if to prove a point, Coriolanus made a show of turning the page in his document and not responding.
It seemed utterly ridiculous that their obstetrician knew what they were having but Coriolanus and Sejanus did not but more importantly, Coriolanus wanted to know. He did not enjoy surprises – he never had – and something as important as their literal baby did not seem to be the appropriate time to spring one on him.
‘Come on,’ Sejanus said, gently brushing up against his side. ‘I’ve barely seen you all day and we’re so close to having our baby right here with us. I want to talk about it.’
Before Coriolanus had a chance to respond, their baby took the opportunity to deliver two sharp kicks in the region to the right of his belly button and Coriolanus had to resist the urge to gasp at the sensation.
‘Oh, did you feel that?’ Sejanus asked, pressing his hand more firmly to the side of Coriolanus’s bump. Their baby had become so strong that Coriolanus could now see his or her kicks making ripples and bulges in his skin.
‘No,’ he said sarcastically because was Sejanus actually serious? Did he not realise that what he was feeling was their baby move inside Coriolanus. If Sejanus could feel it, then Coriolanus certainly could. ‘Must just be you.’
Sejanus let out a laugh. It sounded like a bubble of happiness. Probably because it was easy to be happy when you weren’t the one who had thrown up at least once a day for the past seven months, hadn’t watched their body swell and change as their baby grew, wasn’t currently feeling breathless from the pressure of their baby against their lungs, and wasn’t looking down the barrel of giving birth in the next few weeks.
‘I’m sorry,’ Sejanus said, pressing a kiss to the side of Coriolanus’s mouth. ‘I know you’re getting uncomfortable. Ma says it’s completely normal at this stage of pregnancy. She says she bets you’re feeling restless and can’t wait to meet our baby.’
If by “can’t wait to meet our baby” she meant “can’t wait to have our baby out of me”, then Coriolanus was loathe to admit it, but he agreed with her.
Their baby moved again – a big rolling motion inside him – and this time Coriolanus was unable to suppress his uncomfortable grimace and slight retch in the back of his throat. Most unfortunately, neither of these things went unnoticed by Sejanus.
‘Oh no, my love,’ he murmured. ‘Are you feeling sick again?’
No, Coriolanus wanted to snap. No, I am not feeling sick *again*. Because the word “again” would imply that at some point I have stopped feeling sick and I have been feeling horribly nauseous basically since I took that pregnancy test thirty-five weeks ago.
‘I’m fine,’ he said, trying not to wince as another barrage of kicks started up inside of him.
Oh no. Oh, no, no, no. This had been happening every few nights since he’d entered his third trimester and every time it did, their baby had kept up these movements all night and Coriolanus had gotten no rest at all.
‘Why does this always happen right when I want to go to sleep?’ he asked in frustration. He immediately regretted it. His insides burned at this intimate show of vulnerability. He didn’t want Sejanus to know this was bothering him. He didn’t want Sejanus to know that he was finding his pregnancy incredibly difficult. He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment and hoped that Sejanus would let it go, but of course his loving, well-meaning, yet incredibly tone-deaf husband could never do that.
‘Maybe,’ Sejanus said softly, tracing a big circle around Coriolanus’s belly with his fingers. ‘He or she just wants to make sure that we know they’re coming.’
‘Well, I don’t know about you,’ Coriolanus said. ‘But somehow I’m finding it difficult to forget.’
‘Try and relax, my darling,’ Sejanus murmured, gently taking Coriolanus’s document and placing it on his own bedside table and therefore out of Coriolanus’s reach. ‘It’s 11 o’clock at night, you’ve been up since 5am, and you have an almost full-grown baby inside of you. Although, you’re still so tiny I’m not exactly sure where you’re keeping it.’
Coriolanus scoffed at that. Despite what everyone from his doctor to the media to the general public to Sejanus’s ma had to say, Coriolanus was feeling anything but tiny and he considered himself an authority on the matter.
