breasts?”
“ No, but I know it’s something I need to learn.”
She opened the gown but stopped immediately when she saw the scar on my chest, “You’ve had a recent injury?”
“ It’s a—a gunshot wound,” I said quickly.
“ I wondered if you were the young woman that had been on the news. I know your mother, but I wasn’t sure if you were the person all the stories were about.”
“ That would be me,” I sighed, wondering if she would recognize Micah’s name from the news as well. But she went right back to being professional and no more was mentioned.
We went through the exam and she explained how to start at the nipple and work my way out in a small circular pattern to feel for problems. She discussed selecting a time each month for making this a routine for the rest of my life. That wasn’t so bad. Maybe this exam business wasn’t so tough after all. But, then she went to the other end of the table.
Doctor Kannova smiled as she asked me to relax. The stirrups came out and she placed my heels in them. I couldn’t help being nervous by this point.
“ You’ll have to part your legs, Leese,” she stated as her chilly gloved hands touched the outside cheeks on my buttocks, “and I’ll need you to scoot down toward me.”
Suddenly I had a feeling that a gynecological exam before my wedding night wasn’t the best of ideas. Although I was unwilling, I obeyed her request and tried to relax.
Her fingers were probing gently at first and then firmly.
“ That’s uncomfortable,” I managed to say, through my clinched teeth.
“ Leese, have you ever tried to do any sexual exploration on your—”
“ No,” I cut her off.
“ I’m going to try to take a measurement on something; it may be uncomfortable.”
“ It’s already uncomfortable, Doc.”
“ I know, but I need you to lie very still.”
Within a few moments she was asking her nurse to bring in her sonogram machine. “I don’t know if I can get a shot of this, but it’s worth looking at.”
I was wondering what she could possibly be discussing. What was so unusual that she needed an internal picture? Now I was going beyond nervous. Was something wrong with me?
It seemed she worked for the longest time trying to get the sonogram angled where she could see whatever it was she was looking at. By this time I was ready to cry. I wanted my wedding night to be perfect; now I was concerned that my body might harbor some type of defect.
“ You can sit up now,” she said after wiping the gel from my body. “Go ahead and get dressed and I’ll meet you and Micah in my office.”
“ Doctor Kannova, you’re scaring me and if this is something bad, I’d rather—”
“ No, it’s nothing bad. It’s just going to make your wedding night a little more painful for you and pleasurable for him.”
Okay, there was good and bad in that. I liked the idea of pleasing Micah in every way, but why would there be additional pain for me? Aren’t all women the same? I wondered.
When I managed to get dressed and had walked down to her office, Micah was already seated and looking about as comfortable as I was on the exam table. Doctor Kannova wasn’t in the room yet, so I whispered to him, “I’m sorry I made you go through this—I didn’t know it was going to be so—”
The office door opened and I immediately straightened in my chair. It was an odd feeling, like getting called into the principal’s office when you honestly didn’t know what you’d done wrong. At least she was smiling.
“ Hello, you must be Micah,” Doctor Kannova said shaking his hand before seating herself behind the desk. “It’s good to meet you.”
Micah smiled, but remained silent.
“ Leese tells me she’d like to try the rhythm method of birth control, but since you are the other half of this union, I have to ask if you’re okay with that, too.”
“ I—I don’t know what the rhythm method is,” he stated uncomfortably.
“ There are roughly
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