Bringing in Finn by Sara Connell

role in the interaction but instead tried to coax him into the bed. “You’re gonna do great, honey. It’s just us and maybe, if this works out, a baby.” I found out that while envisioning an egg and sperm coming together in a divine moment of creation was a big turn-on for me, the idea was mostly pressuring, and not even a little bit erotic, for Bill.
    We resorted to some sex talk and foreplay, and despite his fears, Bill ably completed the mission.
    I stuck my legs up in the air afterward, even though none of the medical websites considered the practice one that definitively or
even probably aided in conception. Bill collected his clothes from the floor, looking relieved and revived, and asked if I wanted to go out to lunch.
    We agreed not to talk about stim or our schedule or if we might be becoming pregnant that very minute. “It’s our very first time,” Bill said. “It would be amazing if we got pregnant right away, but statistically, it’s more likely to take a little while.”
    Still, the next day I spritzed our sheets with essential oils that were supposed to increase the chances of conception, and I moved the wooden fertility statue, which one of my colleagues in London had sent me, next to the bed on the floor. It was a two-foot-high aboriginal goddess with a pointed head and a silver- and red-painted face. Bill shook his head when he saw it but didn’t ask me to move it. We’d take whatever help we could get. “Just keep it on your side of the bed,” he said. “I don’t want that thing looking at me while we do it.”
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    The second day’s stim sex was better. We took our time and laughed a lot. When we finished, Bill went to the store to get groceries for dinner. I walked to the park and lay in the grass. It was a Saturday, and the mid-August sun was just the slightest bit less yolky than it had been at the height of summer, its waning intensity a whisper of the fall that would come. I rotated my body until the sun was shining straight on me and tried to imagine my body as the earth, my womb as the great womb, as lush and fertile as a rain forest, the rivers, the trees.
    I tried to sense if we could be pregnant, but I didn’t feel anything telling in my body. It was too early to feel anything anyway, I told myself. I imagined the process: Bill’s sperm propelled by its life force, burrowing like an arrow into the center of my egg, and the new embryo life that was formed floating weightless, as if in space,
down the fallopian tube and into the uterine chamber, falling, falling, floating into a soft landing in the plush, cushioned lining of the uterine wall.
    I stood up, my back stiff from the hard ground. The sun had moved further toward the west, and the afternoon felt long, timeless. I guessed we were probably not pregnant, but I would have been happy to have been proven wrong. My mind was already trying to guard my heart from disappointment.
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    Ten days later, I got my period. I took small joy in seeing a period again, even one brought on by fertility hormones. But we were not pregnant.
    â€œYou have a great attitude,” Tracey said, when she called to follow up and ask if we’d like to do another round. “I sensed that about you right away. It will make a difference. Keep positive. We’re thinking the best for you guys.”
    I didn’t feel too disappointed. It felt good to be in a process, to have an expert team, to have a plan. Bill hadn’t had any illusions about getting pregnant the first time, and we were ready to try again. We’d confirmed that our insurance would cover the Follistim medication and office visits, giving us the means to continue immediately. I gave Tracey the go-ahead to call in our next order and told her I would pick up the Follistim from Braun Pharmacy myself.
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    The most common complaint I’d heard from people who’d gone through fertility treatments was how