One For My Baby

* This story follows ‘Love’s Light Wings’. It is set approximately three days after the close of that story.

* The characters are not mine. They belong to Constant-C, Warner Brothers, etc… I do this for fun and gain no money from it.

* The song featured is ‘The Sweetest Thing’ by U2. It is taken from their Best Of 1980-1990 album.

*Thank you as always to my editors, Cari and Emily. Your inspiration and time are invaluable.

* Thank you to everyone who reads my stories. I’m glad you enjoy my little hobby!

****

One for My Baby
By Jo 
dynamojo26@hotmail.com 

My love she throws me like a rubber ball

Oh, oh, the sweetest thing

But she won’t catch me, or break my fall

Oh, oh, the sweetest thing

Baby’s got blue skies up ahead

But in this I’m a raincloud

You know she wants a dry kind of love

Oh, oh, the sweetest thing

****

‘Doug… what are you cooking in there? It stinks…" Carol exclaimed as she wandered into the kitchen, her face contorted, holding her breath. It was early on Wednesday morning, and they were taking things slowly after the flight from Chicago the previous day. With the girls playing happily on the rug in the living room, Carol had decided to find out what the strong smell was that was turning her stomach. He looked around from the stove, a frying pan in one hand and a spatula in the other.

"Bacon and eggs. Why?" She strode over to the window and flung it open, taking in a deep breath of the fresh air.

"It smells real bad…" He chuckled,

"Ah, well I guess you won’t wanna eat it then…" She went over to him, braving the smell and watched for a moment as he finished scrambling the egg.

"Was it for me?" she asked, feeling a little guilty for her outspokenness. She put her hands on his waist.

"It was breakfast," he said, turning the heat off and scraping the scrambled eggs into a cereal bowl. "I thought you liked bacon and eggs?"

"I do… but I’m not very hungry this morning. I think I’ll just have some juice…" She opened the door of the refrigerator and took out a carton of orange juice. She flipped open the top and took a swig, leaning on the refrigerator door.

"You really should eat something, Carol…" he murmured, picking the bacon up with his fingers and juggling it onto a plate. "You haven’t had anything much for the last couple of days."

"I know," she replied, turning away from him and pushing the refrigerator shut. "I just haven’t felt like eating. I’ve been too tired."

Doug took the food to the table and began sandwiching a couple of slices of bacon between two pieces of toast. He looked up at her closely, "You sure there’s not something wrong?"

"Nah, I’m fine," she dismissed. "It’s just all the travelling and the excitement. It’s knocked me about a bit." She smiled at him, conscious of his concern. "I’ll be fine in a few days." He nodded,

"Okay, well, if you’re sure…"

She nodded, and he left it alone, knowing it was better that way. She took another swig from the juice carton, then sat down at the table with it, watching as he bit into his sandwich. "What do you want to do today?" she asked.

"I hadn’t really thought of anything…" he answered. "We could stick around here, or take the girls out somewhere…? What do you wanna do?"

She shrugged her shoulders. "I thought we could just stay in. I mean, you’re back at work tomorrow, so I figured you’d want to stay home." He nodded.

"Yeah, that’s okay. We could get the painting done in the spare room… The paint’s been sat around for a while now…" He took another mouthful, then remembered, "Oh, but I’ve gotta go into work later on… pick up the mail and stuff..."

"Stuff…?" Carol looked up with raised eyebrows.

"I told Cindy I’d be at the office, so I don’t know if she’s booked any appointments or not, but I doubt it," he explained, glancing over to her. "I know it’s not perfect, but I’d rather get as much as I can done today so I can start off on a clean sheet tomorrow. There’s gonna be a mountain of paperwork to deal with."

"Yeah… well, that’s okay," She was silently disappointed. With no honeymoon to savour, it felt as if their introduction to married life was just a continuation to the old routine, with work once again taking over Doug’s time. Trying to hide her disappointment, she took another drink of juice and then added with a game smile, "These things have to be done. The girls’ll keep me busy…"

"Sorry, kiddo…" He said, reaching out for her hand and giving it a gentle squeeze. "I’ll try not to be long."

"Yeah,"

They stared at each other, until the moment was broken by the sound of Tess beginning to cry in the living room. "I’ll get her," Carol said quickly, rising to her feet and heading out of the room. Doug listened to her talking to the girls and the sounds of Tess’s howling diminish, hoping he’d not angered her. Recently, she’d been uncharacteristically quick-tempered, jumping to conclusions about small things she wouldn’t normally have cared about, but he had put it down to the upheaval of the wedding and her mother’s accident. He didn’t want to start an argument for the sake of checking his mail. Just as he was getting up to put the plates in the dishwasher, she returned with a baby on each hip. "I was thinking, Doug, are we gonna get somewhere booked for a honeymoon?" He frowned lightly,

"Yeah, sure we are. I just can’t take any more time off work at the moment… Things are stacked up enough as it is. Maybe in a couple of weeks…"

"I know that," she said. "I just thought we could look at some brochures, you know, think about where we’d like to go before we make any plans." He nodded.

"Sure… Why don’t you go down the travel agents later on? If you drop me off at the hospital, I can let you have the car and you can pick me up on your way back." She raised her eyebrows, mildly surprised by his suggestion.

"You don’t mind?"

"Nah… You go ahead."

"Okay, then…" she agreed happily, glad of the distraction.

****

I’m losing you

I’m losing you

In love the sweetest thing

****

They packed up the Jeep, strapping the girls into their car seats. "I got the door, Carol…" Doug shouted as she started back towards the house. He jogged outside, his briefcase under one arm and his jacket over his shoulder. "Have you got the stroller?"

"Yeah, all ready…" she called back. He threw his briefcase into the trunk, then climbed into the passenger seat. Carol started up the engine and slowly reversed out of the drive. "So, anywhere you don’t want to go to?" she asked once they’d got on the move.

He glanced sideways at her, grinning. "Nowhere cold,"

"Well, sure, I wasn’t gonna suggest Alaska," she chuckled. "Somewhere we’ve been before? Or somewhere new?"

"Somewhere new…" he answered with a smile. "Makes it special then."

"Okay…" She negotiated the intersection and headed off along the road that led to the hospital. "It’s funny, but all this doesn’t feel any different to before we got married…" she said after a moment of silence. He turned and chuckled,

"No, I suppose it doesn’t…" He paused. "Not what you were expecting?"

"I didn’t say that," she shook her head. "It’s just… I don’t know… back to the old routine."

"I’m sorry about having to go into work…" He paused. "It’s just that time’s ticking on, and people are starting to get pissy that I haven’t been available."

"It’s okay, Doug…" Carol smiled. "I know you’ve got your commitments." He stared at her for a moment, wondering if she was as okay as she was making out.

As they pulled into the hospital parking lot, Carol let the engine run while she waited for him to get out. "Hope there’s not too much for you to do," she sympathised, as he juggled himself, his coat and his briefcase onto the concrete. He paused and gazed at her for a moment,

"Yeah… So do I…" He leaned through the open window and kissed her lightly on the lips. "Drive carefully…"

"Always… See you later."

He grinned, "Find us a four star hotel with room service, and I’ll romance you till you want me to go back to work to get rid of me," he teased, turning around and giving her a wave as she edged the car forwards and headed off into the city.

The traffic in the city centre was busy, but she managed to park the car on the roadside a half a block away from the travel agents. It was nice to be out shopping, even with the girls in tow, and she took her time wandering along the street, gazing into the shop windows. An expensive baby boutique drew her eye and she stood outside for a moment, staring at the pretty cotton smocked dresses, the tiny dungarees, embroidered t-shirts and broad-brimmed sunhats, all displayed in a summer window collection. Hardly daring to imagine how expensive the items would be, she self-consciously walked inside, hauling the stroller over the step, enchanted with the beautiful clothes.

She bought most of the girls’s stuff from the high street, but the clothes in this shop were in a different league altogether. She fingered the edge of a pastel-coloured sundress dreamily. "Can I help you?" Spinning around, Carol quickly took her hand away as if she’d been caught stealing, and saw a red-haired shop assistant, dressed as immaculately as one would assume an assistant from a designer baby boutique to dress. "That outfit has a matching sunhat, if you’d like to see it?" she added, smiling graciously.

Carol, relaxing a little, smiled back and picked up the dress again. "It is very beautiful," she murmured, holding it up against Tess as she sat in the stroller. "How much is it?"

"It’s $39.99 for the dress, and the hat is $10…" The assistant turned around and picked up the hat from the head of an arty wooden mannequin in the window display. "This is the hat…"

Carol took it and dropped it onto Tess’s head, grinning with delight at how the colour suited her eldest. Slowly, she came back to her senses; the girls were growing so fast these days that their clothes barely lasted a couple of months before they became too tight or too short and thirty-nine dollars was a lot of money to spend on one dress alone. But that didn’t lessen the appeal. "These are your daughters, then?" the assistant asked, smiling at Kate and Tess.

"They’re twins, yeah…"

"Oh, goodness, twin girls… You must have your hands full with them…"

She glanced up. "I don’t have enough hands," she smiled. "Do you have anything a little less expensive? It’s just that they’re growing so fast."

"Oh, they do at this adorable age! I bet you’re already looking back on their tiny clothes and wondering how they ever fitted in them." The assistant headed to the back of the store. "We’ve actually got a little bit of a sale going on at the moment. It’s only Baby Dior items, but you might find something you like on that rack…" She pointed to a rail of tiny clothes. "Like this, for example, isn’t this adorable?"

