The Baby Package

by Sarah J. Brooks

  “There are no numbers for these three,” Bruce said and smiled down at the charts. “I am the donor.”

  Bruce Simon was a perpetual playboy bachelor. Up until that moment I’d always assumed that he was just a sloppy bookkeeper. I’d seen other files of his that needed notes and numbers added, but never went back to check if it was done. We were partners, after all, I wasn’t his keeper. It wasn’t my job to babysit him. But this was huge. This was not at all what I’d expected to hear and I was pretty damned shocked to say the least.

  “Bruce, please tell me you aren’t saying what I think you are saying.”

  “I’m saying that I’m the sperm donor for these three women. I thought I was pretty clear about that,” he laughed.

  “This is serious. You can’t be doing that. There has to be some sort of legal thing saying this is not allowed. What the heck?”

  “I have a lawyer. He drew up some papers. It’s iron clad.”

  “But you’re their doctor. Come on, man!”

  “Mike, I was going to be their doctor no matter what sperm swam up and grabbed a hold of their egg. I don’t think that should matter. Plus, it’s not like I’m tricking these women. They come in here begging for me to do this. I’m just being of service to them.”

  “Bruce!”

  “Mike!” he yelled back at me.

  “No, you can’t do this. The medical licensing board would be all over this. Stop doing it! If you want to father people’s babies at least send those women to me to be their doctor. Or just stop doing it all together. God, we are going to be sued,” I put my head into my hands in utter disbelieve.

  “It’s fine. I will start telling them no. To be honest, I can’t believe no one has asked you.”

  “Perhaps I’m just better at setting boundaries with my clients?”

  “Or maybe I’m just the better looking one of the two of us,” he started to look at himself in the mirror off to the side of the couch.

  Bruce was blonde with blue eyes and an olive complexion, I knew from working in this industry that those assets were very popular among women looking to have a baby. Not to mention his willingness to participate had made him an easy option for women. I had never even considered participating something like that and I’d never been asked either.

  “I don’t care what the reasons are, Bruce. It’s not ethical if you’re going to be their doctor. Can we at least agree on that? And I would like to talk to our attorney to mitigate any other potential issues that could arise from this.”

  “I already talked to Bob, he helped me with the contract that the women sign.”

  “I’m still going to talk to him and you still need to stop being the doctor for these women. Understood?”

  “Yep.”

  “Now, let’s talk about these other files and I’ll get you up to speed on what was accomplished.”

  “Sure thing,” Bruce said and continued to look just as relaxed as the moment he came into my office.

  Nothing seemed to bother him at all. I used to be like him. I used to be carefree and unconcerned about boring business stuff. Somewhere in the process of building up our successful practice I became worried about the longevity of things. I became semi-responsible.

  We spent nearly two hours getting everything back on track and rearranging some patients, so I could see the people he had this intimate relationship with. I gave him some of my patients and he gave me some of his so everything ended up working out.

  “By the way, I’m going to need you to cover a couple patients tomorrow morning too. I’ve got a thing tonight,” Bruce added as we wrapped things up and were heading out of the office to the parking lot.

  “Dude, I’m getting burnt out here. Why can’t you come in on time or just reschedule your patients?”

  My blood pressure was boiling at this point. We had already hired an office manager and had several other support staff in our office, all these people were there to help reduce the strain on the two of us. But the way Bruce was operating lately, I was going to have to start looking for a new partner soon.

  “I’ve got a hot date tonight and I hate leaving early in the morning. It’s a little rude, don’t you think?”

  “Wow.”

  “What?” he asked as if he was totally oblivious to the real world that one of us had to live in. “How’s your dating life going?”

  “My dating life is going well. I actually left a hot new girl this morning so I could be here. It wasn’t rude at all. It was me being responsible.”

  “Impressive.”

  “It’s your job, Bruce. Get in here by eight and see your patients or reschedule them. I can’t keep picking up your slack.” I didn’t wait for him to respond and climbed into my vehicle and slammed the door.

  Done, I was done with this crap. Not only was Bruce putting our whole practice at risk with his shady side deals, he wasn’t even covering his end of the work that needed done. Charging clinic rates for women that he fathered children with couldn’t be within the ethical boundaries of the practice. But I called our attorney Bob to see what he had to say.

  “Bob, it’s Mike Cooper. Did you tell Bruce he was cleared to father children with his patients?”

  “Good morning to you, too,” he scoffed.

  “Come on, I trust your legal counsel and Bruce is saying he got your okay. Why wasn’t I told about any of this?”

  “Here’s the deal. If a friend of yours asked you to take care of her during her pregnancy you would do it, right?”

  “Yes, I’d probably do it. But that’s not crossing an ethical boundary.”

  “What if a friend of yours asked you to father a child?”

  “I don’t know if I would do that. I really want to be a father, but it would be hard to know there were children out there that I wasn’t involved with raising.”

  “Okay, so your issue with that is that you wouldn’t get to raise the child, not any sort of ethic issue with the woman asking you or with the sperm being provided?” Bob asked as if this was all leading to some final answer that I just wasn’t seeing.

