Ava, p.4
Ava, page 4
“We’d like term policies for the whole family,” Kaiden told him, and Allie nodded in agreement.
“Oh! You’d like a policy for the two-year-old as well? We can do that. They are relatively inexpensive. I know it’s a tough reality to think about losing your child, but it’s a responsible decision. Your parents raised you right.” He grinned widely as he looked at Allie’s phone and gave a thumbs-up.
Jack continued, “I’d recommend a whole life insurance policy for your son. That way it will build up some cash value, and he can borrow against it when he’s older for unexpected expenses.” He turned to Spencer and winked. It looked like he was going to sell three policies at once today, showing Spencer how he could expertly close a deal.
“That sounds wonderful,” Kaiden said. “Can we see rates for term life for Allie and myself and whole life for our son and the new baby?” He gestured to Allie’s belly.
Jack smiled widely. “Congratulations! Well, of course, but we’ll wait on writing up a policy on your other child until after he or she is born. How far along are you, if you don’t mind me asking?”
“Oh, I’m only seven weeks along. I’m not even sure if it’s a boy or a girl yet, but I think it’s a girl. We are just so excited already. I went ahead and got out all my old maternity clothes!”
Jack laughed. “Well, I appreciate your forethought, but we don’t write policies until after the baby is born. You understand, right?”
“Well, no, we don’t,” Kaiden said.
“This is life insurance, right?” Allie asked.
“Yes, it’s life insurance. That’s what we have been talking about and what you came in for, right?” Jack answered. Spencer could tell Jack was growing agitated even though his voice remained calm, just like a seasoned politician’s.
“Well, our daughter is a ‘life,’ wouldn’t you agree, Mr. Montgomery?” Allie pressed.
Jack answered matter-of-factly. “Yes, she is a life in the eyes of God,” he said, narrowing his eyes. He crossed his arms over his chest and sat back in his chair with a look of derision.
“Well, then we would like a life insurance policy for her as well. Today,” Kaiden said seriously.
Spencer knew this conversation had taken a bad turn. He tried to push his chair as far into the corner as he could so he wouldn’t be visible on the recording.
“We don’t write life insurance policies on babies that don’t exist yet,” Jack said flatly.
“You’re saying our baby doesn’t exist? That our baby is not really a life yet? Is that what you are saying?” Allie questioned.
“We thought you believed life begins at conception, Mr. Montgomery. Shouldn’t you start issuing policies at that moment?” Kaiden asserted.
“What if I have a miscarriage tomorrow? Does my baby not deserve to have her funeral expenses covered by insurance? Is this life not of value to you?” Allie asked.
Jack abruptly stood. “Turn off that phone, and get out of my office. You two are nothing but scheming liberal scum trying to make a stupid argument with your ‘gotcha’ tactics. Get out. Get out now!” He made a grab for Allie’s phone, but she snatched it away and continued recording. His office staff helped corral the couple to the front door.
“Why do you get to define what a life is when it’s convenient for you?” Kaiden shouted. “Why do you get to decide what women can do with their bodies? What gives you that right?”
Allie joined in. “And now you want to ban birth control to give women even less control of their reproductive rights? When will it end? Can a guy pull out anymore, or will you try to ban that next?”
Jack’s face was red with rage. He continued to repeat “Get out! Get out! Get out now!” His voice rose as he walked toward Kaiden and Allie. His staff gathered behind him.
“Godless baby killers!” Jack yelled toward the front door when Kaiden and Allie had left the office. Then he turned around and said it again: “Nothing but Godless baby killers! They won’t stop me from running or winning. This will give me more fortitude. We are surrounded by evil. They have only strengthened my convictions.”
Jack held up his arms and proclaimed, “‘Out of the mouth of babes and nursing infants You have ordained strength because of Your enemies, that You may silence the enemy and the avenger.’”
