Chapter Text
Samira couldn’t shake the feeling this was a teen pregnancy.
Standing here, in her bathroom, with a cup of her own pee and plastic sticks lined up neatly on the counter, she found herself feeling like she was committing some moral sin. Watchful eyes looked down on her from the heavens, judging her for even having to look in the direction of a pregnancy test. Like she was making a monumental mistake and blowing her life up by even finding herself in this situation. As if she wasn’t standing in a house that she owned from the money her and her husband both earned from being actual doctors. She was beyond capable -- emotionally, financially, socially -- enough to have a baby. She was 32 years old. Her life was stable. Busy, but stable. And yet, something in her told her that this was most a human being could fuck up.
This wasn't surprising. She knew what actions she'd taken to be standing here. Honestly, she was a little surprised she hadn't been in this situation sooner. It had been months since they'd been anywhere near stringent with their contraceptives. Flippantly forgetting a condom, or ignoring the birth control alarms. Missing a pill here and there. Not taking it at all. She'd been too busy, or maybe lazy -- neglectful? -- to even make an appointment to renew her prescription.
The conversation about the possibility of having a baby had been ongoing. They weighed the pros and cons and truly considered whether or not they were ready for a change like this. To turn their lives upside down. To slow down on work. To make space in their home. They could never come up with an answer of when the right time would be. There was always more to do. More to see. More to experience. Could they do any of that with a baby in the mix? Maybe everyone was right and there was never a right time. They hadn't fully finished the conversation but eventually they stopped using condoms altogether and Samira let her birth control lapse. They took it as it came. If they were supposed to have a baby, they would without trying. And if they finally decided it was the right time... they'd start trying for real.
The test sat on the counter and she paced slowly around the bathroom, reading the instructions over and over to make sure she did it right. There couldn't be a mistake. It could void the whole test. Tamper the results.
Her tracker had just given her the notification to log her symptoms when she noticed she was late.
Only a day, nothing to be concerned about.
Except she couldn’t quiet the alarm in her brain. She knew there were about a million reasons she could be late outside of pregnancy. Work had been stressful lately and she wasn't eating or sleeping like she should. Her boobs hurt, she was tired, a little nauseous, but that could all be chalked up to PMS and being overworked -- nothing she wasn't used to. The only thing she wasn't used to was having the smelling power of a bloodhound.
Samira was really still getting into the swing of having a regular period again, so a little change in symptoms or being a day late hadn't worried her much. The last six months or so without her birth control was an adjustment as she was reminded just how truly miserable life was when she wasn't able to skip her placebo week. The bleeding didn't throw her off but the hormonal shifts were jarring as she remembered the real reason she'd started taking the pill in the first place. PMDD had drawn her to the edge one too many times for comfort but her life was more stable now than it was when she was a teenager. The symptoms were rough but more manageable with a good support system. She felt less out of control the week before her period. Her mind wasn't clouded. Her emotional state was more stable. Maybe it was age, having learned coping techniques through the years. Still, it wasn’t enjoyable or easy. She picked a lot of fights. Found herself having to hide away more often, getting more overwhelmed more easily. Work was harder. Her relationship was harder. Controlling her emotions was harder. But she wasn't alone.
She'd gotten her regular notifications from her cycle tracker. She had been using it diligently since she had stopped the pill, really trying to get a feel from her own normal again. She knew she ovulated this month, all the symptoms had been the same through then. Pregnancy was definitely not out of the realm of possibility by any means.
Samira looked at the door. Jack slept peacefully just on the other side, fully oblivious to her afternoon activities. He’d worked the night before. He deserved to sleep because she probably wasn’t even pregnant anyway and there was no point in waking him up for a negative test or... three.
She kind of liked the concept of having a moment to process the results if she needed one. Her feelings were so mixed right now. A pit of anxiety weighed heavy but something rang in her ears as excitement. Anticipation.