She held up a bright pink sundress with a hot-air balloon stitched onto the chest. Carol took the dress from her and smiled, "It’s beautiful… oh, and there’s little people in the balloon!" Studying the motif, she was instantly smitten. "Do you have anything similar?"

"This one is a little less expensive than the hot-air balloon one," said the assistant, and pulled another sundress from the rail, this time violet in colour, with holographic bubbles floating up from the bottom of the skirt to the right shoulder. "The bubbles catch the light differently. And the stitching is silvery…" Carol slowly took the dress and smoothed out the full skirt.

"How much would they be together?" she heard herself say.

"Just a moment, and I’ll work it out…" The assistant took out a pocket calculator from her suit jacket and started tapping in numbers. "For the two dresses, it would be $55."

"Oh, man…" Carol moaned. She held the dresses up against Kate and Tess, who compliantly grinned toothily back at her. It was an agonising decision. She knew there was more than enough money in the joint account, but she always felt guilty using that money, knowing she had not contributed to it. "They look fantastic..." The assistant smiled politely.

"They are timeless pieces…" she said quietly. A pause passed between them as Carol wrangled with the cost and the thought of her daughters in clothes such as they had never had. "I can take another ten percent off the total price, but no more, I’m afraid." Carol looked up, then back at the dresses.

"I’ll take them…" she said quickly and handed them over, feeling a rush of excitement shoot through her.

****

After spending so long in the boutique, she barely had any time left to pick over the brochures in the travel agents, so she simply gathered up as many as she could carry and headed back to the car, hoping there would be no ticket. Breathing thankfully, she was glad to see the windshield bare. "That’s a relief, isn’t it, sweethearts?" she playfully said to Tess as she loaded her back into the car and strapped her up. "Daddy wouldn’t be too impressed with a parking ticket, hmm?" Tess gurgled at her. "I think we should call Daddy and get him to meet us at the door," she said, loading Kate up as well. "Then you can surprise him with your pretty dresses…"

She jumped inside and took out her cellphone from her bag and dialled Doug’s office number. Aware that Cindy wasn’t at work to answer his telephone for him, she let it ring for a longer time than she would normally. Suddenly, he picked up, his voice sounding tense and agitated, "Yes? This is Doctor Ross speaking,"

"It’s me."

There was a pause, and he cleared his throat quietly. "Yeah? Er… what’s the problem?"

"There isn’t a problem," Carol said cheerily. "I’ve just been shopping and I bought some great stuff for the girls…"

"Okay…"

"And, well, I thought you could meet me in the ER and then I could come up and see your office…"

There was another, slightly longer pause, and then he replied slowly and carefully, "Carol, I’m actually with the Chief of Staff, Councillor Griffin and the Under-Secretary of the AMA at the moment."

"Oh," Carol took in a sharp breath and cursed herself silently. "Oh, I’m sorry… I, I didn’t know…"

"That’s okay… Can you find your own way up?"

"Yeah, yeah, sure I can… Sorry for interrupting… Bye…" She hung up quickly, and threw her head back against the headrest, feeling foolish. He’d mentioned that he might have had appointments this morning, and that Cindy wasn’t around, but in her excitement, she’d forgotten it all. It was so easy to think that just because she wasn’t busy, he wouldn’t be either.

The bubble burst, she drove back to the hospital, taking her time. The roads were quieter, now that the morning traffic had settled down, but she was in no hurry to arrive directly. Once she had parked the car in the lot, she put the girls in their stroller and headed for the ER, instinctively thinking that she might be able to find her way better from there.

She quickly discovered her intuition to be wrong. This emergency department was set out completely differently to Cook County, and she found herself walking the corridors hopelessly, scanning the walls for some signs to show her the right direction. She didn’t even really know what Doug’s department would be called. Administration? Management? Just as she was about to board an elevator and try again from another floor, a polite voice sounding rather like John Carter’s came from behind her, "Are you lost?"

Turning around, Carol was met by a tall, dark-haired and bespectacled doctor in navy blue scrubs. "Yeah… I’m looking for Doug Ross’s office…" she said. He was probably about six foot four, and she found herself craning her neck to look him in the face.

"He’s on the third floor." He glanced at Tess and Kate, then at her shopping bags and the brochures tucked under her arm. "Do you have an appointment?" Carol smiled,

"Not as such, no…"

"Oh, well, you should really call beforehand," he said. "Doug’s not so hot on people calling in uninvited."

"I’m his wife…" Carol said, trying not to laugh. The doctor in front of her blinked in surprise, and Carol noticed how blue his eyes were, even behind his glasses.

"God, I’m sorry, I didn’t realise." He gave her a wide amused grin. "You must be Carol, then?" She frowned,

"How do you know my name?"

"Word gets around," he teased. "I’m Joe Angelis… Doug’s friend…" He held out his hand. "Great to meet you."

Carol took his hand and shook it, seeing that his wedding band was on the wrong hand. "Follow me and I’ll take you up if you like?"

"That’d be great…" she replied.

"Okay. Let me take some of these bags of you…" He took the bags and brochures ably and then started along the corridor, fielding off a couple of patients as he walked, calling out a sarcastic greeting to a fellow doctor and dodging a gurney.

"He’s talked about you," Carol said as they walked into the elevator.

"What has he told you?" Joe asked suspiciously.

Carol chuckled, "That you’d give me a job when I wanted to come back to nursing…" He turned in mid-stride and grinned at her,

"Oh, well, it’s funny you should mention that, but I was actually going to give you a call tonight." Carol looked up in surprise.

"Really?"

"Yeah… One of our staff, Lucy Rhodes, I don’t know if you’ve met her… she’s leaving us for a couple of months to have a baby and I’ve been searching around for someone to cover her shifts. It’s nothing permanent, I’m afraid," he added. "And she was only a part-timer, but if you don’t mind punching the clock, I’d love to take you on…"

Carol blinked, taken aback by the sudden and unexpected offer. She hadn’t intended to start back at work so soon, but the deal was almost too good to believe. Part-time work would be perfect, as she’d still have plenty of time with the girls when she got home, but it would still be enough to keep her from boredom given Doug’s apparently chaotic schedule, not to mention start up the cash flow again. "I’d love to help you out. Thank you very much, Joe…"

"Not a problem," he smiled. "You’re not bothered about losing the authority?"

"I wanna get as far away from the authority as I can," Carol asserted. "I’ve had enough of playing the bad-guy…" Joe laughed.

"You get hung for everything when you’re the boss, huh?"

The elevator ascended through three floors and then the doors opened out onto a wide corridor. "If you keep going down there, and take the first turning on your right, his secretary’s door is the fourth on the left. Just go straight through and you’ll probably find him sat behind his big desk, drinking coffee..." Carol chuckled.

"I think he’s had a busy morning, this morning,"

"That’s what they all say…" Joe joked. "Now, about the job. I’ll figure out those shifts out for you and then give you a call later in the week."

"Thanks, Joe…" Carol smiled, and started down the corridor. She found the closed door he had pointed to and gently opened it onto what was clearly Cindy’s office. There was a small desk, with a closed laptop, pens in a holder shaped like a milk churn, a purple chrysanthemum plant and photographs of Hannah and Robbie atop it. The top drawer of one of the filing cabinets was open, and someone had been leafing through the folders inside. "Hey, Doug… I’m back…"

"Come on through…" came his voice from the adjoining room. She smiled and pushed the stroller through the half open door. He was standing behind his desk, looking very professional, but utterly besieged. His office was disordered without being untidy, his customary piles of papers in various positions around the room and the desk in front of him cluttered with accumulated mail and assorted box files. The twins squealed when they saw who it was, and Doug descended on them with a relieved grin,

"Hey there, sweethearts…" He greeted them with a delighted chuckle for their reaction, and gathered Tess up, kissing the top of her head again and again.

"Have you been good girls for Mommy?"

"They’ve been good girls…" she confirmed, bending down to unstrap and pick up Kate. "Sorry about interrupting your meeting," Carol said quietly after a moment. Doug looked up from fussing with Tess and replied,

"Hey no, Carol, don’t apologise. It was great to hear something other than total bureaucracy. Even if it was only for a couple of minutes." He was smoothing Tess’s soft, brown hair as she cuddled against his chest and Carol found herself smiling sympathetically.

"Bad meeting?" she asked, as he stepped back behind the desk.

He sighed heavily. "It’s that asshole Moro," Doug cursed in a frustrated voice. "Nothing makes him happy. He’s dedicated to being unhappy and to spreading that unhappiness wherever he goes." He slapped a bunch of papers down on the desk. "And now I can’t find the damned piece of paper he wants to see before he goes home at one…"

Carol made an understanding face and moved around to gently massage his neck. "I guess you should’ve stayed at home, then…" He rolled his head and closed his eyes,

"Would I have gotten this at home, though?" he teased, leaning over and kissing her gently. "You’ve been shopping," he added, noticing the bags.

"Yeah, look what I bought them," Immediately remembering her excitement, Carol set Kate down, then pulled out the dresses and held them up. "Aren’t they gorgeous?" Tess’s hand stuck out and grabbed the hot-air balloon dress.

"You’re staking your claim already, huh, Mischief?" chuckled Doug, then added, "Very nice,"

"Yeah, I thought so," Carol said proudly, folding them up, and then putting them back in the bag. "Oh, and…" she grinned. "I have a job." Doug raised his eyebrows and tilted his head.

"You have?"

"Yeah… I ran into Joe Angelis on the way up, and he has someone going on maternity leave for a couple of months and thought I could cover for him."

