The Porsche, The Beetle And How I Got Here

Chapter 19

“Karen? Karen are you alright?”

I laid on my bed, covered in blankets and my duvet, trying to sleep away from everything. I felt the mattress move beneath me, as someone sat down beside me.

“Karen, love what’s wrong?” dad asked lightly, as he brushed his hand lightly through my hair.

“What are you doing here?” I mumbled into my pillow, however he managed to catch my words and replied softly.

“We’d arranged to meet for lunch at Joe’s today, but you didn’t show up. And when you didn’t answer you phone, I decided to pay a visit.”

“Oh shit, I’m sorry dad.” I said and looked up at him.

“It’s ok, I just got a bit worried.” He said, clearly still worried. “Are you ill?” he then asked shortly after.

“What is it then?” he asked when I shook my head. A lump grew in my throat, and my eyes started tearing up. “Hey, what’s the matter? Have something happened?” he asked in that calm, fatherly fashion, which was the last drop I needed, before I started sobbing violently. I sat up, and dad took me in a tight embrace, trying to calm me down, as I sat there pouring out gallons of salty tears.

As I started to calm down, and the crying slowly paced into some sniffing and watery eyes, he repeated his question.

“What happened?”

“I’m pregnant.” I whispered, bracing myself for some kind of surprised or maybe even angry response, but instead he shushed at me lightly and let go of me slightly, so he could see my face, as he sent me a weak smile.

“Do you know who the father is?”

“Yes.”

“Are you going to keep it?”

“I have honestly no idea dad.”

“Are you going to tell the father?”

“No.”

“No?” he asked, sounding surprised. “Why not? This is just as much his responsibility as it is yours.”

“I know dad. It’s just because... He’s… It’s complicated.”

“Complicated?”

“Yes, complicated…  This wasn’t supposed to happen.”

“Not much is.” He told me calmly, and I looked up at him again.

“How far in are you?”

“I have no idea. One week? Two, maybe.” Three? Maybe more.

We sat in silence for some time before he stood up, and reached out for my hand.

“Come.” He said, again in that fatherly tone, which made me feel so incredibly young.

“Where are we going?” I asked as he left the room and walked towards the front door.

“To the doctor’s.”

“But dad, I don-“

“Karen. I know this is terrifying, ok? But we need to know what we’re dealing with here.”

“We’re dealing with a foetus, dad, a foetus. I don’t need a doctor to know that.”

“Karen…”

“What?” I asked and looked at him, with my arms crossed in front of my chest.

“Look, I can’t force you to come, but don’t you want to figure out your possibilities?” he didn’t say more than that, he simply dropped his coat and went into the living room.

I went back to my bed, and was deep in thought for a couples of minutes, before I got up, took on some more normal clothes, and made my dad drive me to the doctor.

According to the doctor, I was about three or four weeks into the pregnancy, which fitted perfectly with Richard’s and I’s sexual activities in Asia.. Yay..

“So where do you stand?” the doctor, a nice woman, maybe five years older than myself asked.

“What do you mean?”

“You started out saying that the pregnancy wasn’t planned, and that you wanted an abortion. Do you still want that? An abortion I mean.”

“No.” I responded bluntly, surprising the both of us. She smiled at me and walked over to her computer and started typing something.

“How do you feel about coming back here in two weeks? Then we can make some more scans and so on.”

“Yeah, that’d be great.”

I stood up, shook hands with the doctor seeing as it’s social etiquette and I didn’t wanted to seem rude.

“What if I change my mind and want an abortion anyway?” I asked her as I was about to exit  her office.

“Well… tell me what you feel is right in two weeks, and we’ll take it from there.” I nodded and left her, to go and fetch my dad, before we went to Joe’s and ate dinner. We didn’t talk more about the pregnancy that evening, which was good, and I enjoyed getting it out of my head for the first time in what felt like decades.