She wasn’t sure what she was praying for. A positive? A negative? She wasn’t sure of anything beyond her heartbeat pounding in her ears and that the test(s) needed, apparently, the longest three minutes in the universe to run. She could have sworn the world stopped turning just to make her wait longer. Like one of those movies were time has stopped for everyone and everything else but kept moving for her.
She paced around the room. Her hands knotting up in her hair, scrunching at the strands that she hadn’t bothered to do anything with on her day off. She blew out a very heavy breath and let out one curt laugh. Incredulous. Like she couldn’t believe any of this was happening.
Her hands shook -- just slightly, she’d always had very steady hands -- and her palms sweat as she rubbed them over her sweatpants. She took a moment to look over herself in the mirror. She looked the same on the outside. Besides the little bloating and a couple of acne spots that had sprouted over her face, she didn't feel much different. It was hard to fully fathom that everything could be so different so soon. So quickly. That suddenly they’d be finding ways to slow down on work. Figuring out their busy schedule. Adding a third, much more tumultuous schedule, into the mix. In three minutes, they could be deciding which room the nursery was going to be, and figuring out what carseat to buy, and researching daycares, and preschools, and kindergartens. In three minutes, piece of plastic could change the course of their lives so permanently.
An alarm rang quietly from the counter. She stepped forward, silenced it, and grabbed the test. The three minutes of waiting was finally up.
Two lines stared back at her.
Samira blinked once. Twice. Rubbed her eyes trying to make sure she wasn't just seeing things. But the lines remained. The test line was light but she could see it without squinting. Somehow, light as they were, the lines blinded her, burning a hole in her retinas. She put her hands against the counter and took a couple of deep breaths, trying not to fall over. She looked up and her jaw dropped as she grabbed the test again, a hand coming to clamp over her mouth. “No fucking way...” she whispered to herself, finding her body again. Picking up the other two tests and looking them over. Two lines. And another two lines. Every emotion processed at once. The anxiety melting into something more pleasant. Something that edged on hope.
She was trying her best to be quiet with Jack sleeping in the next room but she couldn't hold it in. “No fucking WAY!” Her voice was much louder than she intended, especially with the echo of the tile floors. As hard as she tried to keep it in, a small squeal escaped her throat.
Jack was up in a second, sitting up straight in bed, “-Mira?” He called out, immediately on high alert, his voice still rough from sleep.
“Jack!” Her voice was a little more watery than she expected. “Can you come here?”
Jack pulls himself out of bed and grabs his crutch, a rough acknowledgement leaving his throat, following her voice into the bathroom as quickly as he can. She'd hoped she hid the tears in her voice but the concern etched in his face as he stumbled into the bathroom showed that he heard them.
“What is it? Are you okay? What-” He stopped, recognizing the white stick with a pink cap in the firm grasp of her hand as she spun around, shaking slightly, and the look of shock -- possibly... hope? -- on her face. “Samira...”
She laughed softly, recognizing that he was so worried about her. “I'm sorry for waking you up, but I really didn't expect it to be positive.”
“You should definitely wake me up for this,” he said, taking the test and examining it with awe. The two pink lines in the window sucking the air from his lungs. He looks up at her, “this is real, though? I'm not dreaming.”
She confirms with a quick nod, the smallest sound of affirmation leaving her throat. As worried as she was a few minutes ago, she couldn't stop smiling.
She was always glowing but right now she was ethereal to him. She was having his baby. They were creating a life together. An image of a girl, a mini-Samira, flashes through his mind. Perfect dark curls bouncing, dimples on her cheeks. He couldn't help but picture this perfect little girl. He steps back from the tight hug he'd pulled her in. His eyes trace over her, “are you okay? I mean, how do you- you're okay?”
She nods, wiping the tears from her eyes, “I'm okay. I was scared shitless and then it was positive and I just- I don't know. I'm excited. Are you- I know we weren't exactly trying...”
“We weren't not trying.”