“Amen, Jack. Amen!” The staff members clasped their hands, nodded, and closed their eyes. Spencer just stared ahead, saying nothing, still in shock as to what he had just witnessed.
Within two hours, the recording of Jack Montgomery, conservative hypocrite, was trending on social media, igniting fierce debate on the definition of life, a woman’s right to choose, and the fight to restore the protections of Roe v. Wade.
CHAPTER 7
That evening after work, as they were sitting on the couch, Spencer showed Larkin the video that had already gone viral. Fortunately, Spencer was only occasionally in the frame—just briefly—and was not recognizable.
“Oh, my God, Spencer. I had no idea he was the same guy I’d heard about in the news. You aren’t going to keep working for him, are you?”
“No, of course not. I should have looked into this before I accepted the job. I can’t work for him. I’ll stay until I find something else. Hopefully, it won’t take long. I don’t want to work for him, and I certainly won’t vote for him.”
“I can’t imagine who would vote for him. Who could possibly think banning birth control would be popular?”
“More than you’d think. He’s doing really well in the polls.”
“Well, maybe this experience will change his outlook?” Larkin looked at Spencer hopefully.
He said it only seemed to make Jack Montgomery more sanctimonious, if that was even possible. “Let’s talk about something more fun, okay?” He changed the subject. “Are you ready to start calling our families tonight?” It had already been a week since the OB visit.
“Yes! Can we call my parents first?” Larkin asked. It was her parents’ twenty-sixth wedding anniversary, and she wanted to surprise them. When they heard the news, they were elated. She was their only child, and they were ready to be grandparents. They started suggesting names for the baby and offered to babysit anytime. Her dad was going to teach his grandchild to golf, and her mom was going to teach the baby to speak German. They’d already decided they wanted to be called Grandpa and Oma.
Larkin promised to send ultrasound pictures after they’d seen the obstetrician for the twelve-week appointment. She’d had no idea how much profound and immediate joy this news would give them. The delight continued as they called Spencer’s parents and texted his siblings, aunts, uncles, and friends, promising everyone updates as soon as possible.
It wasn’t long before Larkin’s mother helped her to start choosing items for her baby registry and bought her books on breastfeeding and having a healthy pregnancy. Spencer’s mother bought them a book of baby names with her preferred choices already highlighted.
The couple had their second appointment with Dr. Parrish a few weeks after making the announcements to their families.
“Hello, again, Larkin and Spencer,” Dr. Parrish greeted as she walked into the exam room. “How are you feeling, Larkin? Any nausea? Spotting?”
Larkin said she had been feeling well and was making sure to take her prenatal vitamins, and she was drinking only half a cup of coffee a day. She also told Dr. Parrish about the books her mother had given her and reported that she had been reading about nutritional safety during pregnancy. The doctor praised her for getting off to a good start.
“I know you are both excited about today. Larkin, why don’t you lie back and we will get you ready for the ultrasound?”
Spencer stood beside her and held her hand. Dr. Parrish lifted Larkin’s gown and apologized for the cold, clear goo she squirted onto her lower abdomen. She rolled the ultrasound machine closer to the exam table. Placing the transducer on Larkin’s belly, she moved it back and forth while watching the screen on the machine. She quickly found the heart. They all saw it rapidly beating and heard its reassuring sound. Spencer squeezed Larkin’s hand. Dr. Parrish was quiet as she kept angling and repositioning the transducer, pointing it at the ethereal image floating in the dark space that was the amniotic fluid.
Larkin found it odd that the doctor hadn’t commented on anything yet. She knew the heartbeat had to be a good sign. Maybe she was trying to determine the sex.
Dr. Parrish turned from the screen to look at them. “Larkin. Spencer. Your baby’s brain hasn’t developed,” she said, her voice low but clear.
Puzzled, Spencer asked, “Will it develop in a few more weeks?”
“No, it won’t. Your baby has anencephaly. The skull and brain did not develop. I’m so sorry. This is not compatible with life.”
