Dale
The store wasn’t exactly quiet this morning but it wasn’t too busy either. I wasn’t rushed off of my feet and I was thankful for that because Hannah had informed me that she wouldn’t be coming in today so that left me in charge of the store while she was gone.

Hannah hired me years ago when the store first opened and we quickly became friends so it was nothing new for her to leave me in charge if she had something else that she had to go off and do – it was better than closing the store for the day.

I only got back to Huntington Beach a couple of days ago since I’ve been off visiting my brothers in Australia for the last few months. I was more than ready to jump back into working and getting my life back to normal after having been away for so long.

I’d finished serving a few customers and that left a young couple wandering the isles, looking at our stock. I sat at the computer and logged into my profile and opened up all of the necessary windows that I would be using today. While I was logging into the store’s e-mail address I heard the bell above the door ring, signalling to me that someone was coming inside.

I snapped my head up with a smile on my face, ready to greet the customer, but the smile slowly dropped off of my face when I saw a very agitated looking Hannah walking towards me.

Her hair was more dishevelled than normal, she wore absolutely no makeup, her messenger bag hung off of her shoulder, she had a vice-like grip on her phone in her hand and she looked exhausted.

“I thought you were taking the day off…” I trailed off, standing from the stool and moving to wrap my arms around her in a hug.

“I can’t sit in that apartment anymore,” She grumbled “Erin’s working so I was all alone with my thoughts and I couldn’t relax, I was going crazy so I had to get out of there and somehow I ended up here,”

“Well you’re more than welcome to keep me company,” I chuckled, sitting her on her usual stool behind the counter “But I’m not letting you do much work, you look too tired,”

“I didn’t sleep,” She confirmed “I couldn’t stop thinking about this whole thing and it kept me awake, and whenever I did manage to doze off I was plagued with horrible nightmares about it,”

“Why are you so worried about this?” I asked her.

“There’s a few reasons,” She started, pulling a bottle of water from her bag “I’m worried that it won’t work and I’ll just be adding another disappointment to their list,” I nodded along as I listened to what she was saying “But at the same time I’m worried about what’s going to happen if it does work,” She gave me a sad, pleading look.

“What do you mean by that?” I asked.

“I’m going to be throwing up, literally my whole body is going to get bigger, then I’ll get stretch marks and then there’s the whole pushing a person out of me!” She exclaimed, throwing her hands in the air before dropping her head onto the counter top “I never planned on doing this,” She muttered into the wood “I was never going to get pregnant,”

“You never want to have kids of your own?” I asked, rubbing her back softly and soothingly as she shook her head before lifting it off of the counter a little and looking up at me.

“I always knew that Brian and Michelle would have kids and give my parents grandchildren, but Brian’s the son… I was going to leave the rest of the grandkids to Mac when she’s older,”

“Well then,” I smirked “You only have to do this once, and it’s even better than having your own kid because afterwards you just hand it on over to Brian and Michelle,”

“Somehow…” She sighed “That doesn’t make me feel any better,”

“Are you thinking about backing out?” I asked her.

“No!” She exclaimed, not missing a beat “I promised them that I was going to do this for them and there’s no way I’m going back on my word I’m just… I’m just scared is all,”

“Well you have so many people around you who are here to support you,” I told her “All of you,”
~~~~
Hannah
I spent the rest of the morning at the store with Dale and he really calmed me down about what was happening today.

At noon, I headed over to the hospital to meet Brian and Michelle and we were taken right into Doctor Ferguson’s office. He explained some things to us that I didn’t really listen to because they were more for Brian and Michelle than they were for me, but he did tell me how soon I should start to show symptoms of being pregnant.

After our little meeting in the office, we were taken down the corridor and into another room where I was given the privacy to change into a hospital gown and remove my underwear before I sat up on the bed. Doctor Ferguson was did a sonogram of my empty uterus to make sure that it was ‘good and ready for implantation’ before we went through with anything.

“Alright,” He smiled, looking away from the screen and back at the three of us “Looks like your uterus is ready for implantation,”

Michelle squealed and clapped a little and Brian wrapped his arm around her shoulder.

“Good!” I laughed nervously “I was feeling pretty good in there today,”

“So what’s now?” Brian asked “Go ahead, put them in there!” He laughed, and I looked up at him and saw the biggest smile on his face.

“Well now hold on,” Doctor Ferguson laughed at him “It’ll take just a little while to prepare the embryos,”

“Embryos?” I asked, turning back to Doctor Ferguson with wide eyes and my eyebrows shooting up into my hairline “As in more than one?”

“Yes,” He nodded “Five actually,”

“Five?” I asked, shocked with a nervous laugh “Okay, where am I giving birth?” I asked “In a hospital or in a box under the stairs?”

That made everyone laugh a little.

“We do five because that gives us a twenty-five percent chance that at least one will attach,”

“That’s it?” I turned to Brian and Michelle “Twenty-five percent?” I looked back to the doctor
“That means there’s, like, seventy-five percent of a chance of no baby at all?”

“See,” Brian cleared his throat and scratched the back of his her nervously and shot Doctor
Ferguson a nervous smile “I was thinking, what would happen if we were to just, like, stick five hundred of them in there?”

“Sweetheart,” Michelle giggled, taking Brian’s hand “She’s a woman, not a gumball machine,”
Doctor Ferguson moved away and I turned back to my brother and sister-in-law.

“Whoa…” I breathed “I’m going to do this as many times as it takes to get this right,”

“Of course,” Michelle nodded “We don’t care how many times we have to try this, we have more than enough money to do this again, so don’t feel too much pressure,”

“We appreciate this so much,” Brian said, taking my hand in his “Thank you,”

“Well, don’t thank me until I’m actually pregnant,” I smiled.
~~~~
I don’t think I was ever going to forget what it felt like to be in stirrups, with a man whom I barely knew down between my legs with a light strapped to his head while he used what could only be described as a turkey baster to knock me up with my brother’s kid.

