The doctor and sonographer laughed, as did the nurse.
“That it does. Next time you have your sonogram, he or she will look a little more human-like. And notice I said a little more. I get the ‘he looks like an alien’ quite a bit.”
“I’d say nine and a half weeks. Or a little less,” the doctor guessed.
My heart raced. Nine weeks would put it just shy of the night that Miller and I had…I shut the thought down. I’d promised myself I wouldn’t question it. What’s done was done, and we were going to be a happy family, no matter what.
“Yes,” Mrs. Brewer confirmed. “Nine weeks. The due date should be around the first week in October!”
Miller squeezed my hand. “That’s the week of my birthday.”
His grin was contagious, and I couldn’t help but kiss his hand, excited that he was excited.
“Alright,” Mrs. Brewer said, hitting a couple more buttons on the screen.
Papers started to print out, and she handed us both a copy. “There you go! Baby’s first picture.”
I started to cry.
Miller cleared his throat, and then tucked it into the front of his pocket, right above his heart, and directly behind his badge.
“Perfect,” I said, sitting up once the wand was taken from me.
“Now, I’ll want to see you back in a month. We should be close to telling the sex of the baby by then,” the doctor said as he headed towards the door. “Is there anything else you need?”
I shook my head. “No, you’ve answered them all, thank you.”
With that, the room emptied, and I was left alone with Miller.
“Well?” I asked him.
He’d been staring at the picture still in my hand, eyes never wavering.
His gaze slid to me. “I’m happy.”
My tears, which had just started to dry up, started to well again. “I’m happy, too. So happy I could scream.”
He leaned forward and gave me a kiss on the forehead. “Just wait till we’re outside, or they’ll think I’m beating you.”
I snorted and hopped up, my ass flopping free of the paper gown they had me in.
Miller took advantage and smacked it, causing me to jump in surprise.
“Hey!” I said indignantly.
He grinned. “It was hanging out. It wasn’t my fault.”
I glared at him, but got dressed anyway.
“Do you want to head to lunch after this?” I asked, slipping my shirt back on over my head.
“Sure,” he said.
I looked over my shoulder to see him staring at my ass, and had to laugh.
“Down, boy.”
He winked, grabbing my panties off the chair and tossing them at my face.
“If you don’t want me to look, how about you cover it?”
I caught the panties and slipped them on, making quick work of putting them and my pants on.
My shoes came last, but since I was wearing flip flips, it didn’t much matter.
“Ready,” I said, snatching my picture from his hand and shouldering my purse.
He pulled my hair, “Lead the way, Mercy Me.”
I did, down the hallway, out of the office, and into the bright sunshine.
My hair whipped about my face at the blast of wind, and I giggled when it flew into Miller’s face.
What shocked me, though, was that his eyes were alert and oriented on something far out into the parking lot.
“What is it?” I said, catching my hair and twisting it before tucking it under my shirt.
His eyes followed an old, black car out of the parking lot, watching it drive down the road unhurriedly.
“Miller?” I asked in concern.
His eyes didn’t meet mine until the car was completely gone from his sight.
“Yeah?” He asked.
“What was it?”
He shook his head. “Nothing. It was nothing.”***Linda
The next morning
“Do you see this, my son? Do you see the craziness? Look at our house! I can’t believe you gave that to her! Her, of all people!” I gestured to our old place with a sweep of my hand.
My eyes turned from the ruined house to the silver urn that was holding my son’s ashes. The one I’d been carrying around since he’d been handed back over to me.
The paper delivery driver stopped at the end of the driveway, gawked at the place where our home had once stood only twelve hours before, and finally threw the paper.
Why, I couldn’t tell you. It was more than obvious, even to me, that the house’s occupants were no longer there.
Nonetheless, though, I walked down there and retrieved it.
It was a habit, keeping up with the happenings in the city.
If I didn’t know what was going on around me, I seemed to be a little…unsettled.
My son had kept me grounded, and now that he was gone, because of that stupid bitch of a whore, I no longer had that peace that used to keep me calm.
Then, what little ‘calm’ I had, evaporated when I saw the story on the front page of the paper.
Hometown sweetheart marries Kilgore SWAT officer.
That stupid bitch!
Didn’t she realize what kind of prize she had in my son? What kind of life he could’ve given her?
Then the words underneath captured my gaze, and I knew what I had to do.
Couple to celebrate their wedding this Saturday night at Sacred Spur Ranch.
Bye bye, Mr. and Mrs. Spurlock. I hope you burn in hell.Chapter 23I didn’t choose this life, I chose him.
-Mercy
Mercy
Two days later
“Sometimes my brain shuts off where I sort of zone out for a while, and it’s nice to know that when I snap out of it, I can turn to you and be like, ‘We need to build a fallout shelter to protect ourselves from the zombie apocalypse,’ and you’ll give it serious consideration,” I said into the microphone at our reception dinner, my eyes on my husband. “That’s why I wanted to marry you. You put up with my quirkiness. You protect me, shelter me, and love me. There’s not one thing I would change about our relationship. It may have started on the verge of impossible, but you stuck with me, and loved me through it. I love you, Miller Genuine Spurlock, and I’m proud to be your wife.”
My eyes started to fill with tears during the first of the speech, and by the end of it, I was genuinely crying, tears pouring down my face in fast rivulets.