She scrunches her nose up at him, “fair point.”
She can't hold it back anymore, coming closer and kissing him quickly a few times. She'd known something was off when the smell of the emergency room nauseated her yesterday during her shift and she could smell the stale food in the fridge with the door closed. She'd half convinced herself she'd gained superpowers but it was only to smell stuff. Right now that ‘stuff’ was Jack’s morning breath. She backed up, holding back the urge to gag, “I'm sorry. I love you so much but you have to brush your teeth before I can kiss you.”
Jack laughed softly, but moved to grab his toothbrush, he was smart enough not to piss off his wife 30 seconds into pregnancy. He grabbed her around her waist, pulling him into her side. Samira watched him in the mirror as he brushed his teeth. She watched him stare back at her like she hung the moon. Like she’d given him everything. Like she personally turned his whole world. She couldn’t help but lean into him, head rested back on his collarbone. Arms encircling his body. As peaceful and blissful as the moment was, there was some amount of bittersweetness in adjustment. Enough medically supported fear, that it soured the moment at the edges. Like a milk jug a day from expiration. The milk inside was fine. Perfectly normal and acceptable to drink, but old milk had dried and curdled around the edges. A sour smell lingering from the rim.
“I'm scared, Jack.” Samira admits softly, though the harshness of the echoing tile room amplified her voice. No amount of rugs and towels absorbed the sound enough. Jack knew Samira well enough that this news wouldn’t come without some reality breaking conversation. He could hear her think. Her thoughts had never been quiet. Every emotion she had was visible on her face.
He spit the toothpaste from his mouth, “you don't get scared.”
He counters, much more confident than what she had met him with. He didn’t want to downplay her emotions. She was entitled to feel however she felt. He’d seen her in times of fear. Before, during, and after PittFest. She’d put her head down. She knew how to get to work when the fear came to her work. She was focused. Driven. Calculated. Every move she made was thought out. She was quick on her feet when she needed to be. Daring and willing to take the risk in order to save someone’s life. But when it all slowed down, when she was able to truly process she could mull for hours. She weighed the pros and the cons heavily. She could debate herself into a hole. There was a beauty in the way her mind worked. There was strength in her care. There was kindness and compassion like he’d never seen. He just wished she was able to extend the same grace to herself. To give herself the space to feel what she needed to without having to put it into work.
Samira gives him a weak laugh, mostly to signal she understood. He lets a moment of silence pass between them. It was heavy but peaceful. They found comfort in the silence. “What are you scared of?”
Samira huffs, blowing the air through her lips. She shakes her head softly as she looks for the answer. She's not sure she can pinpoint just one, “everything?”
“Can we start with one thing?”
Samira silently curses the amount of therapy he's been to. Unfortunately, once you learn them, the coping mechanisms spread to those you love. Samira always avoided talk therapy. She didn't feel the need to lay her heart bare for a stranger. She didn't see the use in unpacking all the trauma that she had stored neatly away in well labeled boxes in the storage closet of her mind even if she did now have to slam the door shut to prevent things from falling out. She'd packed everything there on purpose. Getting it out would just make a mess. She continued to beat the topple.
Jack, though, saw his therapist weekly. He seemed to like it. Having somewhere to vent all of his trauma. To put all of his bad emotions and then work on overcoming them. He learned coping mechanisms and ways to not just file his feelings away into already overflowing boxes. Apparently it worked better if you displayed them on a shelf, got rid of the bad parts and kept the memories in a way that didn't overflow storage totes and cardboard boxes. If you got rid of some of the baggage, the door closed just fine. You didn’t have to slam the door, not taking the risk to open it again for the fear of something falling out. If something feel, he could pick it back up and put it where it belonged.
The therapy also meant he knew the right questions to ask to get her talking.
“Bringing a baby into this world is... terrifying,” she shrugged, shaking her head. It was a start.
He makes a sound, something of agreement. A signal to keep going.
