Before long, Jack and Perrin give their last goodbyes to the baby, and the others drift out after them.
I grin at Bee. Just us and a baby.
Baylor
Baby Morrison fusses but I’m so glad to have him here, I don’t care. It’s a dangerous combination: me, Cas, and a baby in a house together. Too close to something I want. Too close to the dreams we talked about in this past year coming to life.
I get to be an uncle, from the beginning this time. With Pier I was too young, and CJ too afraid to ask for help at the beginning. It feels like a whole other chapter of our lives is opening.
Morrison cries his little cries, pressed tight to my chest, which seems to help. I sway; I sing. The deepness of my voice seems to quiet him until there are just the occasional whimpers.
I sing made-up lyrics, little snippets and one-off lines that come and go in my head. I focus on the moonlight coming through the window, and the easing rise and fall of Morrison’s sleepy breaths. So focused that when I realize Cas is back, standing in the doorway to the bedroom, his gaze is so intent I have to wonder how long he’s been standing there.
My song and steps falter, but Cas moves in, pressing his chest gently against Morrison’s back, so the small thing is between us, covered in love.
I switch from made up songs to those we are writing together. Cas joins me, his eyes luminous in the moonlight, never leaving mine as he perfectly pitches his voice to where ours work the best together but letting me have the lead.
Baby Morrison gives a soft whoosh of breath and calms, wiggling adorably as if to burrow into my chest. My hands cover his back and bottom, cradling his head, but Cas lightly holds my hips, keeping us together as we make this little space for my nephew.
The moment deepens, so sweet I swear the air is full of it — heavy and scented. The words, the love, become some real and tangible thing I swear I am breathing in.
We stay like that, humming and singing our music low to put Morrison back to sleep, swaying in the moonlight from the window. Morrison goes from still to open-mouth snoozing.
With graceful ease, Cas finally steps back and takes Morrison from me and has him placed in his little nest before I even realize what he was doing. Morrison doesn’t even give a peep of protest, lulled deep into sleep now.
Case comes back to me, closer without the baby between us, and wipes my face free from tears I didn’t know were there.
My heart cracks wide open. I can’t hide how I feel, how much I want this future with him.
“You ready for this, Bee? A baby we don’t have to give back at the end of the day?” He whispers, wrapping my arms tight around him.
“I’m ready for whatever is next,” I answer, and Cas’s lips softly press on mine. “With you.”
“What’s next is you taking me to bed.”
I run a hand under his shirt, making him smile and press his lips harder to mine this time.
We end up in our bed, naked and kissing slowly like we don’t have a baby in the next room that could wake up at any time.
I smile into every kiss. When we have a baby, I have no doubt there will be late nights and little sleep. But there will also be two amazing grandmothers, cousins, an aunt and uncle, and three pairs of uncles at the ready.
Without that, I might want more time just for us. But as always, I have my family to help out. Its own little baby-rearing village. I don’t want to waste another moment of the future I didn’t know I could have.
“I love you, Baylor Mann,” he tells me, in the same moonlight we danced in earlier, letting me press him into the mattress and wrapping his legs tight around my hips.
“I love you, Cas.”
Epilogue – Baylor
You – Collective Soul
TheviewfromHighTop is my favorite. It’s the tallest peak on the front side of the ski mountain. It blocks the backside ski runs from being seen in Bear Valley and makes that part of the mountain range feel like its own world when you are back there.
Looking out toward town, you can see the shine off Bear Lake and Summit House. The sunset isn’t like what it is down by the Mountain House, the place Jack and Perrin always stop. The place they got engaged.
This is more rugged than that. More light in the sky and shadows through the trees. More daybreak than sunset.
The sky looks the biggest from here.