Coriolanus knew what it was to be tiny. Prior to becoming pregnant, he had maintained the same weight he’d been in his final year in the Academy – no small feat given it had been ten years and he now had access to all of the food and drink he could possibly want. His trim waist and stomach that was so flat it was concave between his hips had been a talking point of Panem in general and his office staff more specifically and an absolute point of concern for Sejanus’s ma who seemed to think her mission in this life was to “feed him up.” He’d always delicately declined her offers of second helpings, of course.
He'd been filled with dread and humiliation when he’d announced his pregnancy at fifteen weeks and the media had declared the entire nation to be on “bump watch” and Ma had affectionately patted his still mostly-flat stomach and said how she couldn’t wait to watch him grow with child.
Still. Now at thirty-five weeks, Coriolanus counted himself luckier than he could have been. His belly had stayed flat throughout his entire first trimester and it wasn’t until he was twenty-two weeks along that he’d started to feel full and bloated. The waistband of his trousers started getting a little snug at around twenty-seven weeks but he’d got away with fastening them with an elastic band until the day after his thirty-two-week appointment. Coriolanus couldn’t understand how it had happened but somehow his belly seemed to round out over night and there was suddenly no mistaking his condition.
Admittedly, he’d wanted to hide it and he probably could have with a loose yet well-tailored jacket and yet he was now showing off his swollen belly in waist-high trousers that hugged his bump and tucked in shirts but that was for two very good reasons. The first was that his publicist had pointed out that his popularity would sky-rocket if the citizens of Panem could see – rather than just know – he was carrying a child. The second was that Livia Cardew was still single and childless and Coriolanus found that an unexpected silver lining of being pregnant was that he got to flaunt his marriage and fertility in her face.
While he logically knew he was far smaller than was expected given how far along he was, it didn’t change the fact that his body seemed entirely unlike his own and he really didn’t like how strange and out of control it made him feel.
‘Coryo,’ Sejanus tried again. ‘I know you’re the president and I know your job is important to you but don’t you think that maybe it’s time you gave yourself the grace to rest?’
If he was being honest, rest sounded amazing. Most of his pregnancy had been fine; he’d been queasy, yes, but he’d still felt as alert and focussed on his job as ever. But now his body and mind seemed to be plotting against him. He’d catch himself absent-mindedly staring into space while rubbing his belly when he was supposed to be writing speeches and reading briefs so he could make decisions about the future direction of Panem. He’d fall asleep at his desk and he’d had to shorten his sentences in press conferences to hide how breathless he’d become now that his baby seemed to be sitting on his lungs.
‘I have a duty to the people of Panem,’ he said, in a tone that didn’t invite rebuttal.
His child somersaulted again and he sat up a little straighter.
‘I’m going to get some water,’ he said, already pulling back the blanket over his legs and getting out of bed. Thanks to his growing belly, the movement was a little more difficult than he cared to admit.
He took his time walking down the hallway, trying to take slow, smooth steps to get his baby to settle. Sometimes he found that when his baby was kicking like this during the day, if he went for a walk and sipped cold water slowly, he could sometimes get him or her to calm down.
After pouring a glass of water, he paced up and down the kitchen, sipping it slowly and rubbing his hand up and down his belly. His skin felt warm and tight under his palm and as his baby nudged against his hand, he felt the strange surge of affection he’d been getting since he’d entered his third trimester and the whole concept of having a baby had suddenly got a lot more real.
Because Coriolanus did want to be a parent. It was something he’d known he’d wanted ever since he was a child and although he’d shut the conversation down for years after he and Sejanus were married, it wasn’t because he didn’t want a baby. It was because he wanted a career too.
But then his twenty-eighth birthday came and went and the media kept speculating about why Coriolanus – who had now been married for five years – had yet to produce a child. Maybe he couldn’t? Maybe things between him and Sejanus were not going as well as they led the public to believe? Maybe they were on the brink of divorce?
