I nodded. “For now, I’ll be good with some crackers and club soda. See, I want all those things, but when I start thinking about them, I get a little nauseous. I need something to settle my stomach down before I can eat.”
“A little nauseous?” he asked and tried to hide a gagging noise.
“Go figure something out,” I said and pointed to the door. “I mean it.”
He started to leave, then stopped when he got to the door. His back still toward me, his head down.
“Flowers…I wish I wasn’t still grieving my wife and unborn child, too. I wish I could tell you I was ready to give you all of me. But I can’t. The truth is, I never wanted this again. But you walked into my life and shook everything up. My emotions are all over the place, too, but I do know one thing, and that is, having you here makes the pain go away. Seeing you, hearing your voice, all of it.Youmake the pain go away.”
He left with that and part of me wanted to tell him I wasn’t a bottle of aspirin. Being the thing that made him hurt less, wasn’t enough forme.I deserved more than that. I deserved to be something other than someone’s pain reliever.
I sunk down on the bed and thought about where we went from here. Living in his house. Having his baby. While the ghost of his pregnant wife still haunted him. It did make more sense now, though.
E.G. wasn’t just consumed with sorrow. There was guilt there, too. He might have been able to accept a tragic accident that took the life of his wife, but he would never believe there was nothing he could have done to protect his child.
It would make him an excellent father if he could allow himself to love again.
Walking away from him hadn’t worked. All I’d done was make us both miserable for weeks.
I needed a Plan B.
“What do you think, kiddo?” I asked my still flat belly. “You think I should fight for your dad?”
This would have been a really cool moment for the baby to kick for the first time.
Instead, I just let out an obnoxious burp as my stomach growled and demanded food.
“What about you, Rocco?”
He meowed vociferously.
“I guess I’ll take that as a yes.”
FORTY
GRANT
It was almost like riding a bike, he decided.
Three Months Later
“Hey there, sleepy head,”I greeted my live-in friend, as she liked to call herself, as she made her way into the kitchen.
“Hungry,” she announced grumpily. She was perpetually grumpy in the mornings, which would have been annoying if it wasn’t so adorable.
“Yes, Buttercup,” I said soothingly “Toast, peanut butter, weak tea, and a banana, but only if you’re feeling it.”
I pointed out the breakfast spread I’d already laid out for her on the counter as she pulled up a chair to the island.
Freshly showered, her wet hair pulled back in a ponytail, she wore her standard leggings with a loose top over it. Trying to hide the bump that was no longer unnoticeable.
Over the last few months, we’d developed a nice routine.
She allowed me to cater to her every need and she didn’t gripe about it too much.
I went to bed every night sexually frustrated and I didn’t gripe aboutthattoo much.
She was here. In my house. She wasn’t going anywhere and she wasn’t fighting every decision I made. Together, we’d agreed on her new doctor, and today we were going to find out the sex of the baby.
