“I told you. Trust your gut. It's never let you down yet.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence.” They both picked up their coats, and Alex helped Annabelle into hers, and the three of them turned off the lights, locked the door, and waited for the elevator to take them to their busy days. Sam kissed them both on the street and then hailed a cab, and Alex walked Annabelle to school on Lexington, as Annabelle chattered to her, and they laughed and joked all the way there. Annabelle scampered into school easily, and Alex hailed a cab and headed downtown a moment later.
Brock was already waiting in her office for her, with all the pertinent files spread out, and there were five messages waiting on her desk, all unrelated to the Schultz case. Two of them were from the previous day's prospective client, and she jotted a note to herself to call him before she left the office.
As usual, Brock was extremely organized, and his notes on the case were extremely helpful. She thanked him, and praised him for his hard work, as they finished their work around eleven-thirty. There were still half a dozen things she needed to do before she left, but her doctor's appointment was uptown at noon, and she only had time to make a few phone calls.
“Anything else I can do to help?” he asked in his usual casual style, and she glanced at the notes on her desk, feeling frantic. She could come back to work, of course, that afternoon, and let Carmen take Annabelle to ballet, but she knew Annabelle would be disappointed. But she always seemed to be late or rushed, or trying to do too many things. Her life always felt like a relay race, with no one to pass the baton to. She certainly couldn't pass it to Sam, he had his own life to lead, and his own business headaches to attend to. At least she had Brock to help at the office. And as she thought of it, she handed him two of her messages, and asked him to return the calls for her.
“That would really help.” She smiled gratefully at him.
“Happy to do it. Anything else?” He looked at her warmly. He liked working with her, he always had, their styles were amazingly similar. It was like dancing with the perfect partner.
“You could go to my doctor for me for a checkup.”
“Happy to do that too,” he grinned, and she laughed in exasperation.
“I wish you could.” It almost seemed like a waste of time now. She was fine, and she knew it. She had never felt better. And she could talk to him on the phone about the Serophene. And as she thought of that, she glanced at her watch and made a quick decision. She dialed his number from memory, and was going to postpone the appointment, but the line was busy, and she didn't want to be rude and just not show up. He was good at what he did, and he had been very attentive to her. He had delivered Annabelle, and had been part of the three-year pursuit of pregnancy since then. It didn't seem right to just stand him up. She tried again, found the line still busy, and stood up and grabbed her coat, in spite of her irritation.
“I guess I'd better go, he probably has his phone off the hook,” she joked, “so he doesn't lose business. Call me if you think of anything we missed on the Schultz case. I'll be home all weekend.”
“Don't worry about it. I'll call if I need to. Why don't you just forget about it. Everything is really ready for him. And we can review it all on Monday. Enjoy your weekend.”
“You sound like my husband. And what are you going to do?” she asked as she shrugged into her coat and picked up her briefcase.
“Work here all weekend of course. What do you think?” He laughed.
“Great. So don't make me any speeches. You enjoy your weekend too.” She wagged a finger at him, but she was glad that he was so conscientious, and he knew it. “Thanks for everything. I really appreciate it.”
“Just forget it. It's going to go perfectly on Wednesday.”
“Thanks, Brock.” She flew out the door then with a wave at Liz, and five minutes later she was in a cab on her way to Park and Seventy-second. She felt a little stupid going to him, she had nothing new to report, and her complaints about the effects of the Serophene weren't new to him either. But she needed a Pap smear anyway, and it always soothed her to discuss her reproductive problems with him. John Anderson was an old friend, and he listened to her worries and complaints with concern and interest. And he was deeply sympathetic to her fear that she wouldn't get pregnant again. He reminded her that there was nothing wrong with either of them, but there was no denying that she hadn't gotten pregnant in three years. There was no specific medical reason for it, but her job was stressful certainly, and she was just that much older. They discussed the Pergonal shots again, their advantages and risks, and the possibility of in vitro fertilization, though at forty-two she was not thought to be an excellent candidate for it. They discussed ZIFT, and GIFT, and the newer technologies like donor eggs, which did not appeal to her at all. And in the end, they decided to stay with the Serophene, and he talked to her about trying artificial insemination with Sam's sperm the following month, if he'd agree, to give the egg and the sperm a better chance to “meet up,” as he put it. He made it all seem very simple, and a lot less upsetting than it could be.
And then he did a routine exam, and the Pap smear, and after looking at her chart, asked her when she'd last had a mammogram, because he didn't see the results for any the previous year, and she admitted she hadn't had one.
“I haven't had one in two years.” But she'd never had a lump or problem, and there was no history of it in her family. It was one of those things she just didn't worry about, although she was religious about getting annual Pap smears. And there were a variety of theories about mammograms at her age anyway, about whether to have one every year, or every other.
“You really ought to get one every year,” he scolded. “After forty, that's important.” He was of the “every year” school of thinking. He palpated her breasts, and found nothing there. She was small-busted, and had nursed Annabelle, all of which were supposedly good news against breast cancer, and she'd already been told that the hormones she was taking did not increase the risk of cancer, which she had found reassuring. “When are you ovulating again?” he asked offhandedly, glancing at her chart.
“Tomorrow or the next day,” she said matter-of-factly.
“Then I think you ought to get a mammogram today. If you get pregnant tomorrow, it could be two years before you have one. You won't want to get one while you're pregnant, and they're inaccurate while you're nursing. I really want you to get one today, and then it's done with, and we don't have to think about it for another year. How about it?”
She glanced at her watch, feeling mildly exasperated. She wanted to pick Annabelle up at school, and take her home to lunch, and then to Miss Tilly's. “I really shouldn't. I've got things to do.”
“This is important, Alex. I think you should make time for it.” He sounded unusually firm, which worried her, and she looked at him with a sudden question.
“Do you feel something that warrants it?” He had palpated her breasts very carefully, but he always did that. And he shook his head no in answer to her question.
“Not at all. But I don't want you to have a problem later. You don't want to be careless about mammograms, Alex. They're just too important. Please. I think you should do it.” He was so insistent that she didn't have the heart to ignore him, and he was right, if she got pregnant that weekend, however unlikely it might seem, she wouldn't be able to get a mammogram for a year or two, so it was probably a good idea to do it.