Coriolanus couldn’t have that kind of gossip. And even he had to admit that the timing was kind of perfect: right in the middle of an election cycle. So he’d told Sejanus he was ready to try. Three months after that he’d woken up and immediately vomited what tasted like acid into the toilet in their ensuite. A positive pregnancy test, followed by a confirmation obstetrician appointment had followed, and now Coriolanus was five short weeks away from giving birth.
‘It’s okay,’ he murmured softly now, relieved that the kicks were becoming less regular and more gentle. He forced himself to take slow, even breaths. ‘I know it’s a sign that you’re strong and healthy but please try and get some sleep so that maybe I can too.’
At that point Sejanus padded into the kitchen and Coriolanus felt his cheeks grow warm at the thought that maybe Sejanus had heard him talking to his belly. To his relief, if he had, Sejanus showed no sign of it.
‘I’m sorry,’ Sejanus said. ‘I didn’t mean to push you before.’
Sejanus push Coriolanus? Ha. What a joke.
‘Grandma’am thinks we’re having a boy,’ Coriolanus said, because Sejanus was looking like a kicked puppy and he didn’t want to be a total arsehole to him. And in the spirit of trying to be nicer to Sejanus, he didn’t add that she absolutely could not understand why they hadn’t found out for sure or that it was entirely possible that this was wishful thinking because Coriolanus had no doubt that she’d want him to produce an heir to the Snow name as soon as possible.
‘What makes her say that?’
Coriolanus shrugged. ‘She asked me about my symptoms and then told me that based on those, it’s a boy.’
He decided not to mention that he’d lied about his symptoms. His family had never been the type to discuss intimate issues and pregnancy felt about as intimate as it got. Coriolanus had mentioned he’d been tired because that didn’t feel particularly personal but apart from that he hadn’t noticed anything different.
‘Mmmm,’ Sejanus said, coming up behind him and wrapped his arms around his waist, resting his palms over his belly button. ‘Ma and I think we’re having a girl.’
‘Oh,’ Coriolanus said, rapidly losing what little interest he had in this conversation to begin with. ‘Well, there you go then.’
‘She says that bad morning sickness is always a tell-tale sign of a girl. Also I told her how breathless you’ve been feeling and she says that means you’re carrying high which is another sign.’
The idea of Sejanus and his ma discussing Coriolanus’s body was enough to make him cringe all over.
‘But what do you think?’ Sejanus asked, because apparently he was determined not to give up on this topic of conversation.
Things definitely seemed to have settled down inside of him. Coriolanus swayed his hips from side-to-side a little, his baby’s slight movements now feeling more like bubbles bursting than actual kicks.
‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘I don’t have any precognitive abilities so anything I say would be a complete guess.’
He leaned back against Sejanus and for a rare moment just let himself be held.
He could have found out what they were having. Coriolanus knew – he’d always known – that if he’d called the obstetrician and demanded to know the gender, she would have told him. After all, who could refuse the President of Panem? Most people couldn’t even refuse him back when he was just Coriolanus Snow.
But he was thirty-five weeks along and he still hadn’t done it.
Sometimes he told himself it was because he wasn’t that interested. He was far too preoccupied running the country to be concerned with something as trivial as their baby’s gender. But other times when he was so full of tenderness or excitement that he could almost burst with it – like when he first felt the baby kick or when he saw their tiny heartbeat on the ultrasound screen – he felt like it went deeper than that. He wanted to find out with Sejanus, in the way Sejanus wanted. For once, he didn’t want to impose his will on something just to get the result he wanted.
‘Do you have a preference?’ Sejanus murmured.
Coriolanus shook his head. A little girl to dote on and spoil. A little boy to craft in his image. He’d be happy with either.
‘What about you?’ he asked.
Sejanus nuzzled his nose against his neck, right above his mating bite, and making him squirm.
‘No,’ he said. ‘All I’ve ever wanted since I was eight years old is a baby with you. Anything else is just details when I’m about to get everything I’ve ever hoped for.’
Yeah, me too, Coriolanus thought.
But he was afraid that saying it out loud might cost him too much. So he said nothing and just let Sejanus hold him.
Afterall, they’d both find out soon enough.