Chapter 9: The Doctor’s Visit
The clinic was cold in a way that had nothing to do with the Georgia heat baking the parking lot outside. It was a deep, institutional chill that seeped from the linoleum floors and the metal legs of the examination table. Emmy lay back, the thin paper gown crackling with every shallow breath. The stirrups were like ice against her calves.
Rex stood by the wall, arms crossed, wearing a faded Bulldogs tank top. He hadn’t looked at her directly since they’d arrived. His eyes were fixed on a poster about the stages of fetal development, but he wasn’t seeing it.
Walter leaned against the sink, his posture deceptively relaxed. He’d put on a clean flannel shirt for the occasion, but his work boots were still dusty. He watched the door, a faint, permanent smirk on his face, as if privy to a joke no one else understood.
The door opened and Dr. Marsh came in, a man in his late fifties with tired eyes and a folder clutched to his chest. “Miss Parsons,” he said, nodding. His gaze slid over the two men. “Gentlemen. Family support. That’s good.” His tone suggested it was anything but.
The exam was brisk, impersonal. Cold gel on her lower belly. The pressure of the ultrasound wand, blunt and invasive. The black-and-white screen flickered to life, a storm of static resolving into shapes.
Dr. Marsh was quiet for a long time, his eyes darting between the screen and the wand’s angle. He moved it, pressed deeper. Emmy flinched.
“Hmm,” he murmured. A frown etched deep lines into his forehead. He zoomed in, the machine giving a soft click-whir.
“Everything alright?” Walter’s voice cut through the hum of the machinery.
“Just… verifying,” Dr. Marsh said slowly. He looked at Emmy, then back at the screen. His professional detachment seemed to crack, replaced by a naked, clinical astonishment. “Well. Congratulations are indeed in order. You’re pregnant. And it’s twins. Dizygotic. Two separate sacs.”
A suspended silence. Twins. The word seemed to bounce around the tiled room.
Rex exhaled, a shaky sound. “Twins?”
“Two healthy heartbeats,” Dr. Marsh confirmed, but his voice was thick with something else. Bewilderment. He kept staring at the image, his finger tracing the screen. “Miss Parsons, this is… medically, this is quite remarkable. Given the… positioning. The development.”
He finally pulled the wand away, setting it down with a deliberate click. He wiped the gel from her stomach, his movements slower now, thoughtful. He didn’t tell her to cover up. Instead, he turned to the men, his earlier weariness replaced by a discomfiting, eager intensity.
“You see,” he began, as if launching into a lecture, “in cases of superfecundation—that’s when two eggs are released and fertilized by separate acts of intercourse within a short window—it’s rare. Very rare. But visually, here…” He gestured vaguely at Emmy, still exposed on the table. “The uterine environment shows remarkable… receptivity. Elasticity.”
Walter’s smirk widened. He understood the subtext. Rex was still catching up, his brow furrowed.
Dr. Marsh seemed to forget Emmy was a person. She was a fascinating case study. He addressed Walter and Rex directly. “The cervix shows signs of significant, recent activity. There’s… well, to put it plainly, evidence of a high volume of seminal fluid. Traces remain for some time, you know.” He cleared his throat, a dry sound. “And the vaginal canal… the distensibility is notable. Sometimes, with particularly vigorous or… accommodating intercourse, especially with multiple partners, the tissue can exhibit a kind of… trained pliancy.”
The room became terribly still. The buzzing of the fluorescent lights grew deafening.
Dr. Marsh looked from Walter’s knowing face to Rex’s dawning comprehension. A strange, unprofessional camaraderie seemed to flicker in his eyes. “What I’m saying, gentlemen, is that this conception event… it’s clear her body was more than prepared. It was optimized. To have taken two distinct impregnations so cleanly, and to show this level of physical adaptation…” He shook his head, a laugh of sheer clinical disbelief escaping him. “It’s like she was built for it. Remarkable.”
Emmy felt a hot tear slip from the corner of her eye and into her hair. She was a specimen. A remarkable, pliant specimen.
Walter pushed off the sink and walked to the exam table. He looked down at her, his eyes dark with possessive pride. He placed a rough, warm hand on her bare thigh, just above the cold stirrup. “Told you she was a good one,” he said, his voice low and rich with satisfaction.
Rex finally moved. He walked over and stood beside his father, looking at the frozen image of the two tiny, swirling shapes on the screen. All the conflict, the jealousy, the guilt that had been tightening in his chest for weeks… it didn’t vanish. It transmuted. It merged with a sudden, shocking surge of pride. A primal, competitive victory. Two heartbeats. Two sons. His and his father’s.
A slow, crooked smile spread across Rex’s face. It was the first real smile she’d seen from him in a month. He looked at Walter, and for a second, it was just them—a team again. A dynasty.
“One each,” Rex said, his voice rough.
Walter chuckled, giving Emmy’s thigh a squeeze that was almost affectionate. “Looks that way.”
Dr. Marsh, suddenly seeming to remember himself, became brisk again. He handed Emmy a towel, avoiding her eyes. “We’ll need to schedule frequent check-ups. Twin pregnancy. High risk.” He was talking to the men. “She’ll need to be careful. But… robust. She seems robust.”
As Emmy sat up, clutching the paper gown to her chest, the men hovered near the screen, pointing at the two distinct, separate sacs. They talked in low, excited tones about due dates, about how you could tell which was which, their shoulders almost touching.
She dressed in silence, her fingers clumsy on the buttons of her sundress. The chill was inside her now, bone-deep. Yet, beneath the shame and the objectification, a treacherous thread of something else wound its way through her numbness. A sense of profound, terrible purpose. She had done this. Her body had done this remarkable, shocking thing. It had pleased them both beyond measure.
Walter slung an arm around Rex’s shoulders as they walked out, the ultrasound printout clutched in Rex’s hand. “Gonna need to build another room on the ranch,” Walter boomed in the hallway, his laughter echoing off the sterile walls.
Emmy followed a step behind, her hand resting on her still-flat stomach. The world outside the clinic doors was blindingly bright and hot. The men were already talking about football, and cribs, and whether they’d need one truck or two.
She climbed into the cab of Walter’s pickup, sandwiched between them. The familiar scent of man, sweat, and leather enveloped her. Rex reached across her to punch Walter’s shoulder playfully. Walter grinned, starting the engine.
As they pulled onto the highway, heading back to the ranch, to the room that smelled of them both, Emmy closed her eyes. The thrum of the engine vibrated through her. Inside her, two separate lives quickened. Two hearts, beating to different rhythms, sown from the same fertile, contested ground.