Chapter 16: Horny Teenager
The doctor’s office wasn’t an office at all. It was a suite in a discreet medical tower, all muted grays and ambient lighting that felt more like a high-end spa than a place of diagnosis. There were no magazines, no weary-looking patients. Just a silent, efficient woman in a linen tunic who guided them directly into a consultation room.
Dr. Evans was a woman in her fifties with a calm, unhurried presence and eyes that missed nothing. She shook Julen’s hand, then turned to Alex. Her gaze was appraising but not judgmental, clinical warmth. Alex felt exposed under it, hyper-aware of her younger face, the obvious curve of her belly under a simple silk tunic dress Julen had chosen.
“Alexandra,” Dr. Evans said, gesturing to a plush chair. “Please. Julen has given me the broad strokes. Let’s get some details from you.”
The questions began. Date of last period? Alex faltered, her mind blank. The old calendar was useless. She looked at Julen, panicked.
“Approximately ten weeks ago,” Julen said smoothly, crossing an ankle over his knee. His posture was relaxed, but his voice held a quiet authority that filled the room. “The transformation events disrupted her cycle, but we’ve been tracking since.”
Dr. Evans nodded, typing into a tablet. “And the symptoms? Nausea? Fatigue?”
“A little nausea in the mornings,” Alex said, finding her voice. It sounded too high, too young to her own ears. “But mostly I’m just… hungry. All the time. And tired, but like a wired tired. And…” She trailed off, heat rising in her cheeks.
“Emotional lability?” Dr. Evans offered, a faint smile touching her lips. “Very common. Your body is conducting a symphony of hormones. It’s a lot for anyone, let alone given your unique… circumstances.”
The exam was thorough, gentle, and deeply surreal. The cold ultrasound gel on her stomach, the dark screen flickering to life. Alex gripped Julen’s hand, her nails digging into his palm. He stood beside the table, his other hand on her shoulder, his attention absolute.
Then, the sound. A rapid, rhythmic whoosh-whoosh-whoosh filled the quiet room. A tiny, ghostly shape, a seahorse in a nebulae, flickered on the screen. A blinking cursor pinpointed the frantic flutter.
“There’s your baby,” Dr. Evans said, her voice softening. “Strong heartbeat. Measuring perfectly for twelve weeks.”
Twelve weeks. The number landed with physical weight. Alex stared, breath caught in her throat. This was real. This was a person. A small, swimming someone inside the body that wasn’t supposed to be hers. A sob hitched in her chest, part terror, part a strange, fierce awe.
Julen’s hand tightened on hers. She looked up at him. His eyes were fixed on the screen, wide and unblinking. The CEO mask was gone. In its place was raw, unvarnished wonder. “Wow,” he breathed, the word utterly insufficient.
Later, back in the penthouse, the data was a tangible thing. Printed sonogram images, prenatal vitamins in a glass bottle, a list of approved foods. Alex sat on the balcony, the city sprawled below, the black-and-white photo in her hands. The tiny, blurry bean. Her mind whirled, but her body felt calm, settled in a way it hadn’t for months. It had a purpose now, a definitive, biological mission.
That night, the shift began.
She picked at the dinner the chef had prepared—seared scallops, a delicate salad. “It’s boring,” she declared, pushing the plate away. She wanted greasy nachos, the kind from the 24-hour place near their old apartment. She wanted sugar. Lots of it.
Julen looked up from his own plate, an eyebrow raised. “You loved scallops last week.”
“Last week I wasn’t starving,” she pouted, slumping back in her chair. The movement felt theatrical, a performance of displeasure. “My body is building a whole brain. It needs cheese. And, like, those sour gummy worms.”
He watched her for a long moment, a curious smile playing on his lips. Not annoyed. Amused. “I’ll have someone get them.”
“Now?” she heard herself say, the demand sharp and immediate.
“Yes, Alex,” he said, his voice low, a hint of something indulgent in it. “Now.”
She got her nachos. She got her gummy worms. She ate them on the vast sofa, crumbs on the silk cushions, a profound, childish satisfaction warming her. Julen worked on a laptop nearby, the glow of the screen illuminating his profile. Every so often, he’d look over, his gaze lingering on her, on the mess, on the contented way she rubbed her belly.
The petulance became a new language. The world, through the lens of her eighteen-year-old hormones and her surreal predicament, was endlessly frustrating. Clothes were never soft enough. The light was too bright. Her hair was wrong. She wanted Julen’s attention, and when he gave it, she sometimes found it smothering. She was a knot of contradictory needs.
And the hunger wasn’t just for food.