  “Yes. That’s right.”

  “Read the contract. It’s clear that I’m simply stating Bruce, as a friend of these women, is providing them his sperm. There is an agreed upon fee and the contract is over once he’s delivered the specimen. It has nothing to do with who they choose as a doctor. Although, I did suggest to Bruce that he not be their doctor and refer them to someone else. I actually suggested someone outside of your practice.”

  “Thank you. That’s what I was saying.”

  The rest of my Sunday was rather uneventful and I had to try my best not to pick up the phone and call Julia. Her trepidation over me really asking her out was bugging me the more I thought about it. Perhaps she really didn’t want me to ask her out and this was her way of pushing her agenda?

  Was that possible?

  Sure, up until that morning I wouldn’t have thought my own partner was lying to me and going behind my back and it turns out he was. So it was possible I’d misread the signs between Julia and I. I’d just sit on her number for a day or so before calling her and see if I felt the same about her after a little time.

  Weekends in general weren’t for relaxing. Most of my errands had to be done on the weekends and by Sunday night I was usually totally exhausted. This particular Sunday was no different and when I finally crawled into bed around ten o’clock, I couldn’t wait to get some sleep.

  Chapter 5

  Julia

  “How was your weekend? I didn’t even hear you come home last night,” I said when I saw Kendra sitting at our kitchen table Monday morning.

  “I didn’t come home until this morning.”

  She had a cheeky grin that I’d seen before from her. Kendra had a way with the guys, she was much better at picking them than I was. I envied her. If I had as much luck as she did, I probably would be more willing to wait to have a baby in hopes of finding the man of my dreams.

  It was totally pla
usible that my own lack of confidence was why I struggled with meeting decent men. I could admit it. When a woman was confident she carried herself differently. When a woman didn’t care if men liked her or not, there was something totally different about how she walked and even the aura around her. I wasn’t one of those women. Even though I felt like I had a normal amount of confidence and I could fake it for an evening or so, I was always rethinking what was going on in my mind. There was constant self doubt in my head during interactions with men. And my night with Mike was no different.

  “So that guy turned out to be decent?” I asked.

  “Yes, we had an amazing weekend together. You know when you just click with someone and everything seems perfect? That’s what it was like.”

  “Nice! That’s really great, Kendra,” I was so happy for her. The last few months both of us had been so jaded about the guys in New York, maybe our luck was changing. Although Kendra had also managed to meet a great guy just last month, who she had promptly dumped after she found out he was only in town for a month of work. “The guy I brought home, Mike. He was spectacular. But I don’t think we will see each other again.”

  “Why not?”

  “He’s really hot and was extremely nice, but to tell you the truth I just don’t think I’m his type at all. He probably dates models and women like that. And well, there’s something else…”

  “So just to be clear,” she said as she interrupted me, “he’s not the one saying any of this? You’re deciding for him that you aren’t the right one for him?”

  “Yes,” I laughed. “Plus, my appointment is today with the fertility place. I thought it was next week but it’s today. I’m moving forward with it. Not exactly the sort of thing a guy is going to want if we were to date. He’s not the love of my life and I’m not going to sit around and wait for that person to appear. I’ve made up my mind.”

  “Julia, why don’t you wait just a little bit? You are still young; you have plenty of time to start having babies. Just wait a year. Or maybe two. Hell, you are still so young. I can’t believe you are even considering this.”

  I totally understood where Kendra and my friends were coming from. I was still young and I knew if I really wanted to wait I could do that. The thing was though, I’d already decided that I was ready to be a mother and I didn’t want to wait. It was unconventional, I knew, but I was ready to get pregnant and have a baby. I was going to be one of those cool young moms with a great career and the perfect life. I just couldn’t wait.

  With all the second guessing I did in my personal life, this was something that I was sure of. I knew deep down that I was ready and to be honest there wasn’t much that I still had to think about. It was very unlikely anyone could have talked me out of this plan, not even my best friend.

  “I know, I know. But I’m okay with being a single mom. Really, I’m excited about it. I don’t need anyone else around. Actually, I’m more excited about being able to do this all on my own than anything else. I’ll get to pick the name, I’ll get to pick my new apartment and decorate the baby’s room. I make a great living and I’m on track to move up the ladder in a couple of years. Now is the perfect time for this.”

  “Julia, this is a little crazy, you have to admit it.”

  “No I don’t. Women are having babies by themselves all the time. Just because I didn’t pick some dude up and accidently get pregnant doesn’t make it weird. I’m financially responsible and since we’ve been roommates for so long I have been able to save up a lot of money. I’m ready.”

  “Fine, I’m not going to argue any more. I’m sure the process takes time, right? You’ll have the ability to change your mind somewhere down the road.”

  “Yes, although I don’t think I’ll change my mind at all. This is an expensive process and I wouldn’t be moving forward if I hadn’t already made up my mind. But today I’m just meeting with Doctor Simon and discussing my options. I have picked out a few possible sperm donors from the registry and I still need to narrow that down before I could move forward.”