If that wasn’t embarrassing enough, I had Brian and Michelle holding my hands the whole way through this dignity-destroying procedure.

Once all of the embryos had been implanted, Doctor Ferguson’s assistant changed the angle of the bed so that my feet were in the air and my head was pointing downward – rendering me almost completely upside down for ten whole minutes, apparently this was to let gravity do its job and help the embryos out.

“Are you sure you don’t want to come to lunch with us and celebrate?” Michelle asked, pulling me against her for a hug.

“I’m sure,” I nodded “I’m going to head over to Matt’s and chill out with him until Erin gets home from work,”

“Tell him I’ll swing by later tonight,” Brian said, pulling me from his wife and hugging me against him instead.

“I will,” I chuckled into his chest before pulling away “You two go off and enjoy a nice lunch together, make good use of the time you have alone while it lasts,”
~~~~
Third Person
Matt was just finishing re-dressing Jack in his bedroom - after having had to give the fourteen month old boy a bath – when he heard the front door opening from downstairs.

“I wonder who is coming to visit us,” Matt cooed to Jack as he lifted him off of the bed and balanced him on his hip before leaving the bedroom and making his way down the stairs.

“Matt?” Hannah called out as she walked further into the house, heading for the living room.

“Well hey there,” Matt smiled when he reached the bottom of the stairs and found the young woman wandering around looking for him “What are you doing here?” He asked.

“I just thought that I would come and pay two of my favourite guys a little visit,” She cooed, reaching her arms out for Jack who was already reaching out for her.

Matt handed the little boy over and he went happily, wrapping his arms around Hannah’s neck as she hugged him against her comfortably and pressed a kiss to the top of his head.

“Well someone smells fresh,” She commented, sniffing Jack’s little tufts of hair.

“Jack needed a bath after lunch,” Matt chuckled “He decided that he would much rather where his banana sandwich instead of actually eating it,”

“Good boy!” Hannah exclaimed happily, using her best baby voice as she walked the rest of the way into the living room and swayed around a little with the infant “What else have you two been up to today?” She asked.

“We went to the park this morning,” Matt answered “And then we needed to pick up some groceries,”

“Sounds like an eventful day to me,” She sang, tickling Jack’s chin.

“How did everything go at the hospital?” Matt asked her.

Hannah finally looked up from Jack and met Matt’s curious gaze. She sighed and then smiled and offered him a nod.

“Everything looked good enough, so all of the embryos were implanted,” She told him.

“They used more than one?” He asked.

“Five,” She confirmed “Apparently the odds are like, really sucky, so they used five to boost the chances to twenty-five percent,”

“Whoa…” He breathed “Do you think that it worked?”

“I have no idea,” She laughed “It happened literally half an hour ago, I have to wait at least four weeks before I’ll start to notice any symptoms,”

“Right,” Matt chuckled “Well what brings you over here?” He asked.

“I didn’t feel like going home,” She admitted “Dale’s got the store covered today and Erin’s at the parlour and I didn’t exactly want to be all on my own so I thought that I would pay you two a little visit,”

Hannah placed Jack on the floor with some of his toys before she moved over to the armchair.

She climbed on the chair upside down so that her legs were dangling over the back. Jack and Matt noticed Hannah’s odd choice of position and they both started to laugh.

“What on Earth are you doing?” Matt asked between laughs.

“I’m letting gravity do its thing and giving those little embryos a better chance to really get in there and hang on with all of their might,”

“Well, I’m wishing you luck over here,”
~~~~
Erin got home from work and found the apartment was still empty. She pulled her cell phone from her purse and called Hannah, suddenly worried a little bit because she realised that she hadn’t heard from her best friend all day despite the fact that today was a big day for her.

“Erin!” Hannah answered the phone happily once it rang a few times “What’s up baby?”

“Where are you?” Erin asked “I’ve just come home to an empty apartment,” She chuckled.

“I’m over at Matt’s place,” She told her “I came over here after the hospital ‘cause I didn’t feel like being along in the apartment, but I lost track of time,”

“Are you planning on coming home soon?” Erin asked, an amused smirk on her face as she opened the fridge and ducked down to look inside at the contents.

Erin could hear that Hannah was talking and holding the phone against her shoulder.

“You wanna come over here?” She asked Erin “Brian’s here and we’re hanging out, Matt was gonna order some pizza and put on a movie, you’re more than welcome to join us,”

“Sounds good,” Erin said “Just give me a chance to change into something comfortable and I’ll be right over,”

“Alright,” Hannah chuckled “I’ll see you soon,”

Erin ended the call and made her way through the apartment and into her bedroom where she changed out of her mildly uncomfortable work attire and into a pair of leggings and a baggy t-shirt. She pulled her curled hair back and tied it into a ponytail to keep it out of her face and then she was on her way.

Notes

And so it begins!
Not much happening here other than the implantation, so it's really just a bit of a filler but this is where the re-writing begins!

More to come soon! Enjoy!

~ LMV