“I don’t want you to do anything if you think it’s too soon.” My heart was rioting inside my chest. I didn’t want to let myself hope.
“We’re having a baby.” She grinned. “I think we missed the taking-it-slow train.”
“What about your family? Your friends?”
She caressed her belly, mulling it over. “It will be hard at first, but I’d rather be next to you than with everyone else combined.”
“I’ll work crazy hours,” I said.
She smiled a little. “I’m used to spending a lot of time alone. I’m comfortable with it. Plus, I make friends ridiculously quickly.” Layla rolled her eyes in mock arrogancy.
“What about your career?” I asked.
Her face softened. “I love that you call it a career when everyone else calls it a job.”
I scowled. “Raising little humans and teaching them the basics of life is no less heroic than treating people for their illnesses.”
“Honestly? I’ve worked since I was twenty-one and never took a breather. Would it really be so bad to take a sabbatical? I don’t think so. An entire year just for me and George—again, name not final—seems like a good idea to reset and get into this role called motherhood.”
“Layla.” I grabbed her hands in mine, feeling full to the brim with this acute, vivid happiness that had a taste and a texture and a heartbeat. “Please tell me you’re sure.”
“I’m sure.” She beamed.
Epilogue
Layla
Valentine’s Day, 2024
“I’ll be right there. I just need to make sure there’s no leftover cabbage in my cleavage” wasn’t a thing I ever thought I’d tell my boyfriend. Or anyone else, for the matter. Yet here I was, in front of my bathroom mirror, tossing bits of white cabbage out of my nursing bra, glowering at myself.
“Pull yourself together,” I muttered. “It’s just a date. You’ve been on many before.”
It did feel monumental, though. Going out with Grant on a date for the first time since George was born.
Fine, he did come out looking like a George.
George Costanza, unfortunately.
It was uncanny. And more than a little troubling. At the end of the day, I’d decided to just go with the flow. It wasn’t like we actually called him George. He was Georgie to everyone who knew us.
There was a soft knock on the bathroom door. “Sweetie?” my mother called behind the plank of wood. “I think Georgie is hungry again.”
I stuffed the cabbage into the trash can, flicking my hair away from my face. I opened the door, and Mom was there,holding my three-month-old son. “Mom, how can it be? I nursed him twenty minutes ago.”
“Have you ever seen your father eat?” She blinked at me. “The Schmidt men have a healthy appetite.”
“And the Gerwig men have a fixation with their women’s bosoms.” Grant breezed past us in the hallway, stopping only to drop a kiss on my forehead before continuing his journey to the bedroom, unbuttoning his shirt on the way. He’d just gotten home from work.
My mother flashed me a sweet smile and handed me my baby, who was gnawing at his own fist. “Go say hi to Grant.”
George had very luckily grown out of his awkward bald man stage and looked like Grant’s little Mini Me these days. With a shock of tawny princely hair—almost strawberry blond—and big eyes the color of the belly of a forest. So green, strangers stopped me on the street to stare at him. He even had his dad’s dimpled chin.
I scooped my baby from my mother’s hands and sighed, then waltzed over to the bedroom while flipping one side of my nursing bra open. Georgie immediately latched hungrily on to my boob, his cheeks doing that hollow suction motion as he gobbled up milk. His eyes immediately fluttered shut, as though this whole eating-and-shitting gig was taking its toll on his energy level.
“Dude, we’ll be gone for, like, an hour and a half.” I laughed a little. “Don’t be so dramatic.”
When I reached the primary bedroom, Grant was already slipping into his date clothes. I was surprised to see he was going for something elegant. Charcoal slacks and a crisp white dress shirt. I was wearing my pink silk dress again. Mainly because it held nostalgic value for me, since this was the night we’d made Georgie, but also because I wanted to show off my slimmed-down body after giving birth.
