They say all this in utter seriousness. But I cannot help thinking: everyone works hard while I get stuck with morning sickness. I must work longer hours in the evening.

A very tall, balding man comes over and puts his arm around the red-headed woman. “Honey,” she says to him, “I was just telling them how hard it is for me to keep up with you.”

“Yes,” he says, not smiling.

Jane and Tony walk away to dance. The two women and the man are absorbed in talking to each other.

“So you’re a biologist,” Rob says to me. “I’m studying law but I’m really more interested in motorcycles. Would you care to dance?”

I shake my head. “I really don’t feel well. I almost didn’t come tonight.” I feel a surge of nausea again, now mixed with slight cramps.

“Maybe you need fresh air, it’s getting stuffy here. Would you like to go for a ride on my motorcycle?”

“No thanks,” I try to smile. The smile seems to dissolve, spread over my face, drip into the room. The room becomes dark-gray and distant, the voices fuzzy. I realize I am exceedingly high on marijuana and wine. “I think I’d better go home now.”

“Are you sure, so soon?”

“We’ll get together again.”

I wave to Tony, dancing, and go back home. I lie on the bed with my clothes on, wondering if something is seriously wrong. I stare into darkness, at the flickers of light that pass by the window. There seems to be a momentary relief but then I realize that I had fallen asleep. The nausea and cramps are worse.

The luminous dial on my watch reads 3:30 and Tony is still not back. He said he wanted to go to bed early so that he could get some work done in the morning. I have flashes of him leaning too closely over various women, touches, a kiss, and close my eyes as if that would exorcise jealousy. “You’re just insecure,” he would say if confronted with it. Or, “Grow up,” or “You know I don’t have time for these things.”

I hear his footsteps approaching. I pretend to be asleep.

I begin to have more cramps, on and off. I consult my gynecologist and he says you must rest in bed for a while. I spend a day in bed listening to the radio, reading the Boston Globe, going over a research paper I am writing on hormones in the brain that I think Science might publish. I have a yearning to talk to someone, a female friend, about the pregnancy and motherhood, to just talk. In my head I go over the list of people Tony and I know. I have developed no intimate friendships for the last few years. I make a resolution to try to make friends, knowing full well I probably will not want to spare the time.

I go back to work the next day. I am a little pale and distraught but that might be from having stayed in bed for a whole day. My rats greet me with their tiny red eyes from their cages. Then I go to my office and shut the door. In a few hours I have cramps again, more persistently now. A sudden dizziness comes over me. The world becomes blank. I literally feel something going out of me. I crumble on the chair. Then with more courage I examine myself. Blood seeps out of me, spot by spot. I ring Tony. Luckily he’s at his desk. “I’ll call an ambulance for you right now,” he says urgently.