Yolk(57)

June laughs, a dry mirthless snort. “Thank you, but I’m not about to get knocked up in the immediate future,” says my sister. “I wouldn’t even know what to put on my dating profile to requisition sperm like that.”

“Jayne,” says Dr. Ramirez, this time looking right at me. My blood runs cold. It’s as if she knows. Then she turns to her patient.

“Thank you,” says June. I know this tone. Her mind’s made up. “But you said so yourself. I’m the one making the decisions. It took me forever and a mountain of literal faxes to even get a referral to see you. I’ll pass on risking my life for the next few years on the off chance I’ll get knocked up.” June shakes her head. “I’ve thought about it. Do the surgery. Just take everything.” June’s open palm brushes against her middle as if to scoop it out.

“Also.” June sighs. “Dr. Ramirez, I’m not trying to be difficult, but don’t you think egg freezing is kind of a scam? The actual percentage of live births is, like, maybe eight percent. For thirty grand of drugs and drama?”

“It’s about knowing that you have the choice if you want it,” says Dr. Ramirez.

“They throw your eggs out like on Storage Wars if you accidentally miss a bill.”

To her credit, Dr. Ramirez remains completely composed. She nods. “I see.”

June flips her neon folder open. It’s full of paperwork. Her narrow handwriting is scrawled all over the various bills. “I just want to set a date.”

“We can do that.”

“Terrific.” June riffles through some papers. “And another thing, don’t you think it’s, I don’t know, distasteful to demand the surgery deductible before you’ll cut me open?”

Dr. Ramirez places both hands on her desk. She’s instantly mouselike again. I imagine her tiny feet dangling in her chair behind her desk.

“You’ll have to speak with your insurance carrier and…”

“Well.” June flips through the reams of printouts until she pulls out what she’s looking for. Meanwhile I was convinced my sister wasn’t doing anything all day but watching garbage TV. The morass of logistics spread out in her lap is exactly June’s wheelhouse. Turns out being sick is a full-time job. “They told me to take it up with you. It’s based on hospital policy. I just talked to them”—June confirms it with her notes—“yesterday.”

“I’ll get a number for you.”

“Thank you,” says June, putting her folder away. “So, I just have one more question.”

“Ask whatever you’d like.”

“How much is this going to hurt?”

The question stops my heart.

Dr. Ramirez studies my sister carefully before continuing. “Patients have reported discomfort in the abdomen and shoulder—”

“Hold it right there.” June closes her eyes. “Why is it ‘discomfort in the abdomen’? It’s pain. Do me a favor and just call it pain if it’s pain?” Her voice cracks on the final “pain.” She opens her eyes.

“Women have reported pain.”

June exhales.

“We’re basically creating an air pocket in you so that we have room to move around. You’re going to feel the effects of that in your abdomen and shoulder. It feels like a soreness in your muscles. You’re not used to having air caught in different regions of your body, and that’s how it may register. I can’t tell you how uncomfor—how much pain you’ll experience.” She pauses for a moment and takes a deep breath. “You know, we’re trained not to use the word ‘pain,’ but I can see how discrediting that can be.”

“It scares the shit out of me,” says June. “It makes me feel like you’re going to downplay everything because of some malpractice lawsuit and I’m going to be in fucking agony.”

“I get that,” says Dr. Ramirez, nodding slowly. “So, I’ll call it pain.”

“It’d make me feel better if you called it fucking agony,” says June petulantly.

“Okay,” she says. “Patients have reported fucking agony, but honestly”—Dr. Ramirez’s shoulders drop—“if you experience what you would characterize as fucking agony, please tell me immediately. You shouldn’t be in actual fucking agony, all right?” A tiny hint of a Bronx accent peers out from her doctorial veneer.

That’s the moment when I realize that Dr. Ramirez is chill.

“But think about counseling?” Her brown eyes soften. “At least give Steph a call so that if you need her, she’s right there. This is a lot.”

“I like her,” June says as we walk out, tucking her folder under her jacket so it doesn’t get wet. “You can tell she kills at poker or something.”

“Yeah, she seems cool,” I tell her. “She probably drinks whiskey.”

“Whiskey neat,” she says. “She definitely also cusses like a sailor.”

“Definitely.”

I don’t know what else to say. I root around my brain to see if I can summon any anger at June. I can’t.

“Do you still need to grab your stuff?” she asks me when her car arrives. I nod, and she lets me in.