Although this story is self contained, it contains allusions to an earlier story, "The Examination." I like to think you will enjoy this one more if you have read the other one.
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Robert Ames was growing concerned. Angelica Lopez had disappeared behind the inner office door of the clinic over an hour ago. With perfect hindsight he realized they could have left some notes back at the office or told someone at the Post outlining the story they were following.
It had all seemed so unreal that night a few weeks ago. He and his curvy girlfriend had just finished making love, passionate and satisfying as always, when she looked over at him with a strange expression in dark eyes.
"Darling, if I agreed to marry you, would you want me to quit my job and stay home to do nothing but keep house and make little brown babies for you?"
"Mi Amor! How can you ask such a thing? You know I love you and want to marry you, but why would I want you to give up your career at the Post? You're a superb reporter; a rising star there; that would be so stupid. As for having kids, sure I'd like us to have two or three later on, but not for you to be nothing but a housekeeper and mother."
"That's a politically correct answer, Robert," she grinned, "But are you sure? Suppose I could be turned into a horny, submissive little slut who wanted nothing more than to please you. Wouldn't you like to have a baby-making fuck toy?"
"I'd rather have a woman."
"I think I believe you, darling," Angelica replied, her eyes glowing with admiration that was almost love. "But not all men, maybe not many men, are like that. Do you remember Emma Parks?"
"Uh...I think so. She's that school chum of yours? On the fast track at BBD&R. Didn't we attend her wedding a year or two ago? Yes, quite pretty. Why do you ask? You haven't mentioned her for some time."
"I had lost track of her. I heard she left BBD&R soon after she got married. Well, a couple of weeks ago I ran into her at that big new suburban hyper-mart. Remember when I got the box of paper for our printer? I hardly recognized her when I saw her in the ladies room. She was sitting beside a stroller with a strapping toddler in it as she was nursing a little one. And she was pregnant!
"Wow! She didn't look like the housewife type to me, from what I remember."
"That's just it. She wasn't! She had told me before she married she intended to continue her career and wasn't sure she even wanted to have children. The Emma I met yesterday was a totally different woman. All she wanted to talk about was her babies and her Frank. She seemed more obsessed with him than in love. Frank said this. Frank did that. Frank likes her being pregnant. I think she would have told me how wonderfully and how often he makes love to her and how often he gets her off, if I hadn't stopped her."
"Weird."
"I thought so, but she didn't. She even mentioned several of her friends that had undergone similar changes in their lives. That was when my reporter's instincts kicked in. I didn't particularly like what I saw in Emma, but if it were some kind of perverse social trend, well, it might be worth a feature."
"So that's the mysterious project you have been working on," Robert grinned at his clever lover.
"Yes, and I think I need your help."
"Leads turn so cold you need help from the sports pages?"
"On the contrary. I found plenty of material for an ordinary feature, but I may have found something else, too."
"Oh?" Robert replied, his curiosity peeked.
"When I interviewed the women, several mentioned the same gynecologist, a Dr. James Bock. I think there is something wrong with this picture and with these women. It's like they were all "fixed" to be submissive, horny little wives, regardless of their previous personalities."
"Now hold on, Angelica. Women do change their priorities over time. At some point many women decide it's time to start a family," Robert objected.
"Robert! These are women like me, in their mid twenties, a little early to be hearing the "biological clock" tick. And why would it strike for all of them at the same hour? Will you take me seriously enough at least to check out this Bock clinic while I continue interviewing the women?"
Skeptical at first, Robert himself was soon convinced that indeed, something strange was going on at Dr. James Bock's clinic. For one thing, it had not always been the clinic of James Bock. Until about three years ago, it had belonged to Dr. Janet McGuire, a cracker-jack gynecologist of about 35 who had developed a downtown practice catering to career women. Then the young James Bock had shown up just out of medical school for a job interview. He got the job ... and Dr. McGuire, too. Within days the former heartbreaker was wandering around her office with dreamy, unfocused eyes. After each "consultation" with her younger partner, Janet emerged looking even more flushed and dazed. The women who worked with Janet sniggered, guessing what went on during those "consultations."
No one was surprised, therefore, when a week or so later Janet let it slip that she and Dr. Bock were living together. They were puzzled, however, when Janet started coming in later and later each morning until one day she happily announced she was pregnant. Seeing the way Janet mooned at James whenever she was near him, no one needed to ask who had put the baby in the pretty gynecologist. The staff watched Janet's belly grow beneath maternity dresses which seemed to get skimpier by the week and her need for "consultations" with a very self-satisfied Dr. Bock became more frequent. Then the bombshell. Janet called everyone together to tell them James had decided she should stay home to "take care of herself until the baby arrived" Consequently she would withdraw from the practice indefinitely.
Stranger still, Robert learned that in the ensuing months the four women working at the clinic also became pregnant -- and the order was far from random! Megan, the youngest nurse had only barely started to show when Suzy the bimbo receptionist went on maternity leave. Suzy was back to cover for Megan by the time she was almost too big to walk. Ruth scolded Alice, the office manager, for letting her husband make her pregnant again "at her age." By the time Alice returned to work, however, she had to bite her tongue not to ask Ruth who had put the office manager, a divorced mother of teens, back into maternity dresses.
"The way you describe Janet and those women is just like the women I'm interviewing," Angelica remarked when Robert told her about his findings. "The change is sudden and total. One day they are bright, aggressive career girls, the next, docile homebodies whose lives revolve around their men and their bulging bellies. All they talk about is her husbands or boyfriends -- what he likes, how he wants her to dress, what he thinks, how to please him, and how to get him into bed more frequently, not that that seems to be a problem. To hear them talk, they all fuck like bunnies. And none of them use any kind of contraception. Every woman I talked to had one or two children already and most were expecting another," Angelica finished, shaking her head.
That was the conversation which had led Robert here with Angelica. It had been her idea to make an appointment with Dr. Bock to find out just what was going on at this odd clinic. She had assumed the name of Angelica Carlisle and posed as a married woman who was planning on starting a family and wanted to get a check up. She had returned from her visit yesterday subdued and to Robert's surprise, did not want to make love that night. She hadn't said much about what happened, just that the doctor wanted to see her today with her "husband." So here he was.
As Robert watched the traffic in and out of the same door that his Angelica had gone through, he had more and more cause to worry. Each woman when she entered seemed cool, even bored with the chore. But each one emerged a half hour or so later flushed, glowing, and rather out of it.
At last the door open and a tall black woman stepped out. "Mr. Carlisle?" She held the door and waited until Robert entered the dimly lit room. Only as his eyes adjusted could he take in the sight. She was magnificent! She towered over him and only partly due to the five inch heals she wore. The smock came down only inches below her crotch showing off those long smooth chocolate legs that riveted Robert's eyes. Until ... he noticed the abundant breasts displayed more than concealed by the plunging neckline of this parody of medical garb.
Stunned by the sexy nurse, Robert almost didn't hear her close the door and say, "Please sit down make yourself comfortable, Mr. Carlisle." He did sit, but he wasn't comfortable. The low couch to which she ushered him afforded him too clear a view up under her smock as she sat down in the chair opposite him. "Or should I call you Mr. Ames?"
"But my name is ..." he stammered, not able to think too clearly.
