Drama Momma (Surprisingly Perfect Sequel)

Waiting for Answers

When we got to the hospital, the emergency room was packed. Mom had to fill out my forms since I was still a minor. It was freaky, because we waited in the ER for my dad. At least when Chrys had the boys, we didn't have to wait anywhere and could walk right in.

I sent a text to Chase and Destiny, then waited, and waited, and waited. I was getting nervous. I was already bleeding through the pad I had on and had to change in the nasty bathroom. Good thing I brought extras.

After over an hour, a nurse came and brought me into an examination room. She gave me a gown to change into, took my vitals, and asked me a bunch of questions. She took my blood for blood work, too. I hated needles even more than I hated hospitals, but again, anything for my babies.

The nurse put a bandage on my arm, then left. We'd already been there for two hours by the time the nurse walked out of the room. My phone battery was almost dead and I didn't bring my charger. Everything sucked.

After that, we waited even more. Mom got be a bag of chips from the vending machine. I hated sour cream and onion, but she said it was all they had, so I ate them anyway. When we were three hours in, Mom went over and complained to the desk. I could hear her from all the way down the hall.

"Listen, my daughter is pregnant and there's something wrong. You have to bump us up on the list!" She walked in a few seconds later and sat down. "They said you're next, apparently."

Finally, a guy in scrubs came in, holding a clipboard.

"Hello folks, sorry about the wait," he said, a slight edge in his voice. "So, tell me what's been going on?"

"What's been going on? My daughter is pregnant with twins and she's been bleeding for hours!" Mom said.

I could tell she was overtired. She'd been up for almost twenty-four hours. I grabbed her arm and pulled her back down.

"I've also been having cramps, but they went away a few hours ago," I said.

"How far along are you?" he asked.

"Six weeks."

"And you haven't had any other issues up to this point?"

"Right. They've been completely fine this whole time," I said. "I got pushed into a locker really hard at school, and everything started a few hours after that."

"Alrighty, I'll request our ultrasound tech take a look. It should only be a few minutes," the doctor said, then walked out.

"I want to go home. I feel like we'll never get an answer," I said.

"I know, Poppy. I'm just as annoyed as you are."

I looked at my phone. It was almost midnight. There were a load of texts from Chase and Destiny, but I really wasn't in the mood to talk to anybody. The only thing on my mind were my two little ones.

Mom and I both started to doze off. It seriously felt like this night was never going to end. Just last night, I was safe in my bed and everything was fine. How could so much change so quickly?

At twelve-thirty, the ultrasound tech woke us up when she came in. She was bright and cheery, which was a nice change of pace. Everyone we'd met so far in here looked like they hated everything.

"Hi there! I'm Joy. I was sent by the doctor for an ultrasound. I heard you're six weeks along and having some bleeding?" she said.

"Yeah, for a while," I said.

"Okay. We'll take a look and see what's going on."

She lifted my shirt and squeezed a bit of cold jelly onto my stomach. The monitor was turned away from me. Joy got everything ready to go and started moving the doppler around.

"Okay, let's hear that heartbeat," Joy said.

A loud, strong heartbeat filled the room. It sounded a lot different than at Doctor Andrews' office, but I figured it was because the room was bigger, I was exhausted, and Joy was using a different kind of machine.

"Well, heartbeat sounds perfect," Joy said. "Baby looks good too. There are no issues from what I'm seeing."

"Wait, no," I said, my voice shaking. "I'm having twins!"

Joy looked at the monitor, then back to me. I saw Mom out of the corner of my eye. All the color drained from her face and her hand covered her mouth. I suddenly heard footsteps running down the hallway.

What the hell is going on?

"Miss, I'm so sorry, but I only see one baby and heard one heartbeat," Joy said, her voice low.

I didn't understand. There had to be two heartbeats. I was carrying two babies.

Over her shoulder, I could see an exasperated Chase standing in the doorway as Joy said the words that broke my heart:

"I'm terribly sorry. I believe you've experienced Vanishing Twin Syndrome. It appears you've miscarried one of your twins." 

To my readers: 

-I'm extremely sorry about this sad plot twist. It was my intention from the beginning for Poppy to only have one child. I was hoping this event could serve for more character development for Poppy and Chase. 

-Vanishing Twin Syndrome is actually somewhat common, occurring in 20-30% of twin pregnancies.