Larkin stared at the screen in disbelief. “But I heard the heartbeat. I saw it beating. I don’t understand.”
“Yes, there is a heartbeat. The baby is still viable now, but you will either miscarry or the baby will be born stillborn. It’s also possible the baby could live for a few hours or days after birth. I wish there were an easy way to say this.”
“You could be wrong about this, right? Maybe you just can’t see it. Maybe I didn’t drink enough water before I came for you to get a good view.”
“No, Larkin. I am sure. I wish I had better news for you today. I’m going to step out a moment and give you some time alone. I’ll get you some information, and we can talk some more.”
Dr. Parrish left Spencer and Larkin in complete shock.
“She has to be wrong, Spencer. Maybe we should get a second opinion. Maybe she’s inexperienced. Maybe we should ask her if one of the other doctors could come in and look.”
He started an internet search on his phone, typing in the words baby brain not developed 12-week ultrasound. He silently read the first result: “There is 100 percent accuracy of diagnosing anencephaly by 12-13 weeks gestation. The condition is fatal.” He put his phone in his pocket and hugged Larkin as he started to weep. She started to cry softly, but it crescendoed into heaving, uncontrollable sobs.
Dr. Parrish came back in with some informational pamphlets. She tried to give them to Larkin and Spencer, but they refused to take them from her hand, as if accepting them meant accepting the awful news. She tucked them under Larkin’s purse and asked that they read them later. She apologized again for having to give them such devastating news and referred them to a maternal-fetal medicine specialist for further testing and counseling.
Larkin and Spencer didn’t talk on the way home. Their phones started chiming with texts from family members who knew today was the day and wanted them to send ultrasound pictures and updates. They turned off their phones for the rest of the drive.
When they got home, Larkin lay flat on her back in bed. She felt dehydrated from crying so much. She rubbed her lower belly like it was a genie’s lamp. Her only wish was to make her baby healthy. Spencer lay down beside her and said he would let their families know tomorrow. She asked him to tell them not to text her or call her right now. She just couldn’t talk about it yet.
Larkin woke up in the morning to the sound of her phone’s alarm buzzing. She had a headache and felt like she had a terrible hangover. As she started to slowly rouse, she suddenly remembered why she felt so awful. Her recollections of the previous day made her head hurt even more. She felt as if her heart could actually break in half. She rolled over to look at her husband, who was still sleeping soundly, not wanting to wake him up so he could enjoy a little more time away from this world.
When he did wake, he looked the way Larkin felt: exhausted and heartbroken. They hugged each other tightly before they left on their morning commute. Spencer reassured her that they would get through this together but seemed at a loss for more words.
Larkin was thankful to be the only one in the lab when she arrived. She knew she couldn’t talk to anyone right now. No one at work even knew she was pregnant, and she was going to keep the news private for a while longer.
She started her morning by going to the freezer and removing a few of the microscope slides containing slices of tissue specimens. She then removed the reagent she needed from the refrigerator; the reagent contained a marker that would adhere to a protein she was studying on the specimens. The protein would then fluoresce when placed under a special light on the microscope.
Dr. Davis knew this protein was important in the development of the avian embryo’s facial structures—it signaled when the medial nasal, lateral nasal, and maxillary processes came together during development to form the mouth and nose. He theorized that interruptions in this signaling process led to the development of cleft lip and cleft palate.
Larkin let the slides thaw for just a few minutes while she prepared the reagent. She then drew a half milliliter of the substance into a pipette and placed it on the slide. It sat for about fifteen minutes before she tapped off the excess and brought it over to the microscope with the camera attached to the top. She then turned off the lights in the lab and sat down in front of the microscope.
When she turned on the microscope, she flipped the lens to forty times magnification and switched to the mercury-vapor bulb. She adjusted the view until the specimen came into focus, and then she moved the microscope stage, stopping when she saw the area she was interested in. It was brightly lit with thousands of pinpoint fluorescent green dots on a black background, like a monochromatic Seurat painting.
