thing.” I shrug. “I find life’s a whole lot easier when you take it one day at a time.”
“I don’t know how you do it.”
Dr. Gupta raps three times on the door before padding in, a tablet in hand and a stethoscope around her neck. Her eyes dance between the two of us before I head back to the exam table.
“How are you feeling, Maribel?” she asks.
“A little nauseous, a little tired. But otherwise good,” I answer.
“Are you taking your prenatals? Prenatal vitamins?”
“Just started last week.”
“Good, good,” she says, nails clicking on her tablet. “So you’re six weeks and two days, which would put your due date at January sixth of next year.”
“Oh, wow.” It seems so close, yet so far away. And slapping an actual due date on it makes it all the more real.
“Did the nurse talk to you about our classes? We have everything from childbirth techniques to caring for newborns to parenting.”
“She gave me some pamphlets,” I say.
“I highly recommend them. You can bring your partner too.” She glances at Isabelle.
“Oh, she’s not my—”
“I’ll be there,” Isabelle says with a smile, giving me an emerald-eyed wink. I love her.
“Do you have any questions for me?” Dr. Gupta asks, eyeing the door. For some reason, I expected this to take longer. I guess it never dawned on me that people get pregnant every day, and I’m not some special snowflake pregnant lady who needs to hoard all of the good doctor’s time.
I shake my head. “None that I can think of.”
“Well, everything looks great on the ultrasound. Why don’t you stop by the lab on your way out so we can get a quick draw on you, okay? We’ll check a few levels and give you a call if anything looks amiss. Just some standard tests we run on all of our pregnant patients.”
“Sure.”
“Great, Maribel.” She places her hand on my shoulder on her way to the door. “We’ll see you back in late June for your twelve-week ultrasound.”
With that, Dr. Gupta leaves.
“You hungry?” Isabelle asks, rising and gathering her things.
“Always.”
“The usual place?”
I nod.
“You okay?” she asks. “You’re quiet all of a sudden.”
Smiling, I say, “Just letting it all sink in. Doesn’t feel real. Not even with the heartbeat and the due date.”
“Once you start showing, maybe it’ll feel real? Or maybe once you feel it kick?” Isabelle puts her arm around me as we head to the door.
“Maybe?”
“Are you going to find out what it is?” she asks. “Wait, what the hell kind of question is that. Of course you aren’t.”
I laugh. “You know me well.”
Eight
Hudson
* * *
“I’d like to meet your parents, Mari.” I pour her a glass of red wine over a candlelit dinner Friday evening at a romantic Michelin star restaurant on the Upper East Side, Villa Moreno’s. We haven’t seen much of each other this week as I’ve been working longer hours than usual finishing up plans for a public library in Still Creek Township, New Jersey, but it’s time to get back on track.
Reaching for the nearest glass of water, she tosses back a couple gulps in an attempt to disguise a startled choke.
“You never said anything about meeting my parents,” she says when she comes up for air. “I really don’t want to involve them in any of this. I can’t do that to them.”
I take a sip of my wine, swirling it first, then flashing a million-dollar smile. “Why wouldn’t they be a part of this? I’m marrying their daughter.”
“You’re fake-marrying their daughter, which means you’re going to be my fake husband and they’re going to be your fake in-laws. It’s probably better off that they don’t even meet you.”
“Why’s that?”
She sighs. “Honestly, you’re probably not what they had in mind for me. And I don’t even know if they’ll like you. And if they think I’m marrying someone who doesn’t deserve me, it’ll break their hearts.”
“Ouch.”
“I’m just being honest, Hudson.” She takes another sip of water, completely ignoring the hundred-dollar glass of pinot placed before her. “You’re not personable or friendly. You’re not small town. You’re cold and distant and self-important. You’re all business and no fun. They’ve got pretty high hopes, and I don’t think they’d be crazy about their only child growing up to become some fancy-pants architect’s trophy wife.”
“A fancy-pants architect’s trophy wife?” I chuckle. “Is that all you think you’re going to be to me?”
She nods. “Basically.”
“Just as your parents have expectations for your future partner, mine do too. My mother would choke on