Doug smiled tolerantly at her, seeing the enthusiasm on her face, "And I guess you’re gonna take it?"

"I think so, yeah," she said. "I mean, it’s only part-time, and it won’t be for long… but well, I know this sounds a bit dumb, but I’m missing it…" she admitted, shrugging her shoulders. He chuckled, mildly incredulous.

"Missing it?"

"Don’t sound so surprised, Doug," she admonished half-heartedly. "I love my job… and with you working so hard and me just sitting at home…" She gave a small, wry smile. "I feel like the draggy other half."

"Carol, you are anything but draggy…" he chastised her, setting Tess down on the floor and then coming up to face her, looking closely in her eyes. "Are you sure about this?" he asked, carefully.

"I want to do this, Doug," she asserted. "I’m practically crawling up the walls at home on my own. If I don’t get out and do something, I might just go mad." He nodded.

"Sure… well, if it’s what you want, then it’s okay with me…" Carol stood on her tip-toes and kissed him, happy that he had agreed.

"Anyway, how you doing? Have you gotten everything done you wanted to?" she asked, turning away and wandering around the room slowly, picking up odd bits and pieces of interest as she went.

"Almost," he answered. "I just gotta find this document and then we can go. I’m gonna run down to the desk and see if they got it." He headed for the door. "If the phone rings in Cindy’s room, just leave it, cos it’ll be Brian Moro asking me to do something for him."

"Sure," she said, raising her eyebrow at him. "Do you want me to look for that document here?"

"You can try, but I already dumped the desk out once… It’s thin, about five or six pages of A4 stapled together. And I know it’s got a coffee ring mark on the front page."

Once he had gone, Carol went to the big, dark wood desk and sat down in the chair, spinning it around a couple of times. The surface was cluttered with a number of files and sheets of paper, none of them with coffee rings, plus the opened mail he’d picked up. She flicked through it out of interest, but most of it seemed business based and utterly incomprehensible, apart from a postcard from Italy from a couple she did not know, and a drug catalogue.

She slid open the top drawer to its furthest reach and started to slowly work her way through the papers and folders there. As she was nearing the bottom of the drawer, the fax machine gave a whirr and a grunt. She span around, but immediately realised what it was and hoped that nobody had seen her react so suddenly. Paper started to feed its way into the machine, and then appeared on the other side with something handwritten on it.

Her curiosity piqued, Carol slowly rose to her feet. She went to the fax and tore off the piece of paper. It was a scrawled note in a female hand that read ‘Who needs you, Doug, when $14.50 plus P&P will buy us one of these’, on top of an advert for a 10 inch vibrator.

Carol stared at the fax. Just as she was reaching to put the piece of paper down again, the door swung open and Doug walked in. "Hey…"

"The fax has a message for you…" she said neutrally. He flicked his head,

"Oh… thanks…" He wandered over to the machine casually and picked up the message. His eyebrows rose and a slow, crooked smile crossed his lips. "Very good, girls," He chuckled, glancing up and smiling at Carol. "You read this?" he asked, holding out the fax. Carol’s face was blank, and she walked smartly over to pick up Kate from the floor. "Hey, what’s the matter?" he asked, following her.

"I’m fine…"

Doug suddenly clicked. "It’s only a joke, Carol… It’s from Libby and Nicole at the desk… I was just joking around with them now… This is their comeback." He looked at her closely. "Carol, you don’t think…?"

"No, no, I’m fine, Doug, honestly… I don’t know what you were doing, but…" She shrugged her shoulders and started tending to Kate, wiping the dribble from her chin. Doug sighed, and dropped the fax onto the desk.

"What’s the matter with you at the moment?" he said, his voice conveying more than a little irritation.

"Nothing’s the matter…"

"Well what is it, then? One minute you’re fine and the next you’re snapping at me and flying off the handle about a stupid joke the girls at the desk were playing with me." He frowned. "You’ve been like this since we left Chicago…" Carol bristled at his tone, glaring at him.

"I don’t know where you’ve gotten that idea from. I’ve been fine."

He was silent for a moment, studying her as she fussed with Kate, seeing how she didn’t meet his eyes. Slowly, he walked over to her and tugged her chin up. "I thought we weren’t doing this anymore…" he said quietly.

"Doing what?"

"This…" She shook her head. "There’s something wrong, isn’t there? There’s something you’re not telling me?"

"Will you just leave it, Doug? There’s nothing wrong. I’ve been a bit off colour for a couple of days, but it’s nothing… probably just a bug…"

"A bug?"

"Yeah…"

"Maybe you should go see a doctor if that’s what you think…" he suggested. "Get yourself checked out."

"Doug, I’m fine," she repeated firmly. "Now, are you finished?" He stared at her, wondering what was going on. He’d known her for far too long to buy into the ‘I’m fine’ speech. Something wasn’t right, and he knew it.

****

They drove home in near silence to find Cindy’s Ford parked in the driveway, it’s engine still crackling. "What’s she doing here?" Doug said, mostly to himself, as he lifted Tess’ car seat out of the rear seat.

They walked around the outside of the house, following the sounds of voices, and found Cindy, Will and the kids sitting around the garden table. "Hey, what you doing back here?" Doug called.

"Just thought we’d drop by and see how you all were…" she smiled. "And ask you if you wanted to do lunch together?"

"Uh-huh, thought there had to be something else going on."

"Why?" Cindy objected playfully.

"Cos there usually is with you…" He grinned at her mock indignation and turned to Will. "Hey, Will, how you doin’?"

"Finding new reasons to love America," Will announced expansively, grinning blissfully. Cindy rolled her eyes tolerantly and explained,

"We went downtown and he met a guy claiming to be Elvis and a bum dressed as Captain Kirk," she eyed him and grinned. "He thinks he’s found his social heaven." Doug chuckled,

"When are you flying back?"

"Friday morning… I’ve got to speak to Dan and get myself a visa before I can start working over here. It’ll take me a while, I think…" Doug nodded.

"Good luck to you, buddy…" he grinned. "Okay, well, as we seem to be eating here, do you wanna crack open some beers?"

"Yeah, sounds like a good idea to me…"

They left together, heading back to the house talking, and Carol sat down. She leaned forward and started to unstrap the girls from their car seats. "How are you?" Cindy asked. "Doug told me you weren’t feeling too great?"

"I’m okay…" she said, looking up with a smile, briefly wondering whether there was anything Doug didn’t tell Cindy. She gently set Tess and Kate down on the grass and kept her eye on them as they started off on their hands and knees like the true crawling pros they had become. "I’ve been better, though."

"Oh?" Cindy turned her head.

"Yeah. I keep telling him there’s nothing wrong, cos I don’t want to worry him, but I haven’t been feeling right since the wedding…" she explained, looking down at her feet.

"Oh, Carol, don’t tell me you’re still hung up on doubts…" Cindy admonished, shaking her head.

"No, no, I don’t have any doubts…" she assured her, smiling. "It’s more like… I dunno… You know when you’ve just had a stomach bug or something, and you feel like there’s something not quite right. I’m tired, but..." She shook her head. "But I don’t know what the problem is… I feel fine otherwise."

"Have you been vomiting?" Cindy asked, her voice taking on a parental concern.

"A couple of times…"

"Well, that’s probably it, then," she said. "These things can effect you differently every time, can’t they?" Cindy gave her a comforting smile. "Don’t worry about it, Carol… it’ll pass…"

"Yeah, I know it will…"

Tess was getting a bit too close to the steps, and Carol quickly grabbed her up, bringing her back over to the table and sitting her on her knee. "I’m gonna have to get him to level those steps," she said off-handedly. "I can just see it when they start walking…"

"Oh, yeah…" Cindy grinned. "Just you wait for that!"

They were quiet for a moment, Carol bouncing Tess on her knee as she wriggled to try and get away. Cindy called out to Hannah not to go too near the edge of the deck, and then turned back. "Carol…?"

"Yeah?"

"You’re not pregnant, are you?"

Carol’s head turned sharply and her eyebrows raised. "God, no…" she laughed off-handedly. "No, there’s not a chance. Why do you say that?"

"Well, it’s just that it all fits… The feeling sick; the tiredness… and Doug said you’d been in a bad mood…"

"Oh, he did, did he?" she smiled. "No, I’m not pregnant, Cindy. I went back on the pill a couple of months ago… there’s no way…" She shook her head. "Besides, I haven’t missed a period…"

Cindy shrugged, "Oh, well, probably not, then…" She frowned and looked away, down the garden to where the lake began. "Probably not…"

****

"See you later, Cin…" Doug called as she reversed the car out of the driveway. "And Will, hope everything comes through for you…"

"Cheers, Doug… Fingers crossed!" Will called out. They all waved as Cindy drove off down the road, sounding her horn briefly when they reached the turning.

"That was nice…" Doug said, turning back to Carol, who was kneeling with the twins, who were standing unsteadily with her support. "Good thing the rain held off." He glanced up at the darkening sky. "I thought it was gonna pour it down."

"Yeah," Carol replied, distractedly. He looked down at her.

"You okay?"

"Yeah, I’m okay…" she said. "Listen, will you take the girls? I just gotta run out for something…"

"What?" He bent down and took Tess and Kate from her, heaving them up onto his hips.

"Oh, just something I forgot to get this morning. I won’t be long…" She smiled back over her shoulder and headed for the car. He nodded, careful not to pursue the matter. She climbed into the car and started the engine. "See you in a few minutes."

