Omar’s expression darkened noticeably. “Sajid, must you be so selfish as to interrupt every happy moment this family has? First, you had to pull a tantrum at mother’s birthday gala, and now this? Is it so much to ask that you simply be happy for me, or do you hate me so much that this is an impossible request?”
“I don’t hate you, Omar. But I love Al-Thakri more than you do. I love this country as much, if not more, than father ever did.”
Mirah hissed. “Watch your tongue, my son. How dare you speak ill of your father? This country was his world.”
Sajid continued, “No monarch of this country has ever been born of a foreign woman. It’s unheard of, and an outrage. You should have found yourself a woman of Al-Thakri, or at the very least a woman with some sort of civilized upbringing.”
I flushed red, embarrassed, with no response to give Sajid. I could feel my son becoming upset by his words, and he began to kick and twirl in earnest, making me grasp my belly to try and calm him down.
Omar rose from his chair, somehow looking even taller than he was, his broad shoulders squared and his hands clenched into fists. “Brother, I will not have you insult Carrie. She is a talented, accomplished woman with a beautiful heart and a gentle soul. She has spent her life training to help people as a doctor, and instead of working in a cushy American hospital, she chose to travel the world and help people who were suffering in much more desperate circumstances. She has sacrificed everything in order to make the world a better place. How dare you sit there and insult her when you’ve barely been outside the country’s borders to see how the rest of the world is fairing. You sit in your palace and move your chess pieces trying to ensure more power for yourself, and then dare to look down your nose at someone who has saved lives?”
Sajid seemed to blush, his brother’s words hitting home in some way I hadn’t expected. Omar’s passionate defense of me made my heart swell and my eyes water. The pregnancy hormones only compounded things, and tears began to fall down my cheeks before I could stop them.
“This is enough, Sajid,” said the Queen. “It’s time for you to grow up and accept that things do not always go the way you think they should go. I know you are still raw about your place in the line of succession, but this has been the way of the monarchy for millennia, and you have to accept it or your anger will kill you while you are still young. Is that what you want? To leave your daughters fatherless, your wife without her husband’s embrace while she raises your girls? Is it so important to you to beat your brother? Why not join him—work with him to make this country you claim to love a better place, instead of wasting all your energy bashing your head against a wall?”
Before Sajid could form any sort of response to his mother’s crushing words, Alima suddenly stood up from her chair looking dazed and afraid. Sajid turned from his mother suddenly to ask what she was doing, but he could barely get out a full question; no sooner had she stood up then she began to wobble on her feet, grasping for the back of her chair. It only lasted a few seconds, but we all watched in horror as she fainted before our eyes, slipping to the floor with a loud thunk.
***
“Alima!” cried Sajid, leaping out of his chair. The couple’s daughters screamed out in fright, and the youngest, barely older than six, began to cry in fear.
Mirah rushed to comfort her granddaughters while Omar and I moved swiftly around the table to attend to Alima. Omar barked at the staff to bring water and a cold compress, and they hurried to fulfill his orders.
I kneeled next to Sajid on the floor and quickly examined Alima. She was breathing steadily, still fluttering on the edges of unconsciousness.
“Rafiq, my bag,” I ordered. Quickly he delivered it, his strong face tainted with worry at the scene before him.
I dug inside my doctor’s bag and instantly found my stethoscope. I placed it on Alima’s heart and listened to its quick, steady beating. It was slowing every second, which was a good sign, but I could hear something else in the echo of the stethoscope that made my own heart flutter a bit.
Curiously, I moved the chestpiece down to her belly and was shocked at what I heard within: another, separate heartbeat.
“Oh my God,” I whispered.
“What is it?” cried Mirah, her granddaughters huddled around her like frightened baby ducklings.
I looked up at Sajid. “Alima is pregnant.”
The look on Sajid’s face told me that Alima hadn’t yet told him the news. He stared at me in shock, as if he were waiting for me to say “just kidding!” But when it didn’t come, he placed his ear on his wife’s stomach to listen for himself. I handed him the ears of the stethoscope so he could get a proper listen, and his eyes filled up with tears at the sound of his child’s heartbeat deep within his wife’s womb.
“By God, it’s true,” he whispered.
I looked up at Omar, who was hovering over me with worry all over his face.
“That’s why her blood pressure dropped,” I said to Sajid. “She needs to go home and get some rest, and be seen by her OB/GYN.”
“But why did she collapse?”
“I’m not entirely sure, but her vitals are steadying. I think she’s probably just tired, stressed and overheated. Some pregnancies are difficult.” I didn’t add how grateful I was in that moment that mine had not been so far.
As I spoke, Alima’s eyes were fluttering open, consciousness returning to her like a slow awakening from a dream. She moaned under her breath, mumbling words that didn’t make sense.
