SEVEN
A few weeks went by after the first insemination procedure without any noticeable change to my body. As the doctors recommended, I made adjustments to my day-to-day life, but it wasn’t looking positive. Omar and I met with his nutritionist and the palace chefs to design a perfectly balanced meal plan for a woman my age looking to get pregnant. Even though I preferred to get my exercise by running from triage to triage, saving lives, I still dragged myself out of bed as the sun rose every morning to head to the palace gym, which included an Olympic-sized swimming pool. The water was much more inviting than a treadmill, so five days a week, I did laps until I was too tired to move.
Even though I appreciated that I was getting more lean and toned, that wasn’t the point. In fact, I needed to get the opposite of lean and toned. I needed to be getting bigger, specifically in the belly region.
As the weeks went by, the frustration began to build for both me and Omar. He would wait eagerly in my private suite while I took pregnancy tests in the bathroom, but every time I came out with the same dejected expression. He would sigh and put his arms on my shoulders—just shy of an actual embrace—and smile at me with hope. “Don’t worry, Carrie,” he would say. “It will happen. The doctors said we should be patient, so let us try harder to be.”
I knew he was more worried than he let on—I could see it in the wrinkles at the corner of his eyes, the way they were growing darker around the edges from losing sleep. Sajid and his wife would be trying every single night, most likely, to get her pregnant again in hopes of beating Omar to the throne. Every day that passed without the process working was another day Omar could lose everything.
It was almost a month later when I finally approached Omar, who was doing paperwork in his incredibly beautiful office. He sensed the frustration on me even before I spoke.
“Is everything all right?” he asked immediately.
I shook my head. “I can’t understand why this isn’t working. I think we should go speak to the OB/GYNs again. There has to be something else we can do.”
Omar shrugged. “Sometimes things just take time. There’s nothing wrong with you, Carrie.”
“That’s not how I feel,” I said glumly, crossing my arms over my chest—even though, deep down, I was feeling more and more inadequate as each day passed.
Worry crossed Omar’s handsome brow. He put down his pen and stood, coming around the desk to put his arms on my shoulders and gaze into my eyes, his expression full of concern.
“There’s nothing wrong with you,” he repeated, refusing to look away from my gaze. “You are a beautiful, strong, intelligent woman, and I know you are going to give me a wonderful son. I dare say you seem more eager even than me at this point. Are you in such a hurry to be gone from here?” There was pain in his voice when he spoke the last line, even though he capped it off with a soft laugh.
I shook my head immediately. “No,” I promised. “I haven’t thought about leaving again since we agreed to this, actually. All I can think about is… him. Our son.” I put my hands on my stubbornly empty belly. “And about how much this means to you and your future. I don’t think I’ve wanted anything so badly since I was applying to med school.”
Omar’s expression fell into something both happy and sad. He rubbed his hand gently up and down my arm. “You are truly an amazing woman, Carrie. You shouldn’t be worried about my future or happiness, and yet you are. Our son is going to be the luckiest boy in the world to have such a gentle and caring mother.”
I blushed and looked away from him. “Thank you.”
“If you’re worried, we can make an appointment with the doctors today,” he said. “You are the goddess here, bringing forth life into the world. Whatever you need, just ask, and I will deliver it. When do you want to meet with them? Say the word, and I’ll make it happen.”
I shrugged. “The sooner the better, really—this afternoon would be ideal. I don’t like carrying all this doom and gloom around with me.”
“I don’t like it, either,” agreed Omar. “This afternoon it is. I’ll call you as soon as I confirm the time.”
“Okay. I’ll be in my suite.”
“I’ll find you there.” He smiled and squeezed my arms.