She drove down to the road, and then headed left and onto the main road. Doug watched her go, wondering what was so urgent that she needed to leave immediately. In his arms, Kate sighed and he glanced down at her, "What’s wrong with Mommy, Katie?" he asked, but Kate simply stared at him, wordless, and he smiled wryly. "So you’re in on the secret, too, huh?" Shaking his head, he went back inside, hoping it wasn’t anything he’d said or done.

****

Carol stared at the rows of little cardboard boxes on the shelf, studying their blue and pink and white labels. It hadn’t been long since she had purchased a pregnancy test… in fact, it was less than two years ago. But this time, it felt different. Before, in those months of trying before Doug left for Seattle, she’d bought a half a dozen or more tests, desperately hoping after every period that she would see the little stick change colour. Now, she was torn between wanting it to stay the same colour and hoping it wouldn’t.

After the twins had been born, with their complications and the difficult caesarean section, Carol had been warned not to hurry into getting pregnant again. It was too hazardous, McLucas had said. She would risk not only her baby’s life, but also her own. The massive haemorrhaging during Kate’s delivery had left her with a lot of scar tissue, and a lot of weak, thin vessels in her uterus. It was possible that miscarriage would occur. It was possible the baby would be premature. It was possible there would be more complications if she managed to carry to full term, and she could risk losing her womb in the delivery, and possibly her life. There was a list of possible scenarios as long as her arm, ninety percent of them negative.

She slowly reached out and took a package from the shelf and went to the counter. "Hello, there, dear…" said the elderly pharmacist behind the counter. She had begun to talk, but when Carol handed the pregnancy test over, she stopped, silenced by the unspoken rule that said one should maintain a certain discretion when confronted with a customer purchasing a pregnancy test. Instead, she buried her head in the till, and quietly asked for the amount. Carol, grateful for her diplomacy, handed over the cash exactly and hurried out.

Once in the car, she drove home as hastily as possible and entered the house without a sound. She didn’t want Doug to hear that she was back and come asking questions again. She needed to find the answer out herself first.

She crept stealthily upstairs to the bathroom and locked herself in. Her heart was pounding in her chest as she fished the fiddly equipment out of the package. Her hands shook as she took the slim plastic indicator stick out and laid it on the edge of the bath. It was all so familiar, she thought as she peeled the cellophane packaging off from around the stick.

Ignoring the instructions about early morning and midstream, she pulled down her jeans, and then her underwear and positioned herself over the toilet. Trying to steady her hand, she crouched over the seat, feeling the muscles ropey in her thighs. She didn’t need to read any more of the instructions, so often had she done the procedure before.

When she had added the correct amount of urine, she sat down completely on the seat, and held the little stick between her thumb and forefinger and waited.

This test was supposed to take five excruciating minutes before it revealed its result. Carol knew in two. Slowly, before her eyes, the stick changed colour, first it was pale, then it became darker and darker blue. She stared, neither willing nor able to let the news sink in. Confusion rushed through her. How could she have missed it? Sure, her breasts had been sore on occasion, but since the girls had been weaned, that was nothing unusual. And she had been short-tempered, emotional about the stupidest things, but she’d put that down to being tired and all the travelling they’d been doing. She sighed, realising that though she’d seen everything, she had never once connected anything to pregnancy. After spending so much time looking for signs the first time around, how was it possible that she’d missed them all this time?

She was methodically clearing away the used test when she heard Kate begin to cry through the door in the distinctive, hysterical manner she adopted whenever something was really wrong. "Doug!" she called. "Can you get her!?" She stayed still a moment, waiting for the crying to stop as he picked her up, but it did not, and instead rose in pitch. Feeling impulsive anger rising, Carol gave a groan and headed out of the bathroom, throwing the test into the waste bin.

"Doug! Where are you?!"

"I’m here…" came his voice from down the stairs. "I’m just changing Tess’s diaper…" he explained as she marched into the kitchen.

"And can’t you hear your daughter crying?" Carol demanded. Doug turned and stared at her, taken aback by the tone in her voice. "She’s crying for you and you’re not with her."

"Carol…" he began, but she cut him off.

"Where is she?"

"She’s in the playpen…" he said simply, standing back. Carol sighed and stormed out to the living room, where she lifted a red-faced and tearful Kate out of the pen and held her to her chest. "What’s the matter, sweetheart?" she asked, rubbing her back. "Did you hurt yourself?"

Carol started to pace with her daughter, until the crying slowed and then stopped. "Carol… I’m sorry…" Doug apologised from behind her. She turned quickly and looked at him, holding Tess. "I was gonna get her…" He looked very small, and Carol said nothing for a minute, realising she’d snapped at him again. She shook her head at herself,

"No, I’m sorry, Doug… I didn’t mean to yell at you, I…" She slowly set Kate down on the floor and went to him. "You know I said I hadn’t been feeling right?"

"Yeah?"

She smiled widely, feeling an unbidden buzz from within, as she faced him and thought of his reaction to her news. He’d said he wanted another baby all along, and now she could tell him he was going to get the chance. "Well, I found out why…"

"You did?" he frowned. "I thought you said it was a bug?"

"I know I did… but I wasn’t thinking," Her smile was growing ever wider, and she placed her hands on his waist. "I’m pregnant, Doug…"

****

"You’re pregnant?"

"Yeah," Carol turned away, still smiling, laughing slightly in the realisation of her joy. Saying the words had come of some sort of clarifying confirmation of her own feelings, not to mention the delight of being with him this time to tell him and enjoy the moment. "I didn’t even think it could be that… but then Cindy said, and I started thinking…" She paced over to the door and spread her arms wide, elated. "But it’s certain now… we’re gonna have another baby…"

He said nothing, staring at her. She waited for him to say something. "Aren’t you gonna say something?" she prompted, coming over to him again. He frowned and set Tess down on the floor, his mind filling with all the medical reasons for her not to get pregnant again.

"I dunno… er… What am I supposed to say?"

Carol’s face fell and she frowned. "Well, I was expecting a little more enthusiasm than this, I have to admit," she said caustically. "What do you want to say?" Doug swallowed, turning away, feeling a panic mounting in his chest that was making his heart beat wilder with every second,

"We used protection… you, you were on the pill." He stared at her. "You were on the pill, weren’t you, Carol?"

"Of course I was!"

"I, I don’t see how…"

"Oh, Doug, I shouldn’t have to explain the birds and the bees to you! Nothing is one hundred percent effective…" She followed him, coming around to face him again, studying his blank, bewildered face.

"Carol, McLucas said you shouldn’t get pregnant again for a couple of years… she said it was dangerous…"

"I know she did," Carol shrugged her shoulders. "But it’s happened, Doug… and it shouldn’t have done…"

"I know it shouldn’t have done…" He sighed.

"But it has…" Her smile had come back, and Doug was starting to feel guilty for having reacted so rationally. He paused,

"Are you really sure?" he asked after a moment.

"The test was positive…"

"You just took one?"

Carol frowned, "Yeah, of course I did…"

"Maybe you should take another… you know, make it sure…"

"Oh, Doug, why!" Carol admonished, exasperated with his response. She was starting to pace, her face getting slowly black with irritation, and he cautiously backed away. "It all makes sense!" She walked over to him.

"But what about all the risks…?" he asked quietly, meeting her gaze. "After all that happened, and what McLucas told you? Don’t you think it’s a bit crazy to be running headlong into this?"

"Maybe," she allowed, putting her hands on his waist. "But, think about it, Doug… We used protection, we were really careful, but this still happened! Don’t you think that says something?"

"What?" he questioned, staring at her.

"That this is meant to be!" She spread her arms wide in her joy and looked up at the ceiling. "Even after everything we put in it’s way, this baby has still made it… Maybe that’s something we shouldn’t mess with."

"But what about the risks?" he repeated, knowing she wasn’t really listening to him.

"Forget the risks," she asserted. "We’ll deal with them…"

"How, Carol?" he demanded. "How can I let you go through with this when you could die doing it? What am I supposed to do, huh? Stand by and just let you throw caution to the wind just because of some… of some… intuition! Just because you think it’s gonna be okay?" He shook his head. "I can’t do that, Carol."

"But, Doug, what about me? What about what I want?"

"Carol… this is… it’s crazy!" he exclaimed. "What about what I want? What about this baby you’re talking about? What about the girls? What if something goes wrong… where does that leave them? Where does that leave me?" He sighed, reaching for her. He took her by the top of her arms and held her firmly. "Carol, I don’t wanna lose you for the sake of a baby we could try for again in a couple of years time… it’s too big a gamble… And I’m not gonna stand here and feed you false hopes…"

"It’s just hope, Doug…" She stared at him for a long moment, studying his face as if she were searching for something. "You don’t want this baby, do you?" she said, slowly and portentously. He blew out air through his teeth in exasperation.

"I didn’t say that!" he exclaimed.

"You practically did…"

"No, I didn’t…" His voice was rising, even though he was trying to stop it. "Don’t… don’t you see what you’re putting on the line?" She pursed her lips defiantly.

"Of course I do!" she replied sharply. "It’s my body, Doug… but I want this baby. I really want another baby… and if you can’t understand that, then, I dunno… I don’t know what to do about that…" She started to step backwards, away from him.

"Carol, don’t walk away from me…" he warned. She shook her head and quickly gathered Tess up from the floor.

"I’m going for a walk, Doug. I need to get some fresh air."

"Carol…"

"Doug, just leave me alone…" she said, and walked out of the door.

