SIX
And that was what had brought Macy face to face again with Aaron in his office.
“I’ve been to an OB-GYN,” she told him. “I managed to rush the appointment because you were coming back, and I didn’t want to delay telling you.” She waited for his reaction and braced herself. It came with a look of panic on Aaron’s face that matched the way she felt when she saw the plus signs on the sticks.
“PREGNANT?” It was both a question and an exclamation.
Macy shook her head solemnly, the assertiveness with which she entered now turning to trepidation. More softly than he, she repeated the word. “Pregnant.”
“Okay,” Aaron said, looking down and nodding, taking in the initial reality of the situation. “Pregnant. You’re pregnant.”
“I own my responsibility for this,” said Macy from across his office desk. “The morning we left your penthouse together, there was still time to go to the drugstore and get a morning-after pill. I didn’t do that. So instead…I ended up going for pregnancy tests. This is on me.”
“Macy, it’s not,” he said, looking back up at her. “It’s on both of us. We did this together. I couldn’t stop…”
“…and I didn’t want you to.”
“What do you want to do now?” he asked.
“I think…” she hesitated to go on. She had not spoken of this to anyone except the physician. It was difficult to get her voice out. As irrational as the thought was, she felt as if she were being scrutinized by some invisible judge or judges, waiting to pass a verdict on her every word. “I think…I want to have it.”
“Are you sure?”
Macy hesitated again, as if waiting for some clap of thunder to sound at what she had just said out loud. There was no reason for it, but the feeling was there, and she could not make it go away. There must have been something in her background, in her upbringing, that she had gotten from her parents or her relatives or her teachers—someone. At this moment, she hated whoever or whatever had put this feeling there. It was as unwanted as her condition was unplanned.
“You have to know,” said Aaron, “I would never think of asking you, or expecting you, to go through with this if it wasn’t what you really wanted. Neither of us was planning this. Neither of us wanted this to happen or was trying to make this happen. All we wanted to do was go to bed and enjoy each other, which we did and we wanted to do again. A lot. If you go through with this, it’s going to change things, change everything—for both of us. It’s going to take us both to places we never counted on going. If you wanted to stop it, right now…I wouldn’t hold it against you.”
“I don’t think I can stop it,” said Macy. “I don’t think I’d really want to, even knowing I can. It’s just such a huge thing. Stopping it, not having it—it’s as big a thing as having it. This is huge. And I’d have to go through the rest of my life knowing I’d stopped it and wondering how it would have been if I’d had it. It’s not a moral thing. It’s not about what people say women were meant for or what we’re obligated to do. It’s just about my own feelings. I wouldn’t want to feel the way I’d feel if I didn’t have it. I’d never forget; I’d always know. Having it would change my life, but so would not having it. And I don’t think I’d want to spend the rest of my life with the feeling I’d have…if I didn’t have it.”
“I understand. I just wanted you to know I’m not putting any expectations on you, Macy. I’m not the kind of guy who thinks a woman he’s gotten pregnant, or a baby, is his property and what the woman does is for him to decide. I hate that kind of caveman thinking. I know I don’t own you, even if the baby is mine. This is a child. It’s a life, not a possession. And it’s your body. You’re the one who’s going to have to go through this whole thing. So, I just wanted to say I get it, that you don’t have to if you don’t want to.”
Macy actually felt her shoulders grow more relaxed, lighter, to hear him say that. She felt some of the tension go out of her muscles. He understood. He actually understood! But even so, she needed to ask: “Aaron…how would you feel…how would you really feel…if I didn’t?”
He took a beat to consider his answer. Then, sincerely, Aaron replied, “I guess I’d always wonder. I wouldn’t resent you for it, but I’d always wonder a thousand things about it. Would it be a boy? Would he look like me—his human self? What kinds of things would make him laugh? What would he love to do—leaving aside that with me as his father I pretty much know what he’d most love to do?” Macy couldn’t stop herself from smiling at that. “What would he be good at? What would he do with his life? I’d wonder all these things. And I guess, if I’m really honest…I’d be sad. The thing I’d wonder most, I guess, is what kind of dad I’d make.”
“And you wouldn’t resent me for not letting you find out?”
“I’d be sorry. I’d wonder. But…I wouldn’t hate you.”