She recognized the area where the pinpoints of light were clustered together and knew they would eventually form the upper jaw and nostrils, defining the earliest beginnings of the facial structures. She took several photos to share with Dr. Davis. Larkin could also see where the eyes were starting to form—and the developing brain.
She sat back in her chair. Larkin understood why her baby’s brain hadn’t developed. Just as a cleft lip would occur if the areas she was studying failed to unite at the preprogrammed time, her baby’s brain had never formed because, somehow, the cells had missed the developmental window when the neural tube should have closed. She remembered learning about neural tube defects like spina bifida in her embryology class a couple of years ago, and now her baby had the worst kind of defect.
She knew it could have happened for genetic reasons. Or maybe she didn’t have enough folate in her system at the critical time when her baby needed it before she knew she was pregnant. She hadn’t taken any medicines that would have caused it. However it happened, it had happened. She understood the science of it but couldn’t understand the unfairness of it all, and she felt the overwhelming sadness start to wash over her again.
When Abdullah walked into the lab, he flipped on the lights and startled her. He saw Larkin sitting at the microscope. “Oh! My apologies, Larkin. I didn’t know you were in the middle of an experiment.” He walked back to turn off the lights again.
“No. It’s okay. I’m done. No worries.”
Larkin went to her cubicle and sat alone. If she started crying again, she wouldn’t be able to stop. She thought of the baby growing inside her. Everything else would continue to grow—the heart, the lungs, the limbs would all be normal. The thought of feeling her baby kicking in a month or two filled her with a sense of dread when it gave so many other new mothers joy.
Dr. Parrish had mentioned that she might miscarry. Before her first visit, Larkin had been worried she might lose her baby as Susan had many times and as so many other women had sadly experienced. But now she selfishly hoped she would. She was ashamed of herself for even thinking it, but she didn’t know how she would be able to cope with carrying the baby to term, something Dr. Parrish had said was a possibility.
Abdullah popped his head over the wall of her cubicle. “Do you mind if I borrow your lab hood for a few hours? I’ve got a couple of things going on at once.”
“Sure. No problem at all.” Larkin gave him a distracted half smile. She paused and then said, “Hey, Abdullah. Can I ask you a personal question?”
“Absolutely.”
“Are you Muslim?”
“Well, my name is Abdullah, and I’m from Iran, so that’s a pretty safe bet,” he said good-naturedly.
Larkin replied, “Sorry if that sounded stupid. My actual personal question is more about your beliefs.”
“I’ll do my best to answer.”
“What is the Islamic view on abortion?”
“Wow. Well, I wasn’t expecting that. I thought you were just going to ask me if I eat bacon,” he joked.
“You don’t have to answer, Abdullah. I apologize if that was too personal.”
“No, no, no. Not at all. It’s pretty clear, for the most part. Abortion is generally forbidden, but if there is a threat of harm to the mother, or the fetus has anomalies incompatible with life, then it is acceptable before ensoulment.”
“‘Ensoulment’? When the fetus is considered a soul? When is that?”
“Yes. That’s the 120th day of gestation. It’s overall very consistent in the Islamic religion.”
“Thank you for explaining. I was just wondering.”
“Abortion in the United States is much more complicated, isn’t it? Seems like everyone has an opinion, and every state has their own rules.”
“Yes, that’s very true, but it’s only the opinion of six people that changed the law for hundreds of millions. It doesn’t matter if you believe something different. It’s decided by who is in power.”
“Next time, maybe ask me about bacon, okay? Much easier topic.”
Larkin promised. She had also made her decision.
CHAPTER 8
June 24, 2022
AP News
Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade: States can ban abortion
Larkin was thirteen in the summer of 2022 when the Supreme Court’s Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision overturned Roe v. Wade. After that, states were free to impose any limits they wanted on abortion.
