Apex Book Company

My breasts hurt.

I shifted in my seat while I waited for the nurse to call me into the doctor’s office. I tried not to stare at the other two girls sitting in the waiting room, but every now and then I would glance up and see one of them glancing back at me. I looked down at the tiled floor and my bare feet, and I repressed a shiver. Why do doctors always keep their waiting rooms so cold, especially when they know that we’ll be sitting in them wearing nothing but a thin gown open at the back and decorated with blue flowers?

“Melissa Connor.”

I looked up. The nurse, a blonde woman with the beginnings of wrinkles forming on her face, crooked her finger to beckon me over. I pushed myself out of my seat, almost losing my footing on the smooth floor.

The nurse started laughing, then bit her lip. “Sorry,” she said.

“What, you think this is funny?” I asked.

She shook her head. “No. I’m just reminded of myself, that’s all.”

“What are you talking about?”

She paused. “I did the same thing you’re doing now.”

“Really?” I reached over to the chair next to mine and picked up the sheaf of papers they had given me on arrival. “And did you have to sign a ton of paperwork every single time you came in for an examination?”

“Yep. Every time.” She took the papers from me and filed them away in a folder. Then she cocked her head at me.

“You know, I’m just trying to get a better life for myself, before I get too old.”

She chuckled. “Too old? Sweetheart, you’ve got years ahead of you. You’re not too old.”

“Oh? You know so much? Tell me, how old are you anyway?”

Her face shut down for a moment, then she mumbled, “Twenty-five.”

I was surprised. She was only seven years older than me. Then I remembered that the treatment only kept a woman viable for about three years. But that was enough time. It had to be.

The nurse brought me into an examination room, took my blood pressure and temperature, said, “Dr. Fremont will be with you in a moment,” and pulled the door shut behind her before I had a chance to ask her what had happened to Dr. Hurley.

Naturally, the “moment” was more like ten minutes. It gave me a chance to look around the room. I’d been in a lot of examination rooms recently, and they all had taken on the same anonymous character. Even this room, with its paper-covered examination table, low stool, and a counter with a computer, looked like it could be in any of a hundred other hospitals or clinics.

Finally, Dr. Fremont knocked on the door. Without waiting for a response, he turned the handle and let himself in. The guy was older than I’d expected. I barely had a chance to acknowledge the graying tufts of hair crowning his bald head, however, before he said, “Get up on the table.”

Not even a “hello” or a “how are you.” Just that: “Get up on the table.” Delivered in a gruff voice.

“What happened to Dr. Hurley?” I asked.

“He’s left,” he said. And then again: “Get up on the table.”

I knew what was coming next; I’d done it before, but I hated it every single time. I eased myself onto the table, lay down on my back, and pushed my feet into the stirrups. Why are they always just out of reach of the feet? This was easily the most uncomfortable position ever forced upon women by men.

I kept my gaze focused on the glowing fluorescent lights as the new doctor shoved the speculum into my private parts. The metal felt cold and I repressed another shiver. I gripped the edges of the table, though, and ran tunes through my head, concentrating on anything but the here-and-now. To myself, I cursed Dr. Fremont’s bedside manner, or rather his lack of one. Dr. Hurley had always spoken calm, soothing words during his examinations.

Finally, Dr. Fremont pulled the torture device out of my body and turned his back on me. Without asking for permission, I extracted my feet from the stirrups and swung around into a sitting position.

And waited, as Dr. Fremont kept his back on me and studied a clipboard.

I counted the seconds off from an analog clock hanging on the wall. After fifteen seconds of silence, I piped up, “Well, doc?”

He turned around, put his chart down on the table and cleared his throat: a loud harrumphing sound. “Well, Ms. Connor, it looks like you’re responding just fine to the injections. Your–your reproductive system is adapting perfectly well to the treatment. The Nivronians should be pleased.”

I didn’t appreciate the tenor or tone of his final statement. “The Nivronians? Hell, doc, I’m pleased. This is what I want.”

He walked around the table and put a cold stethoscope against my back. “Breathe in, please. And out. In again. And out.”