“Well,” said Macy, “I think you’re going to get your chance—because I can’t stop it. Even knowing what it’s going to do to me for the next nine months, and what I’m going to have to go through to have it, and how it’s going to change the rest of my life to something I never counted on…I can’t stop it. I just…can’t.” She closed her eyes, and in the dark behind her eyelids, she saw flashes of a whole life playing itself out. She knew it would probably be nothing like the little glimpses she was seeing, but still, that life was coming. The decision she’d made would bring it.
“Macy,” she heard him say, “…look at me.”
She opened her eyes again and saw Aaron holding his hands out to her across the desk. She leaned forward and gave him her hands.
“Listen,” Aaron continued. “You know something? There’s nothing to be afraid of here. Not a damn thing. Think of who we are. Think of everything you and I have to offer a kid, everything we can do for a child. Yeah, there’s the money—but there’s us. What we’ve got to offer is you and me. And we’re a hell of a thing for a kid to have, coming into the world. You for a mom, me for a dad—hell, that kid is already set for life.”
Aaron gave Macy’s hands a squeeze, and she felt the confidence in both his touch and his words. Why shouldn’t Aaron Bedford look at the prospect of fatherhood with implicit confidence, after all? He had built empires. He had earned millions—a billion. If anyone in the world was prepared for the ultimate challenge of fatherhood, it was this man.
He released her hands, stood up, and stepped around the desk. He held out his arms to her again and repeated what he’d asked her when she first arrived: “Come here.”
This time, Macy did not hesitate. She rose from the chair and went into his beckoning arms. He held her with all the tenderness of the way he had embraced her that last morning at his penthouse. After all the shock and dread and anxiety with which Macy had lived since she took the home tests, this feeling was like a reward for what she’d been through—and a promise that everything would be all right.
Holding her close, Aaron said, “I’m going to clear out the rest of my day. This is no day to work. This is a day just to think about us. Just us.” He parted their embrace to touch her blouse where her belly was. “And whoever this is in here. So, I’m canceling everything. I deserve a day off, after how hard I’ve worked the last couple of weeks, and no way am I working today now that I know about this. I’m taking us to lunch; I want you well-fed for whoever this is. Then, I’m taking you home—back to your place. And we’re spending the rest of the day and tonight together.” He leaned forward and kissed her, his gentlest, sweetest kiss.
After the kiss, Macy looked up into his eyes and knew—though she would have known regardless—what they would be doing after lunch and into the night.
_______________
Macy had not seen Aaron naked since that night when they watched each other on their computers. As she stepped out of the bathroom where she had left everything but her bra and panties in the hamper, here he was, his clothes draped over the bench at her dressing table, his massive maleness hanging hard and proud at the junction of his mighty thighs. She felt the same thrill that he’d always given her, the thrill that had now changed the future for each of them.
She stood beside the bed, and Aaron walked over to her. He first embraced her gently and kissed her the same as he had at his office. He unhooked her bra and let it fall to the floor. He slipped his hands under her panties and pulled them down, then lowered himself to one knee and carried the undergarment with him, pulling it down to her ankles and letting her step out of it. Then, he stood up before her again, erect on his feet and between his legs, and began to run his fingertips over her breasts, hardening her nipples.
A curious look was on his face, a look that Macy did not understand until Aaron said, “This…this is new for me. I’ve never done it to a woman I’ve gotten pregnant before.” He put his fingertip in the groove of her womanhood and moved it up and down, moistening it with her juices and lighting the fire in her again. “When I do it to you now, it’ll be knowing that one of those times I stuck my thing in here,” referring to where his finger was, “and came in you at my place…it was a life changer. This is just new.”
“It’ll be even newer in about twelve weeks,” said Macy. “That’s when the doctor says the bump will start to show.”
Aaron chuckled and continued to move his finger along her groove. “Oh, the bump. Don’t worry about the bump. I’ll want you just as much when you’re showing, believe me. Seeing you with the bump and knowing how it got there…I’m gonna have to read up on what kind of positions to do it in while we’re expecting. As long as it’s safe, that is. Not wanting to be in you because you’ve gotten big is not going to be a thing. I’ll have a wicked boner for you just the same.”
Macy ran her hands up over the muscular plates of his Olympic chest. “Between you and…whoever…I can tell I’ll never get a moment’s rest.”