It hit her at odd times. Watching him on a video call, his voice dropping into that professional register. Seeing his forearms flex as he lifted a box of newly delivered baby furniture. The ache would start, deep and low, an impatient thrum that overrode every other thought. It was a physical impatience, a teenage urgency that refused to be ignored.
One afternoon, he was explaining a complex merger he was orchestrating, talking about hostile takeovers and stock valuations. She wasn’t listening. She was watching his mouth move, the confident sweep of his hand. The ache between her legs was sudden and overwhelming.
She got up from her chair, walked around the desk, and simply climbed into his lap, silencing him. She kissed him, all hungry tongue and need.
He broke the kiss, breathing hard. “Alex… I’m in the middle of—”
“I don’t care,” she whispered, grinding down against the growing hardness in his trousers. “You’re my husband. I need you. Now.”
She saw the conflict in his eyes—the CEO needing to finish the thought, the man utterly enslaved by the demanding, gorgeous girl in his lap. The man won. He stood, lifting her with him, clearing the desk with a sweep of his arm. The crash of his monitor hitting the floor was a distant sound. He laid her back on the polished wood, his hands pushing her dress up, his mouth hot on her throat.
It was fast, and fierce, and slightly uncomfortable on the hard surface. It was perfect. After, as she lay panting amid the scattered papers, he leaned over her, bracing himself on his hands.
“You’re a menace,” he said, but his eyes were shining with possession and pride.
“You love it,” she shot back, a smug, bratty smile on her face.
“I do,” he admitted, helping her up. He righted the monitor, unfazed. “A brilliant, pregnant teenage menace who can’t keep her hands off me. It’s literally the perfect wife for a man in my position.”
She beamed, the words slotting into place in her new reality. Perfect wife. His position. It made a twisted sense. She wandered to the floor-to-ceiling window, naked, looking down at the ant-like cars. Her belly was a smooth, firm dome in the reflection. She ran her hands over it, this symbol of their forced union, and felt not dread, but a powerful, feminine triumph.
She was eighteen. She was beautiful. She was carrying the child of a powerful, devoted man who thought she was perfect. The old Alex, the confused twenty-one-year-old grappling with identity, felt like a distant, sad story about someone else. That person had been weak. This person, Alexandra, was getting exactly what she wanted.
Julen came up behind her, wrapping his arms around her, his big hands cradling her belly. He nuzzled her neck. “What are you thinking?”
She leaned back into him, watching their reflection—the powerful, older man, the nubile, pregnant girl. A classic picture. A timeless dynamic.
“I’m thinking,” she said, her voice light, convinced, “that everything is exactly how it should be.”
He met her eyes in the glass, and his smile was one of complete, triumphant agreement. The narrative was no longer a threat. It was a blueprint, and they were building to spec.
The next morning, a large, flat package arrived by courier. Julen brought it in, slicing it open with a silver letter opener. Inside was a framed, stunningly detailed canvas print. It was the sonogram image, but artistically enhanced, swirling with abstract color and light, the tiny form at the center rendered in delicate gold leaf. In the lower corner was a small, elegant plaque: Davies Heir - 12 Weeks.
Alex traced the gilded outline with a fingertip, a wave of possessive joy so strong it stole her breath. “It’s beautiful.”
“For the office,” Julen said, his chest swelling with a pride that was both personal and profoundly performative. “A statement.”
He placed it on the mantel in the living room, a temporary altar. They stood side-by-side, admiring it. Alex felt a flutter in her abdomen, a delicate, butterfly sensation. She grabbed Julen’s hand and pressed it to the spot.
His eyes widened. “Was that…?”
“I think so,” she whispered.
They stood there, frozen, hands layered over the life they’d made, surrounded by obscene luxury, their identities rewritten, waiting for the next beat in a story that was writing itself through their very flesh. The flutter came again, a soft, insistent tap from the future.
The flutter came again, a soft, insistent tap from the future. It was a punctuation mark. Everything after it felt different.
“I want a swimming pool,” Alex announced later that day, staring blankly at the panoramic city view. “Not a building pool. A private one. On a terrace. Heated.”
Julen glanced up from his financial reports, a slow smile spreading. “That’s a significant structural ask. This building’s frame can’t support it.”
“Then buy the penthouse in the Lumina building,” she said, turning to him, her hands on her hips. The silk of her robe whispered with the movement. “The one with the glass-edged infinity pool. I saw it in a magazine. I want to float and look at the clouds.”
Her tone was imperious, utterly convinced of her own reasonableness. The old Alex would have researched zoning laws, cost analyses. This Alexandra simply wanted. The wanting was a physical pressure behind her ribs.