I shushed her quietly and told her to rest, not to try and move. “Your family is here,” I told her in a soft, even voice. “Just relax and breathe deeply. Everything is fine.”
“Call an ambulance,” said Omar to the wait staff.
To his own bodyguards, Sajid said, “Get my palace doctors ready to see her immediately. I want the same OB/GYNs that delivered my daughters and I want them waiting for us by the time we arrive.” Sajid then looked at me and humbly asked, “Is she all right, Carrie? Is our child okay?”
“She’ll be fine, she just fainted,” I told him, putting my hand on his. “I can’t tell anything about the baby from this, but I’m sure the child is fine, too. We just need to get her back home so she can rest.”
By the time Alima came to, the ambulance had arrived and carefully helped load her into the back. The EMTs confirmed what I suspected: that there were no signs of anything serious happening to Alima, only exhaustion and strain on her delicate body as it worked to grow a child in the blistering desert heat. Mirah insisted that Sajid ride with his wife, while she would take the girls in her limo to meet them back at Sajid’s palace.
Before he stepped into the back of the ambulance, Omar stopped his brother with a silent gaze and put a strong hand on his shoulder. Something quiet passed between them for just a moment, before Sajid disappeared into the back of the white truck.
Omar and I stood off to the side of the movement. He held me close to him, rubbing my back lovingly.
“All the dinners you take me to are so interesting,” I joked, breathlessly.
Omar let out a single chuckle and wrapped his arm around my shoulder, kissing the top of my head. “I’m glad Alima is going to be all right. I don’t know what my family would do if they lost another member.”
“I know.”
“It all happened so fast.”
“It usually does,” I said.
“I’m glad you were here,” he said, pulling me closer into his side.
“I didn’t do much,” I insisted.
“You are a goddess.”
For a moment we stood in silence, watching the reflection of the setting sun in the windows of the city high-rises.
“Well,” I said to him with a sigh. “I suppose it’s a race, now.”
“A race?” he said.
“According to your mother’s decree, if Alima is pregnant with a boy, whichever of our babies is born first will declare the heir of Al-Thakri,” I said with some sadness in my vo
ice. “I’m sorry, my love. I thought we had guaranteed your rule.”
Omar gave me sweet half-smile, and put his lips on mine gently. “Whatever happens, Carrie, you have already given me the world.”
TWELVE
Four Months Later
I groaned as Omar’s strong hands rubbed my tired, aching back muscles as we lay together in bed. The plush penthouse had once been only his, but now it was ours, all my belongings moved in and mingled with his, along with the belongings of our son, who was due to arrive any day.
And I couldn’t have been more grateful for it. Most of my anxiety about giving birth had been replaced by eager desperation to have my beautiful but active son out of my body. Over the last few months, my belly had grown so enormous that feeling attractive was a laughable pipe dream, and now even getting to the pool with Zaynab had become a task of the highest difficulty. I could barely walk under all the weight, but the swimming did wonders for relieving my joint pain, so it was a catch-22 that I was still determined to solve.
“How are you feeling, my love?” asked Omar softly. “Can I get you the heating pad?”
“That would be glorious,” I responded with another moan. “I feel like my back hasn’t stopped hurting in six months.”
“Indeed, my son is making you work for his arrival.” Omar gave a soft little laugh and leaned over to kiss my cheek.
He left bed just long enough to grab the heating pad before returning to place it on my lower back muscles. The soothing heat helped instantly, and I could feel myself relaxing just a little bit more.
“I hate to see you in such pain,” Omar said. “Will you be able to get to sleep?”
“I’m sure I will,” I said. “Eventually. As long as I don’t break the bed when I roll over.”
Omar laughed, leaning over to plant a kiss on my nose. “You are a beautiful treasure, Carrie. I know you don’t feel like yourself right now, but I assure you, you’ve never been more attractive to me.”
“Well, no offense, but I hope we get back to the less-attractive version of me very, very soon,” I replied with a laugh, rubbing my belly. “This son of yours has wanted to get out from the earliest days of this pregnancy and I think we will both be much happier when he does.”
The pregnancy hadn’t been complicated, and I knew I was lucky to have had such a comparatively easy time. After all, Alima had been put on bed rest only a few short weeks after she fainted at the family dinner. Her doctors were concerned about her low blood pressure and demanded she stay as restful and quiet as possible. I couldn’t imagine having spent the last four months cooped up in bed; it was bad enough that I barely got out of the palace anymore.
From the looks of my belly, I was going to give birth to an enormous baby, and even though it was going to be the most beautiful day of my life, I was also more afraid than I had ever been of anything.
Omar listened patiently to all my fears. He wasn’t afraid, not even a little. He was overjoyed with every day that got closer to the day his son arrived. He kissed my tummy gently and leaned his head against it to listen to the sleepy movement of the baby in my womb.
