“You’re welcome. Good luck, and God bless you on your little one. Santoro, I’ll miss you, but good luck on this next chapter of your life.”
I dapped him and gave him a side hug. “Same here, Doc. But I’ll be seeing you around. Thanks for everything, man.”
He smiled and walked out of the room. I looked at Chanel. “How are you feeling, baby?”
“Shocked. Stunned. Elated. Disbelieving. I don’t know. I didn’t think that I could get pregnant. I want to be happy, Ashton, but I’m scared.”
“There’s nothing for you to be afraid of. This is what walking in faith looks like. We’ll keep doing that, and I’ll be by your side even more so. It couldn’t have come at a better time.”
“Yes, but you’ve got these projects that will be taking off at the first of the year.”
“And it won’t get in the way of my being there for you and my baby. The only thing you need to worry about is planning a wedding, a baby shower, and decorating a nursery.”
“Wow. That’s all, huh?”
“You’ll get it done before the baby arrives. We can hire help. You’ve got five more months.”
“I feel cheated. Most women have almost an entire nine months to prepare for something of this magnitude. This baby is about to turn our whole lives around.”
I smiled. “I look forward to it.”
“Wow. A baby and a proposal in the same day.” She laughed. “Did you know?” she asked, tilting her head.
“Can’t say I did, baby. I don’t recall any odd eating habits, sickness, sensitivity to odor, and definitely no weight gain. You’re still fine as hell.”
“I can’t recall anything either. I gained not one single ounce. It didn’t happen for either of us until we were with each other. How spectacular is that?”
“Everything is in His timing.” I pulled her closer and pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “Chanel, I love you, and I look forward to what retirement and life as a husband and father will look like.”
She looked up at me with tears in her eyes. I wiped them away. “So do I, Ash. I have a feeling it’s going to be a beautiful life.”
“With you by my side, it can’t help but be.”
ONE YEAR LATER
“This is so exciting.I love what you’re doing for the community, baby. I’m so proud of all that you have accomplished and how well your business is going. You guys are doing great things for those athletes.”
“Baby, we’re going to be late, and we’re the hosts.”
“I know. I’m just trying to undo this last strap,” Chanel grumbled with a huff. “There we go. Come on, big boy,” she cooed to our seven-month-old son, Ethan Santino Santoro.
He was a big boy, and I often joked that he was almost as big as his mama. I always tipped my hat off to my wife’s ability to push out that big nine-pound, three-ounce baby. He almoststretched my woman to capacity with that big ass head. I could tell that he was going to be a big boy when he was older because he was already a big baby. Most people thought that he was older than he was.
Tino, as we called him, was a happy little baby who loved his aunts, uncles, and both sets of grandparents, who spoiled him endlessly. “Here, give him to me.”
“I can carry him, Ash.”
“Yeah, he put your back out a couple of weeks ago.”
“No. That was you, sir,” she replied, kissing our baby and then handing him off to me. I watched as she grabbed her purse and passed the diaper bag to me. Once we had everything we needed, I grabbed her hand and led her up the sidewalk.
She tussled with her large sun hat as a balmy breeze blew. “I should have left this thing at home.”
“Baby,” I stated, stopping and jerking her hand to make her be still.
“What?”
“I need you to chill your ass out. You’re beautiful. What are you nervous about?”