He kissed her again. “You'll be getting plenty of other kinds of moments, at least from Dad, here.” He glanced over behind her at the waiting bed. “Let’s lie down.”
Again, Aaron was on top of her, and again he was stroking deep inside her. It amazed Macy once again how little foreplay they needed. Just the sight of him naked and ready for her was enough to make her ready for him. And she was ready—so ready. It surprised her to find that knowing she was pregnant with him brought her to the heights of desire. The entrance to her sex, her wet and tightening inner reaches, her entire body, welcomed Aaron home. Macy lay under him and roamed with her hands up and down his back and over his hard and heaving buttocks, and let him hump and thrust away all the worries and dread that had accumulated in her for days.
With Aaron’s throbbing length beating in and out of her, Macy opened her entire being to what she felt for him, and what he made her feel. He had caught her so unprepared that first time in his wine room when he backed her up against the wall and stripped below the waist to show her what he had to offer her. Every time he had mounted or entered her since then, she had relived that moment. Since then, she had given herself fully into the experience of him, and each time had only made her want him more. Lying under him now with their loins together and the head of his tool reaching for the womb where he had put their child, Macy grasped at Aaron’s neck and groped his butt cheeks, and moaned and whimpered at him, and the whole truth of her feelings unfolded in her heart. She did not only want him. She did not merely yearn for him. She craved him. In the weeks and months to come, she fully expected, she would feel different cravings. But none of them would compare to her utter, absolute craving for Aaron’s mouth on hers, for his body, for his urgently and relentlessly pumping piston. In the searing seconds when their mouths were not together, Macy gasped out, “Don’t stop, Aaron…don’t stop…don’t take it out…oh, I want you…”
With torrid kisses on her lips and cheeks, Aaron grunted back, “Yeah…yeah, Macy, I love sticking it in you so much…it’s so f…ing good…damn, it’s good…uuuhhh…I love f…ing you so much…”
After all the times he’d done it to her, Macy sensed something different about the way Aaron was doing it this time. There was a subtle change in his stroke and thrust, in his touch, and in his kiss. He was pouring out his constant need to bring their bodies together, but there was now a new feeling added. It was something more than arousal, more than passion, more than the sheer and boundless pleasure of their conjoining. Clutching at his buttocks to urge him on, then moving her hands up his back and lifting her thighs to enclose his hips, Macy felt the feeling rise in her with his every thrust and penetration. It was there, and it was undeniable. She knew it was real, and she knew she was returning the feeling.
Aaron was making love to her. He was giving her his fantastically hardened wood inside her soft, tight, and yielding wetness—but he was also giving her his love. She was sure of it. And in receiving him, she was loving him back.
Tearing his mouth from hers, Aaron reared back his head while the full length of his tool lodged deep inside her, and he roared out his orgasm even as he poured the thick and free-flowing stream of his seed into the place where it had already started a new life. The powerful pulsing of the head of his instrument, pouring out his cream into her, did the job for Macy as well. She moaned out her own climax and held him in a vise-like grip with her hips, keeping him in her for as long as he could be, until his tool softened and he fell on top of her, spent but elated. Aaron almost sounded as if he were sobbing. “I missed you so much. I missed being in you. I need you, Macy. Damn, I need to be in you…”
Exhaling under him, taking in the heat of his sated body, Macy said, “I need you too, Aaron. I need you…” She stroked his hair and his shoulders and let herself go into the hazy bliss where their sex had taken her so many times before. But in that bliss now was that other feeling, the feeling that she knew would be there every time now. She welcomed it, as she welcomed him.
Afterwards, they lay in each other’s arms, kissing and touching. Aaron fondled her breasts, and Macy caressed his softened and moistened member, and they savored his having been inside her after his time away, and anticipated what would soon be his next time on top of her. And that was when the words came softly pouring out.
“Macy,” he said, “we can make this work. We absolutely can, I know it. You know how I know?”
“How?” she asked, flicking the tip of her tongue on his lower lip.
“Because of how I feel right now. And how I’ve been feeling when I’m in you. My whole life, I’ve screwed around because I enjoyed it. And I enjoy it with you, more than anyone else I’ve had. It was new for me just now, doing it to you while you’re pregnant. But it’s been new all along. It’s new because…I’m not just screwing you. I’m loving you. This is my love, Macy. I’ve fallen in love. I love our baby. And I love you.”