****

I wanted to run but she made me crawl

Oh, oh, the sweetest thing

Eternal fire and she turned me to straw

Oh, oh, the sweetest thing

And now I got black eyes

But they burn so brightly for her

I guess it’s a blind kind of love

Oh, oh, the sweetest thing

****

Cindy was just putting dinner on the table when the doorbell rang. "Coming! Just a minute!" she called out. Hannah and Robbie were sitting at the table, and she hurriedly dumped their chicken nuggets, mashed potatoes and peas down in front of them. "It’s hot, be careful," she warned them, and headed out to get the door.

She fumbled with the latch, and swung open the door to reveal Doug standing drenched on the porch with Kate bundled inside his coat. "Doug, what are you doing here?" she exclaimed. "Come in… You look like a drowned rat… What’s happened?" He shook his head, sending droplets of water spinning to the floor. "Oh, you two haven’t had a fight, have you?" she asked in motherly concern, ushering him inside.

"She’s pregnant…" he said simply as Cindy pulled his wet coat off him and gently pushed him into the living room.

"Carol’s pregnant?" Cindy repeated. "She just told me she wasn’t…"

"I know," Doug shook his head. "She, she didn’t find out until just now. I, oh…" He sighed. "She can’t have this baby, Cin. She…"

"Why not?" Cindy took a seat in the armchair opposite him and leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees in the manner of a calm psychologist.

"Cos of everything that happened before… When, ah, when the girls were born, things didn’t go by the book, and she ended up having a lot of complications." He blinked quickly, putting Kate onto his shoulder and letting her curl up against him. "She almost died… nearly lost her uterus, and her OB told her she shouldn’t get pregnant for a few years, cos it would be potentially very dangerous…"

"Potentially?"

"She could miscarry… or the baby could have problems… or, or worse, she could end up dying. I tried, I tried to tell her all this, but she just walked out. She thinks I don’t want the baby…" He dropped his head, defeatedly. "But I do… I just, I just think it’s too much to risk."

Cindy stared at him, her green eyes wide. "God, I had no idea that all happened," she said, amazedly. "She never said anything."

"She wouldn’t," Doug explained. "I think it was, ah… all a bit too painful… if you know what I mean. And it’s her way of getting a handle on things… I dunno, she thinks that this is some sort of… fate… that she’s gotten pregnant after all this, and all the protection we were using. She thinks everything’s gonna be okay because of this gut feeling she’s got."

Cindy shrugged, "I can see why she would think that…" Doug stared at her, bemused, his head tilting.

"It’s a woman thing, Doug," she smiled enigmatically, her hands spinning loosely around themselves in vain description. "You think you know your body and everything that happens in it, and after a while, you begin to sort of trust it… If you get what I mean…" Doug said nothing, slowly comprehending her.

"But, you can be wrong, right?"

"Of course you can… all the time, but it’s something you can’t fight against. Even if someone’s telling you that it’s wrong, that it’s stupid, if you feel it’s okay, you just can’t help but think it will be." She reached out and gently touched his hand. "If she’s heard all the things you’ve said, she’ll have understood you… she’s just fighting against that feeling inside at the moment."

"I, I know that… but… what can I do to stop her?"

"Probably nothing," Cindy spread her arms. "When a woman gets something into her head, it’s very hard for any man to change that." She grinned. Doug stared at her for a moment, and then chuckled softly,

"I guess you’re right there…"

"I’m always right," Cindy teased. There was a pause, and Doug waited expectantly. "But you want to know what I think you should do, yeah?" she asked, looking at him straight. He was still worried, she could tell from the furrow of his brow and the anxious look in his eyes.

"I can’t let her just put everything on the line like that…" He sighed. "I can’t lose her, Cindy… I love her too much."

"I know you do," she whispered. "But listen to me when I say that there isn’t much chance of you changing her mind. You’ve just gotta lay out all the facts on the table for her and be patient with her. Has she spoken to an obstetrician yet?"

"No, we only just found out…"

"Well, maybe that should be the first port of call…" Cindy explained. "Then she can find out the medical facts as they stand… have somebody completely impartial tell her what the risks are. She might listen, she might not, but either way, you’ll know that you’ve done all you can."

Doug stared, "But what if it’s not enough?"

"Then you’ve just got to stand by her and give her your support. There’s not a lot else you can do." She smiled wryly at him. "Do you want another baby?"

"I want another baby more than anything, Cin…" he admonished, smiling despite himself. "I wanna see it all… see what I missed last time… I wanna go to all the classes and see the scans and… I don’t want to miss a thing." He released a long, pent up sigh. "But I’m so afraid that I might miss it all…"

Cindy gave him a sympathetic smile and took his hand. "Doug, you’re a wonderful guy… you just gotta start and be a bit more positive about this. Think about the good stuff, and try to forget about the bad possibilities… cos at the moment, that’s all they are, possibilities."

He gazed at her, in awe of her rationality. "What do I do?"

"Go home, and be there for her when she’s cooled off. Okay?" She gave his hand a squeeze. "Now, go on… call me when everything’s been worked out…" She pushed him towards the door.

"Thanks, Cindy," he murmured as he stepped outside again, pulling his coat around Kate.

"No problem, Doug… that’s what friends are for…" she smiled. He nodded and smiled back, heading out into the darkening evening.

****

It was almost completely dark when he returned, and the streetlights were flickering on across the neighbourhood. He walked slowly up the drive, seeing the house in darkness and expecting to find the door locked as he’d left it, but it was open. He stepped inside and shut it slowly, listening out for a sound that she was in another room, or upstairs. There was silence. He checked the living room, and the kitchen, and then started up the stairs, leaning in through the open doors of the spare room and the girls’s room, but she was not in either. The door to their bedroom was pushed closed, not quite shut, but pushed against the grain of the too-thick carpet, and low candlelight was filtering through the gap. "Carol?" he called out, softly, hoping she wasn’t asleep and he wouldn’t wake her and her wrath again.

He gently pushed the door open and stepped inside. She was lying on her back on the bed, the curtains still open and lighted candles all around her. She appeared to be asleep, with one hand flung above her head and the other resting lightly on her belly. He stopped for a moment, taken by the scene, and watched in silence, listening to the soft sound of her breathing.

Her head was rolled toward him, her hair strewn out behind her and her face blankly still, shadowed eerily in the flickering candlelight. It took him a few seconds to realise that her eyes were open, and she was staring at him, and his lungs flew into his throat. "We need to talk," he said simply, his voice low. She said nothing, simply staring at him. "I, ah… I’m sorry I yelled at you…" He cleared his throat, feeling oddly nervous. "I was… I didn’t mean to…"

He was finding her impassive gaze disturbing, so he looked away, down to his limp, almost sleeping daughter in his arms. "Carol, I… I don’t want you to do this… I can’t let you put yourself through this, put us through this…" He stalled, feeling self-consciously unsure. Suddenly, she blinked, and then looked at him exactly, her pupils dark pinpricks in eyes awash with fast-gathering tears.

"Doug…" she said softly, "I think you should sleep downstairs tonight…"

He stared, feeling a pain pierce in his chest. There was nothing he could say to that. "Okay…" he managed to murmur. "If that’s what it takes…" He nodded, and walked hesitantly out of the room, taking Kate with him.

****

I’m losing you

Oh, I’m losing you

In love the sweetest thing

Ain’t love the sweetest thing?

****

The sofa was cold, lonely and uncomfortable, but that was not what kept him from sleep. Nor did the sharp moonlight slicing through the room, a white shaft illuminating everything in its path. Or even the lulled sounds of traffic on the main road. He tossed and turned trying to make sense of the thoughts running wild in his head, and ended up lying on his back, staring at the white ceiling, his head supported with his hands. They had been married just four days and they were sleeping apart, in separate sides of the house, a divide between them.

Was he wrong to express his doubts? He didn’t know. He knew there was happiness to be felt, he could sense it bubbling up in his heart. The thought of being a father, a real father, was intoxicating, a dream he wanted to be reality. But each thought was tempered with a bitter little pill. There were so many risks… If he lost her, would he ever be able to forgive himself?

And would he be able to truly support her, knowing the knife-edge they now stood upon? Knowing that he could be holding her hand while she put her life at stake for the sake of a feeling.

He was awed by her certainty. By the faith she had in her own judgement. But it was still something he could barely comprehend.

In the dim of the gathering dawn, he realised that he was willing to try to understand, to try to muster the same blind, unquestionable conviction she had somehow summoned. Carol was right, he realised. It was just hope, after all… and who knew how powerful hope could be…

****

Carol woke as she heard the door brush on the carpet and rolled over in bed to see him in his bathrobe, standing in the door, holding breakfast for her on a tray. "Sorry…" he said quietly, his head hung low, "Can we talk?"

She smiled and sighed at the toast and juice and pulled herself to seated. "I didn’t make bacon and eggs. I didn’t want to make you sick again…" he murmured, gently setting the tray down on the night table.

"You didn’t have to do this…"

"I did," he asserted. "I can’t sleep another night on that sofa…" She chuckled softly, tucking her curls behind her ears and smoothing them down.

"Doug, I’m sorry about what happened yesterday, I, I was shouting, and I wasn’t really listening to you…" He flicked his head. "I know you’re worried, and I know why, but…" She reached out and pulled him towards her. He sat down on the edge of the bed as she scooted along and pulled him next to her. "I really want this baby, Doug. I really, really do…"

"I know…" he murmured, stroking her hair as she rested against his shoulder. "But, let’s not make any decisions just yet." She looked up at him. "We’ve got plenty of time… you can talk to an obstetrician, find out if the danger is something they can deal with, or whether it’s just out of the question." She nodded, smiling at his compromise. "And Carol," he added. "I do want this baby… but I want you as well, and if getting a termination is the difference between losing an unborn baby and losing you, I’d rather lose the baby… I know that sounds kinda crappy, but…"

She smiled, "It’s okay… I understand…" She lifted her face and kissed him. "No decisions yet."

