A Dance of Life

56

"My head just keeps banging and I can't even take pain medication. Plus, I'm tired of sleeping; I feel like a bear in hibernation and each time I wake up, I'm bigger than before. It's unsettling," I'm telling Diana as we're strolling through the mall, our hands filled with food.

Soon it'll be the handlebars of a stroller.

"When's Nathan coming? Maybe he can help you calm down or something."

"A week or so, I don't even want to think about it," I groan, wincing as another Braxton contraction hits.

"I'm sorry ... what?" Diana says. "You don't want to think of your fiancé moving over here? If I were you I'd be ecstatic."

"I am but I don't know ... where's he going to sleep? He doesn't have a job, I don't have a job. That's an extra mouth to feed. An increased water and electricity bill. It's—"

"Could you stop? Wow," she snaps, causing me to jump slightly. "He can sleep where he slept before, during the summer, remember? And it's not like he's never going to get a job."

"What if he doesn't?" I say under my breath, taking a long sip of my almond milkshake, specially recommended by my gynecologist. "I haven't been able to stop thinking about it. I'm so nervous about what it's going to be like when the babies come, I really don't want to stress my dad."

Diana chuckles and shakes her head. "You're really special, you know? You literally took in two random kids that had zero relation to you, maybe with a couple of second thoughts, but you took us in nonetheless. And your dad has taken us in, accepted us like family, do you think he isn't ready to accept his grandkids and son-in-law?"

"It's less about acceptance and more about being a burden," I tell her.

"I reiterate my comment."

"Wow, someone's learning something in school," I laugh lightly, hoping to change the subject.

"It's been almost a month, I think you should be worried if I wasn't," she snorts in reply, raising her large portion of fries to her face and snagging a couple.

"Speaking about the opposite gender, how's Alex," I ask, wiggling my brows.

"Ugh, I don't know what I'm doing. It feels like a long-distance ... thing, even though he's not that far away," she moans. "And even though there's been no admittance of feelings.

"I'm not the best ... flirter, but if you need help you can ask," I say, smiling at her.

Oh, the joy of never having to go through this again.

"Yeah, sure." She glances at her smartwatch and kisses her teeth, "Two thousand more steps."

"I feel like I could have done this one a treadmill."

"I agree, then I wouldn't have to do it with you," she teases.

My first real appointment with Dr. Davis was a week ago and I have another one next week. Although I wasn't too sure if I wanted him to be my doctor, talking with Mary convinced me that it might be a step in the right direction for healing, and if I can't handle the intimacy, I can easily change doctors.

The session started out as normal and it turned out that although I was putting on a healthy amount of weight, my muscles and joints were suffering from my lack of activeness, especially considering I was a super active person before.

"If you want to bounce back into your career, you're going to have to start working out again," he told me. "Ten thousand steps a day should get you going, and when you come in two weeks, we'll see if you can add in a few more things."