Bartoned

Chapter 9

You and Clint had decided that if you were going to try this, you were going to try this from scratch. You were two strangers who were having a baby together. You would stay at your place - he would stay at the tower. He'd help pay for baby-related goods and show up for doctor's appointments and later birthing classes. You would decide what you both wanted regarding ... well... everything... as you went along.

Meanwhile, work had just gone on as normal. Clint had stopped being such a dick and it was back to being like your first day. Sans the sword fights with other recruits. Steve had solved the sparring problem by making sure you were always paired with Kari or the instructor so they knew to pull their punches. He said later he might just put you on in the medbay if the training became too hard. You could continue your field training if you decided you still wanted to work in the field after your maternity leave. You weren't too worried. Yeah, you'd be huge by the end of the six months, but maternity leave technically wouldn't start until after that anyway.

For now, you took your anti-nausea medication and continued like normal.

Because it had taken you so long to realize you were pregnant your first obstetrics appointment was only a couple of weeks later. You were going to speak to a nurse, get blood tests and an ultrasound and then you'd get to speak to your obstetrician.

Kari had questioned if you were sure you wanted to do this with Clint. She had a point. She had been in your life a lot longer than Clint, but at this early stage, it was worth giving Clint the chance to be involved if that's what he wanted.

So that was why you were now leaning back on an examination table with an ultrasound tech moving a long white probe inside you with Clint sitting beside you, trying to pretend your vagina wasn't on show to the room while you both tried to work out what vague black and white shapes were the baby and what were just shapes.

"That thing?" Clint asked.

"No. That's just noise," you said.

"It's this peanut shape," the tech said, circling the little image of the embryo with a cursor.

"That's a baby?" he said. "It looks like something you swallowed."

"Well, it's technically not a baby yet. It just will be," you said.

"This is the heart here," the tech said, pointing at the little flutter on the screen. "Do you want to hear it?"

"Yes," you both said at once.

"Yeah, yes please," Clint added.

She flicked a switch and the room was filled with the rapid 'woosh-woosh-woosh' sound of the embryo's heartbeat.

"Oh my god!" Clint said. "This is so crazy. Can you believe what we did made that?"

You started laughing and you saw the tech smirk too. "It does seem counterintuitive."

"It's okay, right? As it should be?" Clint asked.

The tech nodded. "I mean, the head radiologist will look it all over, but everything is as normal. Your ObGyn will go over everything with you."

"Right. Yeah, of course." Clint said.

"You okay?" you asked him.

He nodded. "Just seeing it, it's really real. I thought I'd be scared. But I'm not."

"Did you want a printout?" the tech asked.

"Yes, please. Maybe a couple," you said.

She did a few more measurements and printed the little photographs of the life growing inside you before leaving you to get redressed.