Macy locked eyes with him, and her own eyes welled with tears. To hear this now, after the uncertainty of the days just past, was everything she needed. She stroked his face and said, “Aaron…I love you. You’re right. Everything we’ve done, it turned into love, so fast we didn’t even know it was happening. I love you.”
He pulled her all the way into his arms and took her mouth in a kiss that sealed the feelings they had just expressed. She curled her thigh around him, he grasped her bottom, and they rocked back and forth on the bed. They felt as though they had the whole world right there where they were. And soon enough, Aaron had her on her back with his erection deep inside her again.
_______________
The next weeks were pure happiness. They awoke together every morning. When Macy was feeling ill from her condition, Aaron was patient, even doting. He served her tea and crackers in bed. He rubbed her feet. After hours, they met at her place or at his. Aaron, ever the exhibitionist with his perfect body, was never clothed for long, preferring to be naked when they were alone together. They did not always go right to sex. Sometimes, they sat on the bed or the sofa together, and Macy let him massage her feet. Sometimes, he just held her and put his hand on her stomach, in silent awe of what was growing inside her. But it always returned to sex—glorious, love-drenched sex, the celebration of what their lives were becoming.
They found another OB-GYN in the city, an Asian woman, Dr. Ling, who was familiar with weredragon life and child-rearing. They began regular visits to her office, and Dr. Ling told Macy what she could expect as the mother of a Nathairfear baby. She showed them pictures of Nathairfear infants in their earliest transformations, which occurred after their first birthday. She played videos of weredragon parents caring for their infant and helping it through its first change. It was all to prepare Macy for the unique experience that awaited her as the mother of Aaron’s child. Preparation, they knew, was key.
All the preparation in the world could not make them ready for what happened when they visited Dr. Ling in the sixth week.
With her stomach bare and slathered with gel, Macy lay on Dr. Ling’s table, Aaron standing at her side and holding her hand. Dr. Ling moved the transducer wand over Macy’s exposed midsection, which made Macy think whimsically of a good fairy performing a spell. Aaron had already cast a spell of his own, and with a much nicer wand. She and Aaron watched the doctor work, and watched the shifting image in greys and blacks take shape on the monitor. They noticed something about the doctor’s manner. She seemed to be gazing particularly intently at the image. They assumed that she paid such minute, careful attention to the developing babies of all her patients, and they thought nothing of it until Ling began to squint and purse her lips. “Hmm…” she said. “Hmmm…well now, I think we have something interesting here.”
Macy glanced over at Aaron. They squeezed hands, concerned. Then Aaron addressed the doctor. “What is it? What are you seeing?”
New anxiety lit up inside Macy. “Is something wrong? Is something the matter with the baby? Has something happened?”
The doctor looked at them with an unreadable expression—unreadable, but calm. Then, she softly smiled and replied, “You might say that. Something has happened.”
Squeezing Aaron’s hand again, Macy asked, “What? Just tell us. What’s wrong?”
“There’s nothing wrong,” Ling replied. “It’s just…something I didn’t expect.”
“Is it all right?” Aaron asked insistently.
“Not ‘it,’ Mr. Bedford,” Ling answered. “Them.”
Aaron’s eyes widened. He looked down at Macy, whose mouth hung open wordlessly. Macy’s eyes darted back and forth between Aaron and the doctor. She managed to stammer out, “Th-them?”
“Them,” the doctor said with a nod.
“Twins?” Aaron blurted.
“Not two,” the doctor said. “Three. There are three of them.”
Macy gasped loudly, then looked up at Aaron, more shocked now by far than she had been when she saw the plus signs on the sticks. She was close to screaming. “THREE?”
The doctor nodded again. “Triplets.”
Aaron let his hand slip from Macy’s. He rustled both hands through his hair. He spun around on his heels. “Holy crap!” he cried. “Triplets! TRIPLETS! We’ve been preparing for a him or a her and we’re having a…THEM!”
Macy, the hand that a moment ago held Aaron’s now lolling at her side, stared blankly and numbly at the sonogram screen. “Triplets…” she breathed.
“Here, let me show you,” Ling offered. And she began to point out the little shapes that she had found on the image of what was happening in Macy’s body. She indicated them, one at a time. Three.
The number reverberated in Macy’s mind and Aaron’s.
Three.