Silence. Her breathing stops. Then starts again. Faster.
She rolls onto her back. Looks up at me. Her dark eyes, wide. Her bottom lip caught between her teeth. And I see it…the fear and the joy and the disbelief all fighting for space on her beautiful face.
“How did you…”
“Baby.” I press my hand firmer against her belly. Feel the warmth. The life. “I read bodies for a living.”
Her eyes fill. Her chin trembles. She presses her lips together hard, trying to hold it in, but it breaks through anyway. A sob. Then a laugh. Then both at the same time.
“Four days,” she whispers. “I took the test on Monday. I’ve been trying to figure out how to tell you and you just…” She gestures at me, tears streaming. “You just KNEW? Like a fucking sorcerer?”
I grin. “Your bull always knows.”
She smacks my chest. Then grabs my face with both hands and kisses me. Hard. Wet. Salty with tears. Her small fingers digging into my jaw. Her mouth desperate and laughing against mine.
When she pulls back, her mascara is everywhere, and she’s grinning so wide her cheeks must hurt.
“We did it,” she says. “We actually did it.”
I lean down and press my lips to her belly. Right where my hand was. Feel the warmth of her skin. The softness. The impossible, terrifying, perfect fact of what’s growing under my mouth.
“Yeah, baby,” I murmur against her stomach. “We did.”
First, Ina calls Tanya. I hear the scream through the phone from across the room.
“I KNEW IT. I TOLD BOBBY. I SAID SHE’S GLOWING AGAIN. THAT MAN OWES ME.”
“You BET on me?!”
“It was a loving bet!”
Lilah finds out via FaceTime. She cries. Full, heaving, ugly sobs that turn into hysterical laughter that turn back into sobs. “I’m gonna be a big sister. Oh my God… Oh, my GOD! Mom, I’m gonna spoil this baby so bad.” I laugh. “We’re having a BABY!”
Miles texts back: ??
Then, ten minutes later:Is it a boy? Can he play ball?
That boy…
My woman reads that text and cries for twenty minutes.
Mama cries. No surprise there. But when she grabs my face with both hands and says, “My baby’s having a baby,” I have to look at the ceiling for a second.
Dad shakes my hand. Firm. Long. His dark eyes bright.
“That’s my boy,” he says.
Mack asks if he can name it. I tell him absolutely not. He suggests “Mack Junior” anyway. Levi offers to babysit. Colt nods from across the room, which coming from him is basically a tearful embrace.
Ina’s parents drive down the next day. Marie walks through the door, already crying. James shakes my hand, pulls me in for a hug, and whispers in my ear: “You’re a good man, Beau. Take care of my girls.”
I will, sir. Both of them. All of them. For the rest of my life.
Sunday evening on our porch where my woman brought her lemonade recipe, her laugh, her body and her heart, and turned my quiet house into the loudest, warmest, most alive place I’ve ever lived.
She’s sitting on the swing. Bare feet. My shirt. Lemonadesweating in her hand. The evening light catching her dark skin, her gold earrings, the yellow diamond on her finger. Her other hand resting on her belly. Not showing yet. But there. Already there.
I come up the steps. The same ones I climbed that first night when I showed up on her parents’ porch and kissed her without asking. Same slow stride. Same certainty.