"You’ll book an appointment?"

"I’ll do it this morning…" There was a long moment, filled only by the sound of the girls stirring in the other bedroom on the baby monitor.

"So, what do you think?" she asked, her face a picture of mirth. "A boy this time? That would be nice, wouldn’t it?"

"Happy and healthy will do by me, Carol…" he murmured into her hair. She nodded, quietly accepting his little insecurity. "But a son would be nice…" he concluded, looking down at her. She turned her head and gazed up, smiling broadly.

"You could teach him to play hoops," she said, imagining a littler version of Doug, all wild brown hair and dirty knees, scurrying around the driveway, sending a basketball soaring through the air to his father. Doug chuckled,

"And you could teach him not to be like his father…" Carol grinned,

"Oh, I dunno, Doug… you’re not so bad…" He raised his eyebrows at her in mock indignation, a small sound escaping from his throat. "I have married you after all."

Doug leaned over and kissed her, "And you’re not so bad yourself…" Carol threw her head back in laughter.

"Oh, and here I was thinking the only reason you married me was cos I put out on the first date…" He tilted his head and deadpanned,

"Damnit, my secret’s out…" Carol hit him lightly in the stomach and wrestled him over onto his back.

"You’re gonna pay for that, you know…" she admonished, resting all of her weight on his body, pinning him down. He looked up at her and grinned,

"That’s what I’m counting on."

She opened her mouth in ersatz horror, fighting her smile in vain, and he growled in his throat at her and spun her over, silencing her laughter with a smothering kiss.

****

"Doug… someone called Emilie Jarnet can see us this evening…" Carol called, dropping down the telephone on its hook. "She’s got a clinic until five, but if we get there on time, she can see us after that."

He came through from the kitchen, a cup of coffee in his hand and the newspaper tucked under his arm. He was dressed for work, though his hair was still damp from the shower. "Emilie? That’s quick…"

"I said it was urgent…" She glanced up at him. "That’s okay, isn’t it?" He nodded,

"Sure it is. It’s great… There’s coffee on the counter, by the way, and I’ve just put the girls in the playpen." He collapsed heavily on the sofa, kicked his feet up on the coffee table, adding, "Ten minutes and then I really must go,"

"You’re not gonna be late, are you?" she asked. "I didn’t… er… make you late… did I?" she said wickedly, coming over and straddling his legs. He bobbed his eyebrows at her.

"You know what… the only person who’ll notice I’m late is Cindy, and it’d be pretty hard to pull the wool over her eyes." He chuckled. Carol smiled and stepped aside,

"I think Kate’s teething again," she noted, changing the subject and heading towards the kitchen. "I’ll have to get some gum ointment from the Pharmacy again."

"Try her with some Tylenol. She’s still grumbling in the playpen… I don’t think she’s gonna settle…" Doug called through. Carol returned a second later with her coffee.

"Poor baby," she murmured and sat down again, bringing her coffee cup up to her lips and hanging it there, gently blowing it to cool it down. They were quiet for a few moments, Doug flicking aimlessly through the newspaper.

"Oh, well…" he sighed, and threw the newspaper down. "I guess I better be going…" He stood up and smoothed out his shirt. "Do you wanna meet me for this appointment?"

She nodded, "I don’t want to go on my own…"

"Okay," he agreed. "See if you can get someone to watch the girls…" He headed out of the room and she followed him, waiting while he collected his jacket and briefcase from the kitchen. He opened the door and kissed her, "See you later, then…"

****

It was raining hard when Doug arrived at the hospital, sheets of water pouring out of the sky, drenching him as he sprinted from the parking lot to the ER, the nearest entrance. Once inside he met the familiar controlled chaos of Joe Angelis’s emergency department and smiled. There was something very paradoxical about Joe that meant whenever things were teetering out of control, he was happiest and bizarrely, most in control. It was a trait Doug admired immensely and one he wished he possessed. Thinking of Joe, he suddenly realised he had in him the perfect person to ask for advice from. He ran his hands through his hair to take away some of the water, then headed for the desk.

Suddenly, from down the corridor, he heard Joe’s voice yelling and stopped in his tracks,

"For God’s sake, Campbell, I am not Ricki Lake. Solve your own problems for once in your life." Doug leaned around the dividing wall and looked down the corridor to where Joe had exited an exam room in a flurry, drawing confused looks from the patients in the hallway.

"But…" A rake-thin younger man with a mop of ginger hair followed him out, red faced and embarrassed.

"But nothing," Joe turned and faced him; standing a good half a foot shorter than his younger antagonist, Campbell looked pallid, nervous and frail in comparison to Joe Angelis. "We all know there are certain members of the surgical staff we would all rather be rid of, but the fact is, they’re here, and there isn’t anything we can do about that. If you think they’re taking advantage of you, you gotta stand up on your own two feet and let them know exactly what you think." He took a breath and started down the corridor again. "It’s not gonna do a lot of good coming to me moaning and groaning that you got too much work to do and you’ve not been on a break all day when all I can do is stand there, nod my head and smile sympathetically."

"But, I can’t stand up against them. They’ll report me…"

Joe stopped again and sliced his hands through the air. "Yeah right, and I’m gonna be the next president. They won’t do anything cos all that’ll happen is it’ll come right back to them. Think about it, Campbell, they’ve got everything to lose if they do it that way."

Campbell was about to reply, but shut his mouth slowly without saying anything. "See… when you start thinking about it, it all becomes clearer," Joe continued, his voice growing quiet and more confidential as they neared the desk.

"But why do I feel like I can’t impress them…?" Campbell sighed. Joe strode around to the board and stared at it absently.

"Maybe cos you’re doing exactly what they want you to do. You’re being their scut puppy…" He spread his hands wide. "Sometimes people forget about the little guys, especially when their egos are the size of a small country. It’s your job to get them to notice you again." Campbell stared for a moment,

"But, I… I’m trying, I’m doing everything…" he began, but Joe cut him off.

"Oh, Campbell," he sighed. "You got a lot to learn if you want people to think of you as a miracle worker… So why don’t you go take a break and think about what you’re going to do? Okay?" Campbell nodded, his hair falling in front of his eyes, and scurried away.

"Staff trouble, huh?" Doug greeted. Joe turned around and rolled his eyes.

"If that boy could tie his shoes on his own I’d be seriously surprised," he complained. "It’s like shepherding a ten-year-old." Doug chuckled.

"It’s great being the boss, isn’t it?"

"Oh, it’s like a comic strip." He selected a patient from the board, signed his name up and then went across to the pile of charts. "So, what can I do for you, Doug?"

"Ah, well, it’s about Carol…" Joe looked up.

"What about her?"

"I hear you offered her a job?" Joe’s eyes narrowed.

"And?"

"But you haven’t given her any shifts yet?"

"No, I haven’t had time to do anything. We’re completely swamped." He flicked the front sheet of the chart back and scan read the notes. "Why? She’s still interested, isn’t she?"

"Oh, yeah, she’s pumped…"

There was a little silence as Joe searched in his pocket for a pen. Slowly, Doug came around the desk and nodded his head toward the staff lounge. "Actually, that’s not it, Joe… can we…?" Joe caught his meaning and they slipped inside. Doug waited for the door to close. "We just found out she’s pregnant…"

"Oh, well, congratulations, Doug!" Joe grinned, then teased, "You know, we didn’t doubt your fertility…" Doug laughed.

"I don’t have to prove anything, buddy…" he replied. He sobered, "But there’s a bit of a problem,"

Joe frowned, "A problem?"

"Yeah… She, er… She was pretty beat up with the girls, and things were a little… they were sort of close…" He looked at Joe, hoping he understood without the need for more words. He nodded. "And, and her OB was kinda precise about her getting pregnant again for a while."

"And it’s been less than fourteen months and she’s pregnant, right?"

Doug nodded, looking down at the floor. "I, I’m a bit worried, Joe… I don’t want her to go into this without thinking it through properly, and I don’t think she’s in the right frame of mind to do that."

"She wants the baby…"

"Yeah…"

"I don’t know what to say, Doug…" Joe started, immediately feeling sympathetic. Doug looked up,

"I, I just thought you might be able to help… you know… with what happened with Ali…"

Joe sighed, and leaned back against the sink, crossing his arms in front of him. "I don’t think you should be thinking about Ali at the moment, Doug." He said and glanced down at his wedding band. "She was a special case."

"I know she was… but it was… you guys had to make some decisions didn’t you?"

"Yeah, of course we did, but the difference is, when you think there’s a solution to the problem, it’s not such a big deal. We just talked about it, and decided it was worth the risk." Joe smiled sadly at Doug’s bewildered expression and explained, "We wanted a baby…" he said quietly. "Just like Carol." Doug blinked,

"I don’t know how you can cope with it all now, though… knowing you took a risk like that…" He shook his head.

"I don’t think about it like that. I just think about how unhappy we’d have been if we’d not decided to go for it…"

"But you’re unhappy now…"

"Maybe," Joe said quietly. "But for a while back then, I was exhilaratingly happy…" He swallowed. "That’s how I deal with it, Doug. That’s how I can even get up and come to work in the morning… knowing that she made me happy… Knowing that she was happy…" He smiled, sadness in his slow breaths, herding his emotions silently together. "I wouldn’t change a thing."

