Dark Dance by Tanith Lee

Author:Tanith Lee [Lee, Tanith]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: (¯`'•.¸//(*_*)\\¸.•'´¯), Fiction.Horror, Fiction.Dark Fantasy/Supernatural, Acclaimed.HWA's Top 40, Acclaimed.Dell Abyss
ISBN: 9780440212744
Google: mCaIAAAACAAJ
Amazon: B003T3KBBI
Barnesnoble: B003T3KBBI
Publisher: Dell
Published: 1992-11-01T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Ten

A poster on the wall showed a bleeding rose. Tetanus: it doesn’t have to be a rusty nail, the caption read. Beneath, a handwritten notice pleaded: ‘If you or your child feel sick, please tell the receptionist.’

The surgery was crowded, a plague ward. Children sneezed and cried and ran about in a fever. Men and women coughed and evacuated their noses, blue germs puffing from their mouths in the chilly room. The chairs were hard and the magazines few. You were not encouraged to come.

The buzzer went angrily. Who would dare to be next.

‘Miss Day? Go through please.’

Rachaela walked through into the doctor’s room, which was quite large, with netted windows over a garden.

The man wore a suit and tie. He was slim and fit with well-brushed thinning hair. He gave Rachaela a neat and ironed smile.

‘What can I do for you?’

Rachaela sat down on the chair he indicated.

‘I need an abortion.’

The doctor put his smile away and raised his brows.

‘Let’s not put the cart before the horse, shall we? So you think you may be pregnant. What leads you to believe this?’

‘My periods have stopped. I’ve been sick several times.’

‘How many periods have you missed?’

‘Two.’

‘Have you brought a sample of your urine taken first thing in the morning?’

‘I did a Predictor test.’

‘I see. Well as you’re here, we’d better take a look at you.’ He pressed at the intercom. ‘Mrs Beatty, come through please.’ He said, ‘Just slip off your under-things behind that screen. Keep your slip on.’

Rachaela did as she was told, and came out to the examining table, very white with something on it like a large paper towel.

Fat Mrs Beatty entered and sat down in a corner beyond the screen.

‘Knees up, please, ankles together. Just relax.’

The last time a man had touched her it had been a pleasure, a miracle of sensation. This one was rough, knowing how tough the female body had to be, how much it could take.

‘Yes,’ he said, ‘um.’

And he poked and prodded at her vagina and her belly. He stared in behind a light, like a miner.

‘All right. You can put on your things now.’

He washed his hands, soiled by her, at a sink, and Mrs Beatty slunk back out of the room.

‘Well, Miss—ah, Miss Day. I’d say you’re definitely pregnant.’

‘I know.’

‘Everything,’ he said, ‘seems very healthy. Let’s have a look at your blood pressure.’ He attended to this, checking his gauge. They waited in silence. ‘That’s excellent. You’re a very healthy young woman.’

His congratulations did not thrill her.

‘I want an abortion.’

‘There’s absolutely no reason that you should. You’re what—’ he consulted her statement before him, ‘twenty-nine? That’s not too late. There are tests that can be run if you’re worried the baby—’

It’s not a baby. It’s a thing, a parasite, lodged in me.

‘I don’t want it.’

‘But, Miss Day. It’s not as simple as that. You have a responsibility. The child has been conceived. A life, Miss Day, which you are carrying.’

‘It was an accident.’

Could she say that? She had not taken any precautions, nothing had been further from her mind.

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