He closed his laptop, the click final. “The Lumina is a good investment. Their strata council is notoriously difficult, though.”
“You’re Julen Davies,” she said, as if explaining something simple to a child. “You don’t ask councils. You buy the building and dissolve the council.”
He laughed, a genuine, surprised sound that filled the room. He walked over, cupping her face. “When did you get so ruthless?”
“I’ve always been like this,” she said, and the words felt true as they left her lips. A flicker of confusion followed—had she?—but was quickly washed away by a warm, certain tide. A memory surfaced, crisp and bright: Julen, 28 and a half met Alex in one of his seminars he does in her university, she was just 18, he invited her for dinner, she said yes. She’d been arguing about economics, politics and fashion, he’d told her she was the most formidable mind he’d ever seen for a young woman like her. That’s how they’d met.
She blinked. That… wasn’t right. They’d met as roommates, found a ad online. She’d been nervous, clutching a six-pack of cheap beer as a peace offering. The new memory felt richer, more layered, more appropriate for who they were now. It superimposed itself, a brighter film over a faded photo.
“You were,” Julen murmured, his thumb stroking her cheek, his eyes searching hers as if he could see the memory settling. “You terrified me and I am the CEO. In the best way.”
The confirmation was a key turning in a lock. The false memory cemented, becoming real. Her brattiness wasn’t new; it was the re-emergence of a privileged, brilliant girl who was used to getting what she wanted. A girl born for this life.
That evening, a storm of cravings hit. “Pickles,” she said, standing in the vast, cold kitchen. “And vanilla ice cream. And the spicy ramen from that place downtown. Together. Right now.”
“That’s a digestive crime scene,” Julen said, already tapping his phone to summon a driver.
“It’s what your son wants,” she countered, patting her belly. She’d decided it was a son. It felt correct.
While they waited, she scrolled through her phone, her mood souring. Photos of a sleek, pregnant celebrity in a gorgeous gown sparked a hot spike of envy. “My clothes are all wrong,” she declared, throwing the phone onto the sofa. “Everything is just… maternity wear. I look like a bland, beige whale. I want couture. I want to look dangerous and pregnant.”
Julen leaned against the doorway, watching the storm build. He was dressed in a simple black turtleneck and trousers, the uniform of understated wealth. “Dangerous, hm?”
“You know what I mean,” she snapped, tears of frustration springing to her eyes. Another new, volatile frequency. “I don’t want to be cute. I want to be breathtaking. I want people to look at us and see a king and his pregnant queen, not a businessman and his… his incubator!” The word tore out of her, a fear she hadn’t let herself articulate.
He was across the room in three strides. He didn’t hug her. He gripped her shoulders, his hold firm, forcing her to look at him. “Listen to me. You are the single most breathtaking thing I have ever seen. This?” He slid a hand down the curve of her stomach. “This is power. This is the future. Anyone who sees you as anything less is blind.”
His words were a balm and a drug. The tears stopped. She sniffed, leaning into him. “Really?”
“Really.” He kissed her forehead. “Tomorrow, we’ll call some designers. You’ll look like a queen who conquers worlds. Because you do.”
The food arrived. She ate the bizarre combination with savage glee, cross-legged on the floor by the coffee table. Julen sat in an armchair, sipping a whiskey, a king amused by his consort’s peculiar rituals. The city lights blurred into a galaxy below them.
“Remember,” she said around a mouthful of pickle and ice cream, “this summer in Monaco? Before all this? We got so sunburned on the yacht.”
Julen’s glass paused halfway to his lips. His eyes went distant, then cleared. A slow, fond smile emerged. “You refused to wear sunscreen. Said you wanted a tan. You were lobster-red for three days. I had to slather you in aloe vera.”
She laughed, the memory vivid: the smell of salt and coconut oil, the sting of the burn, his careful hands on her shoulders. It was perfect. It had never happened. They had never been to Monaco. They’d once spent a weekend at a cheap beach motel, sharing a single room with a broken air conditioner.
But the fake memory was better. It was theirs now.
She finished her ramen, the spice making her eyes water. A different heat gathered low in her belly, insistent and familiar. She looked at Julen, at the strong line of his throat as he drank, at the way his trousers stretched over his thighs as he sat.
She didn’t speak. She simply stood, walked to him, and took his glass from his hand, setting it on the table. She climbed onto his lap, straddling him, her bulky robe falling open. The silk of her nightgown beneath was thin. She pressed herself against the hard ridge in his trousers.
“Alexandra,” he breathed, a warning and an invitation.
“I’m bored,” she whispered, nipping at his lower lip. “Entertain me.”
He did.