He pulled the stethoscope out of his ears, came around in front of me, and started squeezing my neck. “Are you sure?” he asked.

“Huh?”

“Glands are fine.” He looked me in the eyes. “Are you sure this is what you want?”

“What right do you have to be questioning me on this?”

He squeezed my breasts, and I let out an “Ow!”

He let go and pulled back his arm. “Are you in pain?”

I shook my head. “You’re squeezing too hard.”

“I have to check for–I have to make sure you’ll be able to nurse properly.”

“Nurse?”

“Yes, nurse.” He gave me a look. “Don’t you read all those things you sign?”

“Yeah,” I said.

“Then you must know that the Nivronians expect their hybrid offspring to receive nutrition from you in the first few months of life.”

I cleared my throat. “Kind of,” I said.

He shook his head slightly. “For a college kid, you don’t seem too smart.”

“For a doctor, you don’t seem too empathetic,” I retorted.

He made a clucking sound with his tongue and continued to examine me. As he was checking my foot reflexes, he said, “You know, Ms. Connor, it’s not too late to change your mind.”

“I’m afraid it is too late to change my mind.” About eighteen years too late.

“Are you sure?” he asked.

“Doc, you sound as if you disapprove.”

He pressed his thin lips together and slowly shook his head. “I’m a government physician. It’s not my place to approve or disapprove of your decision.”

“But you do, don’t you? It’s okay, I’m not going to tell anybody.”

“Ms. Connor, I know from your profile that you’re not a typical host. You’re in college, for–”

“Doc, drop it.”

His shoulders slumped. “Consider it dropped. At least by me.”

He continued his examination in silence. A moment later, I decided to break the silence myself.

“Dr. Fremont, if it’s all right, I have a question for you.”

He looked surprised but replied, “Certainly.”

“If you hate this so much, why are you doing it?”

The doctor got a faraway look in his eye. “There are fewer choices now,” he said. “Fewer than before.”

I understood. Just because he was doing this work didn’t mean he liked it. It was a simple matter of what he had to do to survive.

Kind of like the rest of the human race.

My breasts continued to throb as I took the subway home. I had finally admitted to Dr. Fremont that I had minor pain, and he told me that the pain was a side effect of the treatment. He said it should fade as my body became more adapted to “servicing the aliens,” his words. But it still put me in a crappy mood.

Ma called to me from the kitchen as I entered our apartment. “Melissa? Is that you?”

I sighed as I closed the front door and took two steps into our living room. “It’s me, Ma. Who else would it be?”

“How was school today?” she shouted.

I pushed aside a pile of yellowing newspapers in order to open the closet door, so I could hang up my winter coat. Ma’s coat, I noticed, still sat on the sofa, covering up one of the torn pillows.

“I wasn’t at school today, Ma.”

She marched into the room, using her large body to intimidate me. I didn’t let it work. “What do you mean, you weren’t at school? Did you cut classes?”

“Yes, I did, but I’ll get the notes from the web.”

She glared at me and lifted her arm as if she wanted to whack me, then put it down, as if realizing that it would do no good. “Then where the hell were you, little missy? You only work in the evenings.”

“It’s like this, Ma. I have a surprise for you.”

And then I told her. And watched her face turn a satisfying shade of pale.

“You can’t be serious,” she said. She eased herself onto the sofa.

“I’m perfectly serious,” I replied.

“What about children?”

“Well, Ma, I’ll certainly have children. Just not human ones. They’ll be Nivro–”

“Don’t say that name in this house!”

“What are you going to do, Ma? Deny that history happened?”

“You promised me you would marry, and have lots of children.”

“Yeah, Ma. I was going to marry a rich prince and pop out the babies, one right after another. Well, guess what? I was foolish then. And young.”

“You’re young now, honey.”

She called me honey? “Yeah, I know I’m young. That’s why I was a prime candidate to be a host.”

We both fell silent for a moment, and then she said, “It takes a while for you to adapt, doesn’t it?”

“Yeah, it does.”

“So you’ve been doing this for a while.”

“A few months now.”

“Why haven’t you said anything before?”