  “Sperm donor, eww! That sounds gross.”

  “It’s not that gross.”

  I tried to defend it but Kendra was right on this one, it did sound a little gross to be talking about sperm at all. I didn’t even want to imagine what it was like for the men to be hiding away in sterile doctors’ offices spewing their seed into a cup. But I liked this plan much better than having to be tied to some random dude for the rest of my life.

  If I happened to get pregnant from a guy I dated for a night or two, well, that seemed like a recipe for disaster to me. There could be custody battles and child support hearings and all sorts of messiness. Nope, my way was much easier. I just paid for some sperm and hired a doctor to squirt it into me, then BAM! It was baby making time.

  “Well do you want me to go with you? I’m not totally on board but I’ll go with you if you need support.”

  “Kendra! That’s so nice of you!” I wrapped my arms around her and held on tight. This was the sort of friend she was. She clearly didn’t like my plan, but she still offered to be there for me. “You are amazing! But I think I should do this alone. I want to be focused and plus it’s good for me to practice my independence.”

  “Good! I really didn’t want to go to that place,” she laughed. “But you let me know if you ever need some backup, I promise I will go with you. And I’m sure I’ll come around to this whole idea if you end up going through with it. I’ll be here for you.”

  “Thanks again, Kendra. You’re a really good friend.”

  “I know. I know. I’m the best. The baby can call me Auntie Kendra.” We both laughed at the idea, but it was likely what would end up happening. Since I didn’t have any sisters Kendra was as close as I was going to get to that sort of relationship.

  “That’s a plan,” I said with a hug before finally heading out of our apartment and to my doctor’s appointment.

  My heart was pounding out of my chest as I maneuvered my way through the city to the clinic office on 56th street. After much rumination I’d settled on Doctor Bruce Simon. His online reviews were stellar and many of his patients had noted going back to him over and over again.

  The first appointment was supposed to be more like a blind date, or at least that was what I had gathered from everything I’d read up on this process. I was going to interview him and his practice to see if we were a good fit and he was basically going to be making sure I was a good fit as well, but honestly I couldn’t imagine any doctor not working with a woman that was willing to pay them.

  My fingers were freezing as I pressed the button for the elevator up to his office. It was a beautiful fall day and the weather was in the mid 70’s so I shouldn’t have felt as cold as I was feeling. But as I looked at my hands I saw I’d been clenching my fists the entire trip to the office and still had fingernail marks on my hands from the tight grip.

  I took in a few deep breaths as the elevator door closed and I did my best to try and calm down. Getting pregnant with the help of artificial insemination wasn’t all that hard, but there were a ton of steps to jump through. Doctors had liability issues if they helped a woman who wasn’t healthy get pregnant, even if it was something as little as squirting some sperm inside of her. The rules, or what I understood up to this point, were daunting. Especially if you consider I could have decided to lie under some random dude and get pregnant without so much as a check of my pulse before I did that.

  As the elevator doors opened I took a few steps and stood in front of the fancy glass doors to Doctor Simon’s office. My vision was blurry as I stared at the sign on the door. I couldn’t even read the names on there but I saw the large RMA letters and knew I was in the right spot.

  I pressed open the door and took another deep breath in an attempt to calm down. It wasn’t helping much though, I still felt like I could hear my heart beating in my ears and my breathing was so heavy that I was sure everyone in the waiting room could hear me.

  �
�Good afternoon and welcome to Reproductive Medicine Associates. How can I help you?” the young blonde at the desk said with an annoyingly chipper smile.

  “Um, hello. My name is Julia Rivas. I have an appointment with Doctor Simon.”

  “Miss Rivas, here you are,” she said with her fake smile. “I have some paperwork for you to fill out. The doctor is running a little behind, but it shouldn’t be too long.”

  “Thank you.” I grabbed her clipboard with my shaky hands and found a spot in the corner of the room.

  The waiting room was filled with happy couples and only a few single women. I didn’t necessarily feel out of place, but I didn’t feel comfortable either. Handling new situations on my own was just one of the things I needed to adjust to if I was going to be a mother though. So I took another deep breath, wiped the sweat from the palm of my hand, grabbed the pen, and started filling out my life story on the clipboard stuffed with papers.

  It was nearly a half hour before I’d completed my large packet of paperwork. The questions went on and on as if they were never going to end. When was your first period? How long have you been considering having a child? What steps have you gone through to try for a child? Some of the questions seemed absolutely ridiculous to me while others were clearly more geared toward couples who were having fertility issues. But as I walked back up to the young blonde at the desk, I finally felt my breath calm. This was what I wanted and filling out thirty minutes of paperwork wasn’t going to sway me from my dream. In fact, I was even more certain of my plans now that I’d managed to navigate that road block.

  It was a road block, I was sure of it. They put this enormous packet of information together to deter young women who just wanted to gather information and weren’t really interested in moving forward. Of course, some of them would stay and stick through the paperwork for the appointments. But I suspected more than a few women had dropped that clipboard and made their way out of the office. If the months of waiting for an appointment was enough of a deterrent, the paperwork might have been.