The Tales of a Future Hockey Wife

Chapter 54: Gender

~Eleanor~

My mother's need for perfection has always been a stretch on our relationship. Ever since I understood that my mother chose her career instead of her children, I have slowly pulled away from her. When I was about seven, my mother stopped being around on weekends. My father's answer, when I asked him why mom wasn't coming to the movies with us anymore or why she wasn't driving me to my swimming lessons, he simply said that she had to work. My seven-year-old-self bought it. My fourteen-year-old-self found out that my mother had been offered a promotion back then. She would have to work on some weeknights and on the weekends. She received the paycheck that goes with the amount of work she put in, but she almost never saw us anymore. I later found out that my father started taking us out to Tim Hortons when my mother took the promotion to give us some "quality family time." My mother also started buying us stuff we didn't ask for nor needed. Will and I each got a MacBook for our birthday, I got a brand new bedroom  and a new wardrobe each year, Will spent complete summers at a science camp, we got a pool so big we could lose each other in it, a slide to go with it, a spa, and so many other things it would take forever to name them all. We also had a photographer take photos of us in our new rooms, playing in our pool or in the garden, he was there for Christmas and for a few of our birthday parties. My face has been in my mother's magazine more often than I could count. I started to hate spending time with my mother when I realized that she was trying to buy our love with things and clothes or to create the perfect family vibe that sold those magazines so well.

Everything had to be perfect at all times. How we performed in school, how we looked, how we walked, how we talked, how the house looked, how the backyard looked, how everything looked had to be perfect. The only moments I could look how I wanted was when I was at Ben's house. Trish never told me we couldn't go out because my hair was undone or because I was wearing leggings and one of Ben's shirts. Spending time there allowed me to finally be free to be me. I could say what I wanted while wearing what I wanted as I was standing in a place where everything wasn't in its place. Moving to Windsor gave me the same sense of freedom, so there's no way in hell I'll ever move back with my parents. I escaped, why would I lock myself up again? Plus, I don't want my child to have to support the same perfection criteria as I did.

We didn't stay long after I told my mother that leaving healed my heart. Christmas at the Johnsons wasn't a lot more joyful. His father was still upset with him over their talk in the garage, so he barely said a word to us all evening. We spent most of the rest of our stay with Olive and Alexander walking around town. We came back home a week ago, the both of us needing a vacation from our vacation. Christmas drenched so much of our energy. From all of the fighting with our families to my meeting with Karel, let's say we didn't have the most joyous holidays, but memories of our two weeks in BC flash through my mind today because, even if it was awful, reminiscing those days is easier than imagining all the ways today could go wrong. Ben and I are sitting in Dr. Hudson's clinic waiting for the amniocentesis results. I came here four weeks ago to do the test and Dr. Hudson's assistant called us yesterday to give us an appointment. We are also supposed to learn the gender today. I don't know if I am more nervous about the results or the big reveal. Personally, I don't care if we have a boy or a girl, but I feel like it's important for Ben. He hasn't said anything about it, but I have a faint memory of him back in high school saying that when he has a son, he will teach him how to play hockey before he can even walk. I told him that he could teach our child how to play hockey regardless of the gender, but I know he would love to have a mini-him just like I would love to have a mini-me. Today is also the day we find out if our child possibly has a disability. Don't get me wrong, I'll love my child either way, but I am already afraid enough to have a child at my age, I can't imagine how petrified I would be to learn that our baby will have special needs.

So, it's with my heart a beat away to burst out of my chest that I tell my gynecologist to enter the exam room. She enters with a warm smile, shakes both our hands, and sits on the stool beside the table where I am laying. She tries to exchange a few pleasantries, but she must feel how high our blood pressure is because she cuts it short.

"Ok, I have one question to ask you before I give you the results," she says her smile even brighter than when she walked in. Maybe this should lower my stress level, but it doesn't. "Do you two want to know the gender?" It's not even a question for me. I am the kind of person who reads the end of books before starting them and waits a week to go to the movies to read all the spoilers on Internet. I wouldn't be able to last twenty more weeks not knowing something I could. I don't even have to look at Ben before nodding my head several times. Dr. Hudson smiles once more as Ben grabs my hand to interlock our fingers.

"Eleanor, Ben, you are having a beautiful and healthy baby girl. Congratulations." Tears spill out of my eyes when the word "healthy" comes out of her mouth. I had to ask her to repeat the last part to be sure I heard right. A beautiful and healthy baby girl is growing inside of me. This is probably the most emotional day of my entire life. Ben, too, has tears in his eyes when I finally turn my head towards him to bring him in for a hug.

"So, we're sure? No chromosome abnormalities, no nothing?"

"We're sure at 99.9% that's the best we can do. I'll let you get changed, Eleanor, and we'll do the ultrasound in a minute. I'll be right back."

***

"Are you happy, Ben?" I ask him as we buckle our seatbelts, my tone as serious as possible.

"Of course, I am. Why would you ask that?" He was about to start the car, but his fingers stopped on the key when he heard my question.

"I don't know. I remember you saying that you wanted a son one day." I raise my shoulders, avoiding his stare by looking at the woman with a huge stomach and a little boy attached to her hip walking towards the clinic.

"I really don't give a shit, El. As long as she's healthy, I don't have a care in the world that she's a she." His index touches my chin to pull my face towards his. His lips press against mine in a soft kiss. If we would have been anywhere but in this car, I would have pulled his face closer and pressed my lips against his harder to pour all of today's anxiety in him to hopefully get rid of it.

"Did you see, at the ultrasound, she looks like a baby now and not a weird shrimp or something." He nods, a fond smile on his face.

"It makes it more real, doesn't it?" It's my turn to nod, the ball of anxiety returning in my throat. "Should we talk about, like, names now?" he adds, finally starting the car.

"I have actually already thought about that, but I know you're not surprised." He chuckles before asking what I had found for a girl. "Jane, for Jane Austen who made me fall for literature, Elizabeth or Emma for the same reason, Daisy like in The Great Gatsby, Alice or Charlotte. What do you think?" He stayed put, his face emotionless the entire time I was listing names.

"I don't think Jane Johnson would be really pretty because of the double "j"." That's it?

"I didn't just say Jane, Ben. I had like five other names." He raises his shoulders, pouting. "Well what names do you like?" I add, sighing.

"Well I haven't really thought about it, but Sidney is kind of cute and it fits for a girl too."

"Sidney after Sidney Crosby?" He nods, his eyes focused on the road.

"I don't know how I feel about naming our daughter after a hockey player no matter how good he is."

"Well, I don't know how I feel about naming our daughter after the character of a book I haven't read."

I am about to reply that he just has to read it, but something stops me. The increasing weight of the anxiety ball in my throat stops my voice from coming out. We found out we were having a girl about twenty minutes ago, and we're already arguing about hockey versus literature. I imagine all the possible settings where those two passions will come clashing together in full force. Will we sign her up for hockey lessons or for the morning readings at the library? Will there be more books or hockey sticks in the nursery? Will she learn to skate before learning how to read? I wonder if we will both have to defend those aspects of our lives to integrate them in our daughter's life, but, mostly, I wonder if we will ever agree on what has to prevail. Will we ever agree on anything?