One Bride for Five Brothers

“Wait, hold on,” I stammer. “Are you saying… twins?”

She shrugs. “Looks that way! Two heartbeats, two heads. Unless there's a surprise third one hanging out in there, which has happened before, but…”

“Triplets?” I choke.

She holds out both hands. “No, I think it's just twins,” she smirks. “Sounds like you got enough on your hands, anyway, right?”

“She sure does,” Stan says proudly. “Twins! That's amazing!”

Dr. Francis smiles, shaking her head in a little bit of disbelief. I could see she sort of figured out our arrangement, but she's too professional to say anything about it. She hands me a tissue to wipe the ultrasound jelly off my stomach and helps me sit up.

“So, we won't be able to tell the gender until maybe a month from now, but you look great. I'd say nothing here to give you any kind of alarm. Just live your normal life, do anything you want to do, okay? I mean, no drinking or smoking of course…”

“Of course!” Charlie interjects.

I roll my eyes at him. “I think I got this handled,” I tell them curtly.

Dr. Francis pats me on my shoulder. “Yes, generally mothers know best. But you can resume your normal activities, within reason, okay? And I will see you in about a month?”

“Yes, thank you,” I smile, giddy and excited. I hadn’t even realized how worked up I was until just now. Twins! It's so much think about!

“So, any questions? Is there anything you want to —”

“Could she have sex?” Tom blurts out.

Dr. Francis’s mouth pops open again. She goes a little bit white, then swallows.

“Um, yes. She can. Have sex. Yes,” Dr. Francis nods, looking slightly alarmed. “Yep. Pregnant women can have sex. Yes they can.”

She stands, collecting my clipboard and putting it under her arms, then hurries out of the room.

“Okay! Thank you!” I call after her. I shoot Tom an exasperated look. “Seriously? Did you have to startle her like that?”

“What!” he objects. “I need to know, okay? It's an important question!”

I just roll my eyes. I want to be mad at him but, but how can I?

Looks like my fairytale has taken a bit of a twist. A twist with twins.

The way they're all looking at me, they feel it too. This is such a beautiful life. Such a beautiful journey we’re on. All together.

All for one, and one for all.

Chapter 23

Stan

Twins.

Twins!

All the way home, I keep trying to get my head around it. It's really happening now. Everything that we've ever wanted is finally, finally happening. And it's happening with the most beautiful woman I could've imagined.

I watch her hair blowing in the wind from her window as I hang onto the back of the truck. Charlie usually drives like a maniac and I wouldn't be surprised if he tries to dump us out into a ditch on the way home, but today he seems much more careful. Probably doesn't want to startle our princess too much.

From now on, we have to be a million times more careful. We have to make sure nothing goes wrong.

Everything seem so much more precious now. My mind races backward and forward, going over every decision we have made so far, and every decision coming up. Has she been drinking the wine? Has she been drinking enough orange juice? Should we be giving her more protein? Have we been working her too hard?