“The world sucks. Women’s rights are being taken away every day.” She pulls herself upright and steps away from him, giving herself a chance to physically move through the muck in her mind. “This... baby has more rights than me right now. I mean, what if something goes wrong?”
He wants to tell her not to think like that. That everything will go well and she will have an easy pregnancy but he knew better than that. He knew that there was no guarantee this would be smooth sailing for her. There was no guarantee she wouldn't miscarry tomorrow. Even thinking about it made him squirm.
“The tests are great. They’re accurate. They’re... all positive. But we haven’t gotten it confirmed yet and still 1 in 4 pregnancies ends in miscarriage. What if it's ectopic, or a molar pregnancy, or I have an incomplete miscarriage and everyone is too scared of losing their medical license to do anything about it?” She rattles off possibilities as they swirl through her mind. “I could die, Jack.”
“You won't die, Samira.”
The chance was low, but non-zero. Close to non-zero but still not. The thought made him nauseous. He leaned back against the countertop.
She mulls over the thought for a moment, toying with her fingers. She pressed her teeth into the inside of her lip. It clicked as she opened her mouth. “Are we crazy? Doing this? Bringing a baby into a collapsing society? Into this racist, sexist world?”
“Samira...”
“I'm sorry. I know. This is all irrational. I just spend all day dealing with birth emergencies. Especially from people who absolutely refuse to listen to medical professionals. I have a sampling bias, I think.”
“Most pregnancies go full term, they're healthy. You have no reason to believe that won't be you.”
Samira bites her tongue, holding back the facts and statistics about brown women more likely to die childbirth or from pregnancy complications. The rate is lower than black women but there's a clear disparity. Unfortunately, she knew so in too much detail. She'd set out during her fellowship to look into the maternal mortality crisis. To develop more culturally sensitive obstetric and gynecological care for people in general. She knew Jack knew all this and he was trying to make her feel better. Ultimately, he was right. She was fairly young. She was healthy. She'd never really had any hormonal or gynecological issues before. Nothing that would affect her pregnancy. And Pennsylvania wasn't actively preventing doctors from performing medically necessary abortions. This didn't mean it wasn't scary. It didn't mean that the thought didn't haunt her as she worked through her day to day.
“People don't just... come into the world not trusting their doctors. That's built. And maybe nobody harmed them directly but someone harmed their mom, or their sister, or their aunt, and now people are scared. And that fear becomes generational. They just want what they think is best for them and their baby. And when it seems like everyone is out to get them... or they think none is on their side because no one in their medical team looks like them, what are they supposed to think?” Samira rambles on. This might not even be about her or her pregnancy anymore. This is about everything else. The system as a whole that keeps women vulnerable.
“I know you're scared, Samira.” He reaches forward and pulls her close, rubbing up and down on her arms. Stroking them softly. He rests his head on her shoulder. “It's okay that you're scared. It's good that you're scared. The anxiety is normal. But you've got a whole team of people looking out for you. You and this baby are protected."
Somehow, that was helpful. Just knowing that she wasn't losing her mind even though it kind of felt like she was. The anxiety was persistent. She’d felt it for days and didn’t have anywhere to put. It had been festering. Itching to come out and now she had a place to put it. To keep it at bay somewhere that wasn’t all in her brain.
“Please don't let me die.”
Jack’s arms tighten around her. He didn’t even want to consider the possibility of a complication. For either of them. He knew it was his own mental turmoil but the thought of losing her was almost too much to bear. He put his head on her shoulder for a moment, a quiet fall between them. The sound of their breathing settling in the room. He placed a kiss against her shoulder. A silent promise that he would be on her side through it all. That he wouldn't let her out of his sight. That he'd protect her as much as he could. That she'd never be alone. He couldn't predict the future. He couldn't promise it would all be complication free. But he could promise that he'd be there. He'd show up. And he’d do anything to keep her safe.