“Hmm, not nervous. Guarded excitement.”
“Yeah, me too. You still don’t want to know the sex of the babies?”
I shake my head. “Not yet. I don’t want to have assumptions about them before they come into the world. And with so many things to plan, I want that part to be a surprise.”
His gaze flicks to me, his lips tilted. “That’s a good reason.”
“You can find out confidentially. It’s your choice to make for yourself, Tristan.”
“I’ll wait. But can we at least make a name list? My teammates made me promise to consider hockey-themed ones.”
“I am categorically rejecting anything that rhymes with ‘Zamboni.’”
He’s about to offer a comeback, but I squeak.
Oh shit, Ifeltsomething.
It only happened one other time in the shower, the slightest movement. Like a tiny goldfish flipping inside me and then it was gone.Thissensation in my belly is more like a glide than a flip.
“Is everything OK?” he asks, concerned. Tristan’s hands are tight around the steering wheel as he eases into a parking spot. As soon as he shuts off the engine, he reaches out to me.
“Ligaya, what’s wrong?”
“I felt something.” I grab his wrist and press his hand low on my abdomen. “There.”
This time, there’s a slight poke at the right side of my belly. Tristan’s eyes are wide as saucers.
“That was the twins? That wasn’t gas?”
“That was not gas.” I laugh. “That was one of our kids doing a backflip.”
He laughs, too, and then we’re both kind of quiet. His hand stays where it is, tenderly caressing.
“I think that’s it,” I say. “We don’t want to be late.”
Inside, a different tech meets us in the room. She’s kind and quick with instructions, smoothing warm gel over my belly. Tristan sits near my head, watching the monitor like it’s live coverage of a championship tournament. We take each other’s hands automatically, his thumb brushing across my knuckles.
The babies flicker into view. Two glowing peanut-shaped silhouettes moving in slow motion. The details aren’t clear, but the shape hints at their spines, their heads, their alien-like profiles.
Then, the technician frowns. She tilts the wand, types something and slides the mouse to manipulate what appears to be a measuring tool on the screen. The mood shifts slightly.
“Is something wrong?” I ask, tightening my grip on Tristan’s hand.
“The doctor will be in shortly,” she says by way of answer.
Tristan and I stare at each other wordlessly. Annie swoops in and takes the spot of the tech. She asks how we’re doing—the usual polite chatter—but our answers are monosyllabic. Neither of us are in the mood for small talk.
“Alright,” she says, turning to the screen. “These little ones are at a beautiful stage. Early anatomy’s formed, and now they’re practicing breathing. You might be feeling more defined movements. Little pops or nudges?”
“More like flips than pops,” I say. “Random and quick, usually, but today it was more like a graze.”
Tristan squeezes my hand, grinning at the screen and then at me. “It was amazing to feel it under my hand. I can’t imagine what it’s like from inside.”
The wand slides across my belly, and the black-and-white fuzz blooms into shape. Two round heads, stacked like tiny moons in orbit. One of them jerks an arm, the movement sharper than before, and I swear I feel it inside me a second later.
“This one’s more active today,” Annie says, tracing the outline with her cursor. “And over here, see this? Baby’s practicing those breathing motions. Chest expanding and contracting. That’s a great sign.”
I focus on the smaller one, curled in tight. “Is it OK that one of them is so much smaller than the other?” The words stick in my throat.
