Chapter 3 - The Three HeartbeatsAt six-thirty the next morning, I called my obstetrician’s office. Graham drove me to the clinic without asking a single intrusive question.
Dr. Helen Marsh had been my physician for six years. She had guided me through five brutal IVF attempts, holding my hand through every heartbreak.
I lay on the exam table, staring up at the white ceiling tiles while she prepared the ultrasound probe. White tiles. Fluorescent lights. Rooms where hope had been translated into medical statistics.
Helen grew very quiet as she moved the transducer over my lower abdomen. My heart stopped. “What is it, Helen?”
She moved the monitor toward me. “Clara... there are three.”
I laughed because the alternative was screaming. “What?”
“Three gestational sacs,” Helen pointed to the black-and-white screen. “Three heartbeats.”
“That isn’t possible,” I breathed, staring at the three distinct, tiny shapes flickering on the monitor.
“I’ve been practicing medicine long enough to be cautious with that sentence,” Helen smiled warmly, handing me tissues as tears spilled over my cheeks. “A triplet pregnancy requires extreme care. Does Raymond know?”
I looked at the three small images on the paper thermal printout. “No. And not today.”
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When I returned to Harbor House, Graham was waiting beside the front desk. I held up the ultrasound photograph, my chest rising and falling. “I’m pregnant. With triplets.”
Graham’s eyes widened, and then a slow, grandfatherly smile spread across his face. “That, my dear, sounds like the start of a very grand rebellion.”
