blockages in both your tubes.”
My stomach turns over. “Meaning?”
“Meaning that in order to conceive, you’d most likely be looking at fertility treatments and probably have to go straight to IVF. The problem with endometriosis is that we can go in and remove it, but it can come back. It leaves you at a high risk for an ectopic pregnancy, which is automatically not a viable pregnancy, plus it’s a potentially life-threatening situation for the mother. Not to mention that if we didn’t catch an ectopic pregnancy in time, you could lose an ovary and a fallopian tube.” She pats my leg. “This is a lot of information for you to get all at once. Do you want me to have Adam come down or call Ethel in?”
I shake my head, coming out of a fog. “You said Dr. Ramirez told me this?”
“Yes, but obviously because of your accident, you don’t remember. Now, I suggest just restarting the pill at this point. Let’s have you go home, talk to Adam, then we’ll get back together. There are some great surgeons and fertility treatments available.”
“What are the chances of them being successful?”
She sighs. “You need to go through more tests, Lucy. More recent ones. Dr. Ramirez put your endometriosis at stage four. We need to see if surgery is even an option.”
“How could I have not known this?”
“Well, you’ve had painful periods and the pills, and the IUD probably helped you with the pain. But sometimes women just don’t feel it. The symptoms come and go, and most chalk it up to a stomach issue rather than a reproductive issue. But we’ll figure this out.”
“Can I see the notes from Dr. Ramirez?”
She hems for a moment. “Sure. They haven’t been scanned in yet, so give me a second.”
She leaves, and thank God Ethel doesn’t try to come in. My phone pings in my purse, but I ignore it, hopping down to get dressed while I wait.
Stella returns right after I get my second shoe on. I stare at the date on my last visit with Dr. Ramirez and bile rushes up my throat. Last March.
“Thank you,” I say.
I walk out of the room, past Ethel and Dori, past the damn waterfall, and once I’m outside, I bend over and throw up in the trash can. I finally have the answer, but it’s far from the one I wanted.
I tell Ethel and Dori that I’m fine, I just have an upset stomach. On the way home, I hear the agitation in my voice when I have to explain what an IUD is.
All Ethel says is, “It stays there?”
They drop me home and I send Adam a message that we’ll talk when he gets home, but that I’m fine.
Fine should be my new slogan. Just a T-shirt that says “I’m fine” so I can point at it when people ask.
I go out to the deck and call my mom. She answers on the fifth ring, which means she probably wasn’t going to answer at all but couldn’t help herself.
“Lucy,” she says as if I’m a telemarketer.
“Did you know why I left Adam? You did, didn’t you? You purposely kept this from me?”
“Luce,” she says in the same way she has every time she’s hidden something from me.
“Tell me!” I scream. “I have a right to know. Did you know that’s why I left him?”
She’s silent.
“There’s my answer. How could you ever call yourself a mother? How could you let me come back here and rekindle things with him, knowing I can’t give him the one thing he wants? Was it just to hurt him? Hurt the Greenes? Hurt me as punishment for staying?” I can’t stop yelling as tears stream down my face.
All I can envision is despair and disappointment in the hazel eyes I love so much.
“I told you to come home. I didn’t want you up there, but you were defiant like always. What was I to do?”
“Tell me! Tell me you knew why I left, so at the very least I could’ve told him before we fell back in love.” I hate saying we fell back in love, because in my mind, I’ve always loved him.
“If he really loves you, Lucy, he’ll understand this is out of your control.”
“Mom!” I shake my head, unable to talk to her with the rage simmering through my veins. “I never want to talk to you again.” I click end call.
Sitting on the patio chair, I bury my head in my hands. How on earth