I ran my fingers through his hair and let out a deep sigh, momentarily content.
I couldn’t believe how happy it made me just to lay here in bed with the man I loved while he worshiped me for carrying his child. It was its own kind of adventure—a much more blissful kind than those I had been on before.
But like all adventures, it had to come to an end, or at least a fork in the road.
As he worked to massage the pain out of my muscles, I could sense Omar growing nervous, clearing his throat. When I saw him put his hand in his curly hair, I knew he had something on his mind.
“What’s bothering you?” I asked him. “Is something going on at the office?”
Omar looked surprised for just a moment, and then he gave me a small smile. “Your intuition is only getting stronger every day; you know that? Being a mother is good for you.”
“And I think you try and use that silver tongue of yours to change the subject when you don’t want to talk,” I retorted playfully. “Tell me, love, please?”
Omar sighed. “I just worry this is not the best time to bring up my concerns, that’s all. The last thing I want to do is cause you or the baby undue stress.”
“When would be the best time, then? After the baby is born and I’m exhausted from being up all night breastfeeding and crazy with hormones?” I laughed. “Now is the only time.”
Omar hesitated a few moments, his gaze running over my face as I turned to look at him. Finally, he relented. “There is something I want to ask you… about our future, Carrie. And we are running out of time to discuss it.”
Carefully, and with great ache, I rolled over to face him properly. I had known deep down that this conversation was coming eventually, but some foolish part of me had been hoping we could somehow bypass it. I was never great at planning my future, and just as bad at talking about my emotions. Of course, the future had been on my mind every single day since Omar had asked me to carry his child. With every step we had taken beyond that, the questions had only become more and more urgent.
I had always liked my life with an escape hatch so that I never felt trapped. I didn’t want to grow old and regret tying myself right back into the Leave-It-to-Beaver family I had grown up in. Sure, I wanted that at some point, perhaps, but wasn’t that what older age was for? What good was my youth if I spent it simply re-creating the life I had already experienced as a child? I wanted to see the world. I wanted to feel the warmth of the sun on every ocean’s shore, to experience how different it felt on my skin.
But Omar was right. Time was running out for me to face that fork in the road. My son—our son—would be arriving any day, and there would be no turning back after that.
“My love,” whispered Omar as he nuzzled against my face. “I need to know what you intend to do after the baby has arrived. I know his creation began as a much more practical arrangement, but I think he—and we—have grown beyond that.” He curled his fingers in mine and pulled my body against him.
“Yes, we have,” I agreed, squeezing his hand.
“Our son was born of love, not through a procedure in a medical lab,” said Omar. “And I am truly grateful that, whatever happens next, I can tell him that with utmost honesty. He will know he was the product of love.”
“Yes, he is,” I said, smiling. I ran a hand down the side of Omar’s smooth, handsome face. “I do love you, Omar.”
“And I love you.” He kissed my hand. “I think you know what I would ask of you. I want to know if you intend on following through with our original arrangement, or if you could be persuaded to stay here in Al-Thakri with me, and our son.”
Hearing the decision laid out so starkly only made my anxiety and fear loom bigger. I took a deep breath and let it out, trying to suppress the groan that came with it. I didn’t want to hurt Omar’s feelings. He was only doing what was right, confirming with me how I felt so that we could think about the future together, like mature adults. But in that moment, I didn’t want to face reality.
I didn’t want to face it because I still didn’t know what I was going to do. Shameful or not, I was still torn between the old, adventuring me, and the new Carrie who was emerging just as surely as her son was: one day at a time. Neither of them had pulled ahead of the other in this internal civil war, and I didn’t want to break Omar’s heart by telling him that. Not when he was in such joyous spirits about our son.
Omar waited, searching my face for any hint of what was in my head. Before I could form any sort of reasonable answer to give him, a sharp pain erupted in my belly, and I cried out. My hands flew to my stomach.
“Oh my God,” I whispered breathlessly.
Omar’s expression twisted in worry as he sat bolt upright. “What is it? Are you all right?”
I grasped my belly and waited, trying to breathe, when the pain came again, stronger and deeper this time. “Oh God.
Omar… the baby is coming. He’s coming right now!”
He blinked twice at me, as if I’d spoken in a foreign language.
“Omar, I said the baby is coming!” I repeated with a stressed laugh. “Now’s not the time to gape at me like a fish!”
Reality hit him all at once. His eyes lit up and his face flushed with the rush of adrenaline. “The baby! My son is coming!”
He leaped from the bed and ran for the hallway to call in Rafiq, who was posted outside in his usual position. Omar ordered his faithful bodyguard to gather up the overnight bags we had packed weeks ago.
“Get them down to the garage and load them in the Rolls Royce,” he said to Rafiq, who seemed more than a little disoriented at the sudden interruption. “We have no time to arrange the royal transport. We’ll take her ourselves.”
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