Happy Birthday by Danielle Steel Read Free Book Online Page B

from her last menstrual period, April was now ten weeks pregnant. The doctor suggested they do a sonogram to see how things looked. It was standard procedure for a normal ten-week visit for pregnant patients. April agreed and was relieved that they had the sonogram equipment right in the office.
    A nurse led her into a dimly lit room, had her drink three glasses of water, and wait twenty minutes, and told her not to empty her bladder and to put a gown on. After April lay down on the table, the technician applied gel to her belly, turned on the machine, and moved a metal wand around in the gel, as April watched the screen. And then she saw it, the tiny little being nestled deep inside her. It had the shape and look of a baby but was tiny, and its heart was beating regularly. The technician told hereverything was fine, as she showed her where the head was, and the “rump,” as she called it, and the little stems that were becoming arms and legs. This was a baby, not just an idea, or a mistake she had made with a total stranger. This was already a life, with a heart, and one day a soul and a mind. As she looked at the screen, April felt sick, as tears ran down her cheeks. She had never felt so overwhelmed or so alone, and at the same time so close to anything or anyone in her life. It was an avalanche of conflicting emotions all at once. She hadn’t been prepared for how she would feel when she saw it. It changed everything she had thought about a baby for the past week.
    “Everything is fine,” the technician patted her arm and reassured her, then handed her a printout of what they had seen on the screen. April was still holding the photograph in her hand when she walked back into the office to see the doctor.
    “I’m keeping it,” she said in a hoarse voice, as she sat down across the desk from her again, and the doctor watched her.
    “Are you sure?” she asked her, and April nodded.
    “I’m sure. I’ll make it work somehow.” She couldn’t get rid of it, and now she didn’t want to.
    “Then we’ll see you in a month,” the doctor said as she stood up, smiling at her. “If you change your mind, let me know. We still have some leeway timewise, not much, but we have a few weeks, if you decide not to proceed with the pregnancy after all.” But it was no longer just a pregnancy to April, after what she’d seen on the sonogram, it was a baby. This wasn’t what she had wanted to do with her life, but she was two months pregnant.Her due date was in June. She had a baby now and a due date. She walked out of the doctor’s office in a daze, feeling stunned. The decision had been made. And April knew she wouldn’t change her mind.
    She hailed a cab and went back downtown to the restaurant, and as soon as she got there, she went upstairs and called her mother.
    “I’m keeping it,” she said softly. Valerie was still at work.
    “Keeping what, darling?” She had just come out of a meeting and had a thousand things on her mind. “Oh my God,” she said, before April could answer the question. “You are? Are you sure that’s what you want to do?” She wasn’t happy to hear it, and April could tell.
    “I saw it on the sonogram, Mom. It looks like a baby. I can’t do it. I want to have it.” She was crying as she said it, and listening to her, Valerie started to cry too.
    “Are you going to tell the father?” She was desperately worried about her daughter.
    “I don’t know yet. All I know is that I’m going to have it. I’ll have to figure out the rest as I go along.”
    “All right,” Valerie said firmly, “let me know what I can do. Thank God you’re not feeling sick. I was sick as a dog with you.” This wasn’t the choice she had hoped April would make, but she was willing to go along with it and support her. “You’re sure?”
    “I’m sure,” April said firmly.
    “And when is this going to happen?” Valerie asked with dread.
    “In June,” April said, smiling for the first time in a