CHAPTER NINETEEN
FALLON
The daythey got the paternity results was the same day Fallon had scheduled his upcoming surgery. Gage didn’t say anything, of course, but Fallon could see the tension in his body, and he knew Gage hadn’t read them yet. They arrived in a nondescript envelope and were sitting on the kitchen table before they left for Fallon’s pre-op testing.
He wasn’t brave enough to ask Gage about them. Gage said he’d be happy either way, and Fallon believed him. The problem wasn’t him. It was the disappointment, rage, and ache Fallon would feel to learn that the tiny bit of hope that Charlie didn’t have a single tie to him or his family ever again would be destroyed.
His stomach was feeling wrecked, and while he knew he needed to eat to keep himself and Mango healthy, he couldn’t stomach anything besides dry toast and some chamomile tea.
The blood test went well enough—nothing abnormal. He’d been through more than one surgery in his life, so the prospect of going to sleep and waking up with no uterus and his baby was a welcome one. And he knew he wouldn’t have to struggle with recovery after.
Gage would be with him.
He wouldn’t have to fight for bare-bones help that might have come if he’d lost his mind and tried to do all of this with his ex.
“Do you want some lunch, baby?”
Fallon glanced over as they headed home. He was holding the paperwork with his surgery date—two and a half weeks left before they got to meet Mango. It felt surreal.
“No. I’m not feeling well. You can get something if you want.”
Gage bit his lip, then said, “I promised my dad I’d try and keep us occupied for a bit while they finish the house.”
Fallon’s eyes widened. He hadn’t realized their families had already done the shopping. “Is it bad that we didn’t pick out anything?”
Gage snorted. “I had no idea what to even tell them we needed. My dad tried to ask about a color scheme, and I just went blank.”
Fallon grimaced. “Yeah. I don’t…I don’t know. I don’t care. By the time it matters, Mango is going to outgrow all of it anyway.”
“Exactly.” He let out a puff of air. “Do you…I mean. Should we talk other stuff too? Like baby names?”
Fallon snorted. “Yeah. I guess we can’t really name them Mango, can we?”
Gage grinned. “No.” He squeezed the steering wheel. “Wanna do the zoo? We can sit by the cheetahs and think about it.”
And that, Fallon decided, sounded like heaven.
Gage got himself a snack while they found a comfortable bench, and Fallon leaned against Gage’s side as they watched the cheetahs napping on their wooden platforms hanging from the cage trees. Fallon always felt sorry for the animals at the zoo, though theirs was to rehabilitate injured animals before they were released back into open-sanctuary zoos on other continents.
But he hated the idea of being caged.
Pressing his hand to his stomach, he felt a flurry of kicks. Mango had been quieter these days, but his doctor assured him that was normal as the baby ran out of room to grow.
“Are there any names you love?” he asked after a bit. This was one more thing he’d been avoiding.
Gage blinked at him. “Oh. Uh…I don’t know. I’d never really given it any thought. Are you, ah…” He bit the inside of his cheek. “Do you want to raise the baby with their assigned gender?”
Fallon shrugged. “I think so, yeah. I don’t think it would have been any easier for me if I’d been raised without one. I think it just sucks when parents put a lot of pressure on their kids to be a certain way, you know? Like, if Frankie had tried to make me wear dresses and play with Barbies and yelled at me for not being girly enough, it might have been harder. But he never stopped me from being myself. It just took a while for me to put a name to what I was.”
Gage took his hand and kissed his wrist. His lips were sun-warmed and a little chapped. “So why don’t we pick a few names, and we can see which one Mango looks like the most.”
“Don’t they all just look, like, bald and squish-faced?”
Gage burst into laughter. “I wasn’t bald. I had a full head of hair. I actually had really fine black hair all over my shoulders and back too.”
If the test results came back positive for Gage, Fallon wondered if Mango would look like him or Gage. Or a mixture. Or neither.
“I’ve always liked nature names,” Fallon said. “I don’t want to continue with theFs. I’m glad my mom ditched that tradition with Elodie.”