Doug was silent, humbled by the force of his words and the strength of his character. Suddenly, Joe’s pager went off, and jolted from his momentary reverie, he fished it out of his pocket and answered it. "It’s the ER," he murmured. "I gotta go, Doug…"

Doug nodded, "Don’t spend your time together playing it safe," Joe added, his hand on the door. "Time passes faster than you think."

****

Five o’clock came quicker than Doug was prepared for, and when Carol walked into his office he wasn’t really ready for what had to be done. They walked in near silence up to the OB Outpatients clinic, but while they walked, he stole sideways glances at her over and over again, searching for something in her face. But she was unreadable. Her face blank, her eyes distant, and her lips thin and pressed together.

They found Emilie Jarnet’s office and for a moment, she paused, taking in a deep breath and steadying herself. "You okay?" he asked, concerned about her abrupt halter. She looked up at him and nodded,

"I’m okay. You?"

"Yeah… Let’s get this over with…"

She put her hand up to the door and knocked. From inside, a woman with a bright, highly educated Canadian accent answered, "Come in! The door’s open!"

Carol slowly pushed open the door. Emilie Jarnet, a moderately built blonde with a freckled button nose and watery blue eyes was standing immediately to the right of the door, leafing through an antique bookcase filled with ancient, discoloured hardbacks. She turned and smiled welcomingly, "Oh, hello, you must be Carol… and Doug, hello there… I didn’t know you were…" Doug smiled,

"Yeah, she’s, er… this is my wife…"

"Ohhh…" Emilie exclaimed, her smile widening. "I heard you were getting married. Congratulations!"

"Thanks," Doug replied. "How was your vacation?"

"Good, thank you, Doug. Italy is such a beautiful country…" Carol immediately remembered the postcard on his desk and connected the two pieces of information. "Have you spoken to Graham?"

"No, not yet… I saw him in the corridor yesterday, but he was heading for the hydro-pool with a patient, and couldn’t stop." Carol stepped aside as Emilie and Doug spoke, shifting over to the plastic chairs gathered around the centrepiece desk. Doug appeared to know most people in the hospital, and it was quite disconcerting to feel at such a disadvantage. They had always known the same people, socialised together and run practically parallel lives; now it was as if she were being introduced to a whole new life he had built without her, and she found herself feeling envious.

"There’s a wonderfully relaxed but effervescent culture," Emilie continued, moving around to sit in her leather seat. "And the food… oh, I think I’ve put on ten pounds in two weeks…" She gave a short, quavering laugh and Doug joined her,

"So much for the diet, then?" he said, his eyes sparkling at her.

"I couldn’t help it," she explained with a hopeless shrug, "I can resist everything except temptation."

"And pizza…?" Doug teased her.

"Yeah… pizza and cheese and wine and those wonderful little amaretti things you get with your coffee… God…" She gave a sigh. "Anyway, enough about my ever expanding waistline, what can I do for you? I gather you have a bit of a dilemma?" She twisted to look at Carol.

"Do you have my notes there?"

"I do, yes…" Emilie glanced over to the computer monitor atop her desk, briefly scrolling down with the roller button on her mouse. "You had birth trauma…" She looked up.

"Yeah, I almost had to have a hysterectomy."

"And now you’re pregnant again?"

Carol nodded, confirming the question. "It wasn’t intentional…" she began, but then stopped herself, wondering why on earth she was offering justification.

"Regardless," Emilie said, professionally ignoring Carol’s momentary embarrassment. "I think we have quite a serious matter on our hands. Carol, have the risks been spelled out to you before?"

"I had been told there could be complications…"

Emilie raised her eyebrows and looked at her directly, "‘Could be’ is rather ambiguous. I would say, based on the condition of your uterus after the second delivery, you are looking at a fifty fifty chance of this foetus even making it to full term."

"Fifty fifty?" Doug started, his eyes wide, staggered by the bleakness of the figures.

"I wouldn’t like to put any better odds on than that, I’m afraid," Emilie explained. "Of course, I’m being brutally honest here, but I would guess that there are a lot of weak vessels in your womb, Carol. There are any number of problems that could result from that condition alone. Antepartum haemorrhage, a breakaway placenta, poor foetal development… the list goes on…" She glanced back at her screen. "And there’s a strong possibility you could miscarry."

Carol stared, nodding slowly. Doug glanced over at her and saw the tiny frown on her forehead. She was absorbing the information but it was not what she had hoped to hear. "What about if you were to examine me? Do some tests and, I dunno, an ultrasound…?"

"I would be only too happy to do that, Carol, but I’m not sure it would make a difference to my assessment…" Emilie shot a quick, vaguely concerned glance toward Doug.

"Is there a high mortality rate with pregnancies like this?" Carol continued,

"To be honest, Carol, I haven’t ever taken on a pregnancy with this high a risk factor involved."

"Not even Alison Angelis…?" Doug questioned suddenly, adjusting his position on his seat. Both Carol and Emilie looked to him sharply,

"Ali wasn’t expected to have as many problems as she did, Doug…" Emilie replied in a low, reverential voice. "But she entered what I call the Helter Skelter. She was high risk, and once one problem showed itself, another quickly followed, and another and so on, until there was nothing we could do."

"Alison Angelis?" Carol asked, "Joe’s wife?" Doug nodded, briefly closing his eyes.

"She died just over a year ago," he explained in a hushed voice. "She had a pre-eclamptic pregnancy…"

Carol was shocked, though she tried not to show it. She glanced down at the floor. "Was there nothing you could do?"

"She’d had a bunch of other problems as well. She was a diabetic with high blood pressure… but we all thought they had it under control, and then she just collapsed one afternoon in the street, started seizing… They lost her and the baby…"

"Oh, God…" she murmured. "I had no idea…" She stopped, stunned into silence. Doug stared at her for a moment, wondering whether the brief moment of veracity had changed her mind. It felt callous to want it to have worked, but right now, he was clutching at straws, and even drawing on the death of a friend’s wife was forgivable, if it meant that Carol realised the repercussions of her gamble.

Everyone was quiet for a long moment, until Emilie spoke up, her voice low, "Carol… You have to decide whether this is worth the risk," she said. "This isn’t your last chance to conceive. You’re only in your early thirties, and given a few more years, your uterus will have had sufficient time to recover, but at the moment, it is a very large, very real risk, and you have to think about that and how it’s going to affect Doug and the rest of your family."

Carol was silent. "I don’t pretend to know the outcome," Emilie continued. "But I have been helping women through their pregnancies now for twenty years… and I have seen plenty of miracles, but also, plenty of disasters. Pregnancy is a risk for a healthy woman, but for someone with your medical history, it’s an even greater risk. I think you have to go away now and sit down and talk with Doug about what this means for you both…"

Emilie cleared her throat as she finished speaking and looked to Doug. He was gazing at Carol and her dutiful face. She was nodding and apparently listening to Emilie’s words, but there was something in her face that told him she’d made her decision before they’d even walked into the office. He sighed, "Come on then," he murmured, holding out his hand for her. "I guess we better go home and start thinking, hmm?"

Carol looked up at him, a vague smile on her lips. "Okay…" She stood up, but just as they were turning to walk out of the room, she stopped and glanced back, "Emilie?"

"Yes?"

"If I decided to go through with this… Would you help me?" Emilie smiled a restrained smile,

"Sure I would, Carol… sure I would…"

****

At home, she was curiously quiet. She made the girls’ dinners, fed them in the kitchen then took them upstairs to the nursery. Doug was torn between wanting to ask her what she’d decided and an unease that warned him off, so he stayed downstairs, picking at his warmed up spaghetti and pesto.

Upstairs, Carol changed the girls into their pyjamas and wiped their faces and hands, ready for bed. She wondered if he was keeping out of her way, afraid to ask, uncertain of her response. He’d been quiet and introspective since they’d left the hospital, asking only brief questions and responding to all her enquiries as simply as he could. She had the feeling this was going to last until bedtime, or perhaps after.

He’d known her for such a long time, felt like he knew her every move and that he could almost read her every thought. But today had reminded him that they were two separate entities, not quite as joined at the hip as he’d allowed himself to believe. She had her own thoughts and opinions, and so did he. It was a balancing act he wasn’t convinced he had judged quite right.

Carol put the girls down to sleep and idled for a while, sitting on the window seat while they drifted away. It was getting dark outside, but still he hadn’t come up to speak to her. She’d made up her mind, of course, but that didn’t make the task of telling him so any easier. She just hoped it wasn’t going to cause a rift between them. Arguments had always had a tendency to boil out of control between them, but even after all this time, she still remained unaware of just how they did.

After she was convinced the girls were asleep, she walked to the top of the stairs and listened down, straining to make out where he was or what he was doing, but there was silence. Taking slow steps, she soundlessly descended the stairs, her hand running along the banister rail, causing her wedding ring to hum metallically against the wood. She reached the bottom of the stairs and suddenly saw him. He was standing in the doorway of the billiard room, the slight, dull light behind him highlighting him to her vision. "Hey," she murmured.

He nodded, but did not move toward her. There was a long, uneasy silence, measured by the ponderous tick of Carol’s grandfather clock in the hallway. She glanced at the pendulum swinging through the air, taking her eyes away from his intense gaze. He followed her gaze. For a moment, it was as if everything else in the room had melted away and it was just the two of them and the clock. Back and forth, back and forth. Slicing through the air, cutting through time, cleaving it neatly, second by second.

