Mr. Unavailable #111: The Sad Ultrasound

See Could it Be?, It's Not Him, It's Me, The Recovery, We're Just Not That Into Each Other, The Continuation, The Curse is Broken, Unfortunately, The Make-Up Date, The Phone Call, The Negotiation, Dates 9 Through 12, Dates 13 Through 15, The Public Sex Talk, Bridging the Chasm, The Shut Down, All Kinds of Good, Meeting the Friends, Part 2, Hamptons Getaway, Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4, Happy Birthday to Me, The Drunken Text, Jeckyl and Hyde, The Layoff, One-Man Show, A Boy in Man's Clothing, The Doctors Visit, Giving Him the News and The Appointment for the background on this one.

Just one day after the door incident, I had an appointment at NYU for a more detailed ultrasound in the ongoing hunt for the missing embryo that could kill me. #111 had replied to my email the day before saying he'd still like to go to my next appointment with me, so I told him where and when. He was 15 minutes late--and he was never late, so, clearly, he was making a statement. He didn't apologize or anything when he walked in. I had gone to The Strand that morning and was reading an E.L. Doctorow novel in preparation for a New Yorker Festival panel discussion the next day--a discussion featuring Doctorow, Annie Proulx and Peter Carey that I had originally gotten the two of us tickets for. Clearly, I was making a statement, too.

We had nothing to say to each other. I started to put my book away and he said, "You can keep reading if you want to." So I did, and he got out his cell phone and was laughing as he texted or emailed someone, which bothered me to no end because, naturally, it made me wonder who was on the other end.

Finally, they called us into the examining room and I got undressed and up on the table. I learned from the day before to throw vanity out the window. The first technician came in and did one ultrasound. Again, it hurt--not only from pain but also from fear and #111, who was sitting in a chair next to me, put one arm over the top of my head and held my hand with the other. I squeezed his hand harder every time the technician hit a sensitive spot, digging my nails in just a little bit for my own gratification.

When the technician finished, she said it looked like it was in the cervix, which was a very bad place for it to be. "They did the right thing yesterday in giving you the pill and injection," she said. "They did a very good thing." When she left to get the doctor, I said to #111, "It's ironic that I don't even think I want a kid and this one could have killed me."

Then the doctor came in--an older doctor with a poor bedside manner who was not shy about jamming the ultrasound wand in. More hand squeezing, more nail digging. He had a more tempered diagnosis and told us that it may have miscarried on its own and been on its way out by the time they gave me the drug. "But we'll never know for sure," he said. "Either way, you're fine. This kind of thing happens all the time. With the next one, there will be no problem." That was the twenty-zillionth painful layer to this whole scenario: Everyone we came into contact with didn't know we weren't together.

On our way out, #111 said he was getting a bagel and asked if I wanted to get one, too. "Ess-a-Bagel?" I asked. That was the plan, he said. Sadly, we were always on the same page. It was raining a little and we walked together downtown. The conversation was light--this movie, that movie, Guy-Ritchie-is-a-one-trick-pony, oh-isn't-the-Ess-a-Bagel-decor interesting, teasing me about losing my keys... that sort of thing. Back outside, we were going in different directions, so we gave each other a sad little hug in the rain.

Diagnosis: Sad. Just sad.