"You're In Trouble"

sur·prise:  1.) to strike or occur to with a sudden feeling of wonder or astonishment, as through unexpectedness, 2.) to come upon or discover suddenly and unexpectedly

Synonyms:  Uh oh, crap, no friggin' way and seriously???

Surprise No. 1:  Finding out that my wife is pregnant.

Surprise No. 2:  Finding out that my wife is pregnant with twins.

The last two months have been rather interesting in my world.  I've found out that I will become a father of two on or around January 17, 2009 at the age of 23.  I realize this is a common occurrence all around the world, but definitely not in my world.  So let's start from the beginning:

About two months ago, my lovely wife Becca told me it might be a good idea to pick up a pregnancy test.  I guess technically, that should've been Surprise No. 1, but my brain attempted to find all the possible holes in this idea and therefore delayed reality.  Enter daunting task No. 1:  sneaking through the local Wal Mart to purchase a pregnancy test without running into anybody I knew.

This covert operation may not seem quite as dangerous as you would think, but I was born and raised in a small town.  Every time I go into Wal Mart I see a former teacher, class mate, church member or general acquaintance of myself, my parents or my sister.  At this point, we were still trying to fly under the radar, so we fumbled our way through the health section trying to find out which cardboard box was better/ cheaper than the others.  Unfortunately, we couldn't stop our child-like giggling long enough to stand there and figure out which one was better than the others so we just grabbed one.

So now that the task of picking the proper pregnancy indicator was done, it was time to tuck that bad boy under our arm (hidden of course by several other random, unnecessary purchases) and haul tail to the front of the store.  Of course I looked both ways before exiting the aisle and saw no familiar faces so we made a mad dash toward the self checkout.  Sadly, the self checkout aisles at the Madison, Miss. Wal Mart aren't open on Sunday afternoons (in case you're ever in town) so we had to do it the old fashion way.  Luckily we didn't know Belinda.  So things worked out there.

Now that daunting task No. 1 is accomplished, we rush home to see the results.  One peed on positive later and my stomach feels funny.  Since two tests come in the box, I suggested we try the second one and see what it says.  Same thing.  Surprise No. 1 is official.  Becca is prego.

Since I'm a male who's out of touch with most of reality, I don't know the proper benchmarks of doctor visits during a pregnancy.  So a few weeks later I find myself in completely new territory:  the gynecologist's office.  Not only is this uncharted territory for most males my age, but it is also a whole new level of awkward.  As I sit in the nearly-empty waiting room I was kept entertained by an obese 12-year-old's conversation lovingly played for the entire waiting room via her speakerphone.  The adorable little child decided to give me the stink eye and speak louder every time I glanced her way, which only added to the awkwardness.  

Anyway, after a few minutes we were called to the back and I was then forced to sit alone in a chair with no wife around to make me look like I belonged in this VIP lady doctor area.  I ended up just playing Brickbreaker on my cell phone as women in various stages of pregnancy passed by.  (High score of 25,750 thank you very much.)

After a few minutes of the brick breaking action, we moved into the Sonogram room where I would be introduced to my offspring for the first time.  Enter surprise No. 2.

After a few minutes of small talk and goop application, the lady pulled up a screen similar to television static and proceeded to click some buttons.  And then it happened . . .  The most jaw-dropping conversation of my entire friggin life.

"Do you see what I see?" - Sonogram technician lady

"Probably not." - Me

"I don't think so." - Becca

"There's two of 'em!" - Sonogram technician lady.

Silence.

"Pardon?" - Me

"Yea, there's two of them." - Sonogram technician lady (as if we had any idea in hell that was a normal thing)

Silence.

"Are you kidding?" - Me

"Nope.  There are two babies in there.  See, one and two." - Sonogram technician lady.

"No, seriously.  Are you joking?" - Becca

"No, I'm serious.  You guys are having twins." - Sonogram technician lady.

It's at this point that my wide-eyed stare turns to Becca and I mutter the words, "You're in trouble."

At what is by far the most exciting news I've ever been given, I turn to my lovely wife and all I can muster is "You're in trouble."  I'm going to make one hell of a father.

So after several days of not being able to come up with anything more to say to each other than "frickin' twins" Becca and I now have to face daunting task  No. 2:  telling the parents . . .