Doug wondered why she refused to look back at him, and for a moment, frowned, then suddenly, he recalled the words Joe had said to him earlier in the day: ‘Time passes faster than you think’. "Carol?" he whispered, keeping his voice low. She took a moment to respond, but then she looked up at him.

"Yeah?"

"I think we need to talk…"

****

Blue eyed boy meets a brown eyed girl

Oh, oh, the sweetest thing

You can sew it up, but you still see the tear

Oh, oh, the sweetest thing

Baby’s got blue skies up ahead

But in this I’m a raincloud

Ours is a stormy kind of love

****

It had happened again. Without either of them realising, their restrained, informed and composed talk had turned fiery. They were in the billiard room, Carol sitting rigid and hunched in the armchair, her legs drawn up under her chin, Doug standing at the other end of the room, the pool table between them. "Carol," he was saying, his voice struggling to remain at a normal pitch, "Have you stopped to think about the other people in this equation? You’re not the only one who’s gonna be affected by all this…" He was pacing now, backwards and forwards, agitated and confused.

"I know… but it’s my decision…" she said, trying to stay calm, but becoming increasingly rattled by his fractious behaviour. He stopped for a moment and stared at her, then reached sharply for a pool cue from the bracket on the wall. For a second, she thought he was going to break it across his knee in frustration, but instead, he shook it hard and closed his eyes, giving himself a moment to rein in his irritation.

"It can’t just be your decision, Carol. There… there are other people you have to think about." He paused and swallowed. "There’s me… and, and I stand to lose the woman I love. There’s Tess and Kate, and they… they stand to lose their mother." His face was distressed now, and Carol had the feeling he was fighting against the emotion welling up inside of him. "And there’s your own mother…"

"Doug…" she interrupted, and stood up. Still, she was smiling, and Doug briefly thought how she could, then she was standing right in front of him. Her face mellowed as she gazed at him. "Doug, I can hear you…" she whispered. "I know what you’re saying, but don’t you get it?" She touched his forearm. "We were taking precautions. We didn’t mean to get pregnant… it just… happened. Doesn’t that say something about fate?"

He stared at her irrepressible smile. "But…" he began, feeling his resolve weakening.

"This baby wants to be born, Doug…" Her hand slipped down his arm and grasped his hand, gently bringing it to her stomach. "I can feel it," she said. "Can’t you?"

Doug felt a surge of emotion charge through him. "Oh, Carol…" he sighed. Suddenly, from up the stairs, a little girl started to cry. They both looked around, towards the sound.

"I’ll go…" she began, just as he said,

"I’ll go…" She looked at him squarely. "Let me go, Carol…" he pleaded. "Let me go and see my daughter."

Carol nodded and released his hand. He turned away from her and was gone, up the stairs and out of sight. She stayed behind a few minutes, staring absently out of the window, then made her way out of the billiard room. Sighing, she started up the stairs, but stopped on the fourth or fifth step. Coming from the girls’s bedroom was a sound she had never heard before. It was Doug, singing…

"It’s a little bit funny, this feeling inside,

I’m not one of those who can easily hide,

I don’t have much money but, girl if I did,

I’d buy a big house where we all could live.

And you can tell everybody

This is your song

It may be quite simple, but now that it’s done

I hope you don’t mind, I hope you don’t mind

That I put down these words.

How wonderful life is… while you’re in the world."

Carol was stunned to stillness, remembering Cindy talking of Nigel singing Hannah to sleep when she was a baby. She waited while he continued, but gave up as he forgot the words and turned to humming to the tune. Slowly, she crept up the stairs. The door was partially open, and as she pushed it back, she saw him, in the half-darkness, holding his baby, and felt her heart soar.

****

Cindy was fresh out of the shower, in her bathrobe when the doorbell rang, and wondering whom on Earth could be calling at nine thirty in the evening, she went cautiously to the door, snapping the chain on so she could check the visitor out before she committed herself. She opened the door slowly and saw Carol standing on the step. "Carol?" she asked, her brows disappearing almost into her hairline. She took the chain off and stepped back, allowing her friend to come inside. "What are you doing here at this hour?"

"I need to talk…"

"Talk?"

"Have you got a minute?"

"For you, sure…" Cindy smiled, leading her into the living room. "Here, take your coat off and sit down." She motioned toward the sofa. Carol sat down, and fidgeted for a moment. Cindy settled herself in the armchair and crossed her legs, folding her robe over her legs. "Now, tell me what the problem is."

"I’m gonna assume Doug’s told you…" she began, a slight smile on her face. Cindy nodded, smiling back. "He’s mad with me," she sighed. "Cos I want this baby and he thinks I’m not thinking about it properly. He thinks I’m being selfish."

"Selfish?"

"He says I’m not thinking about everyone else…" She looked down at her shoes.

"And are you?"

"Thinking about everyone else?" she frowned and paused. "I guess I am being a little bit selfish… but… I… didn’t think it mattered." She gave a heavy sigh. "I don’t think he wants this baby,"

"Oh, Carol," Cindy exclaimed. "Believe me, Doug wants this more than anything… he’s just a little bit scared at the moment. You can understand that, can’t you?"

"That’s the thing, though," she explained. "I don’t know whether I do understand. I don’t understand why he’s so worried… it’s not that big a gamble. I’ve gambled on bigger things in my time… and he sure as Hell has…"

"But this is different," Cindy interrupted. Carol looked up at her and her brow furrowed.

"How is it different?"

"Because this is something that really matters to him, Carol. All those other things… sure they mattered to him at the time, but they weren’t ever gonna change his life. I mean…" she paused, trying to think of a way to make her understand. "Turn it around. Imagine it was Doug risking his life in something, I dunno… a skydive or something. Would you be happy with him? Or would you think he was crazy?"

"I’d think he was crazy," she answered immediately. "But I’d let him do it if it was something he really wanted to do."

"Would you though?" Cindy questioned. "Would you let him do it if one of the outcomes was that he ended up in a box and you were left on your own with the girls… Could you let him go ahead and do that without a word if you knew that you could’ve stopped him?" Carol was silent, deep in thought. "How would it feel if that was what happened and you’d not said anything to him to try to get him to change his mind?"

"I’d think it was my fault…" she said in a barely audible voice. Cindy smiled sadly,

"Exactly…"

Carol said nothing, just staring at the patterns in the carpet for a long moment. "I just wish he was more excited," she said finally, despondency in her voice.

"Oh, he is, Carol…" Cindy assured. "He’s just too scared of losing you at the moment. I’m sure he wants to be excited, he’s just finding it all pretty hard to accept right now. He nearly lost you before, and I don’t think he’s up for a repeat performance." She reached out and took Carol’s loose hand. "Just give him some time…"

****

The second the door opened, Doug was standing in the hallway. "Where’ve you been?" he asked, his voice slightly sharper than he would have liked. "I looked everywhere for you."

"I went to see Cindy…" she said simply, walking past him and into the kitchen.

"What for?" He followed her.

"I needed to ask someone else… that’s all, Doug… I needed a second opinion…" She stared at his befuddled expression. "I needed to talk to someone who wasn’t gonna bite my head off or walk away the moment things get a bit controversial. Is that alright?"

He sighed, "I’m sorry…"

"You’re sorry? And that’s supposed to solve the problem is it? You’re very good at doing this Doug, but we don’t ever come to an answer." She was standing near the kitchen table, her hands gesturing emphatically. He stared at her and she shook her head. "I can’t explain this… I don’t even think there is an explanation…" She paused. "But I’ve made my decision… Call it maternal instincts, call it human nature, I dunno what it is, but I just know this is gonna be okay."

He was still staring, his eyes wide and glassy with emotion. He shifted his weight from one foot to the other, and for a second, Carol thought he was going to walk away again. "I’m happy with that decision," she continued. "The question is… can you be happy for me? Can you be happy for us?"

Doug was stunned. "Happy for you?" he repeated. She was looking at him, and for a second, he thought that she was reading his mind, such was the concentration in her gaze. He tried to formulate some kind of answer, but found that he couldn’t. So instead he tried to find a way of expressing how he felt, but he found that he couldn’t do that either. His feet were glued to the floor, and his body felt like lead weight. Slowly, she stepped toward him, till she was just a foot away from him, her gaze still unmoving, then suddenly, her blank expression changed and her eyes welled with tears. "Is it okay with you?" She was pleading with him. "Tell me it’s okay with you…"

He looked at her, standing in front of him, this woman he loved with all his soul and realised that he couldn’t bear to see her cry, so he reached out and pulled her next to him. She let out a sharp sob and enveloped him in a crushing embrace. He put his chin on top of her head and breathed in the familiar scent of her hair. "Oh, Carol," he murmured, "it’s okay… no, no, it’s more than okay. It’s… it’s great…"

She pulled away from him, her arms loosening from around his ribcage, her face streaked with wetness. "Really?" Her voice was small, but he could hear the bubbling joy in it.

"Yeah… really…" He took her by the upper arms and held her a distance away, so he could look her right in the eyes. "But you listen to me. I’m gonna start and insist on a few terms and conditions from now on… okay?"

She was smiling now. "Okay…"

"You’re going to follow the OB’s instructions…"

"To the letter…" Her smile was growing wider.

"No working too hard… No rushing around after the girls… No stress… No hard exercise… No lifting…"

And now she was laughing, her eyes sparkling, brightened to luminescence by the recent tears. "Are you finished, yet?!" she smiled, and Doug felt himself smiling back.

"Oh, no sweetheart…" he murmured, and pulled her back to his embrace. "I’m only just beginning…"

The End.