I used to be the woman who could stay awake for twenty-four hours and bounce back with just a shower and a coffee.I used to be the woman who rolled her eyes at sentimental commercials and would rather swallow a thumbtack than admit she got her feelings hurt.
Now I cry because Monty is building the crib or figuring out how to set up the gates in the stairs.
Now I cry because Callaway buys the “good” orange juice without being asked—extra pulp, because apparently he remembers my preferences better than I remember my own.
Now I cry because an ultrasound tech smiles at the screen and says, “Look, she’s waving,” and my entire soul goes feral, like it wants to crawl out of my skin and meet her in person.
She feels so real.
Not just a due date and a list of tasks on my phone.She’s a tiny person in there, doing tiny-person things, and there is no pretending I’m untouched by it anymore.
There’s a part of me that’s thrilled in the way sunlight feels after months of rain.
And there’s a part of me that’s terrified, because love like this doesn’t come with a safe word.
I’m on the couch with my laptop propped on a pillow, watching a parenting video hosted by a woman who looks like she came out of the womb already knowing how to swaddle.She’s smiling into the camera like babies are puzzles and not tiny, screaming gods who can ruin your life with a diaper blowout.
“Your newborn’s sleep schedule will?—”
Sure.Great.Love that for her.But will it really be a schedule?
Our place looks like we live here now.Not like I’m borrowing space while I figure out what comes next.Not like I’m passing through.
There’s a throw blanket that never stays folded because Monty drags it from room to room like he’s a large, emotionally constipated housecat who refuses to admit he enjoys comfort.
There are Callaway’s sunglasses on the counter, because he takes them off and forgets they exist the second he’s thinking about something else.Which is ...frequently me now.Sometimes it hits me, how fast I became his favorite thought.How absolute he is about it.
There’s a little stack of prenatal books I keep meaning to read.They sit there judging me with their cheerful fonts.
My shirt rides up when I shift.My stomach is different.Not the full, round, unmistakable baby-bump moment yet.Just a soft curve that wasn’t there before, like my body is whispering,Something is happening.Keep up.
I slide my palm over it anyway.Skin warm.Mine and not mine.
I don’t feel her move yet.At least, I don’t think I do.Sometimes there’s a fluttering sensation that makes me go completely still, like if I move I’ll scare it away.Then it turns out to be gas and I get humbled by my own digestive system.
This is my life now: trying to decide if I’ve felt my daughter or if it was the bean burrito I craved at three in the morning like a gremlin with a mission.
Thankfully, Cally and Monty don’t follow thedon’t feed her after midnightrule.They spoil me and I’m grateful for that.
Family therapy has been even more annoying lately, because now there are two men sitting beside me like emotional bouncers.When I start spiraling, they make eye contact like they’re coordinating a rescue.Like they can tag-team my nervous system back into something functional.
It’s rude.
Also, it works, and that makes it worse.
The front door opens, and I don’t look up because I know them by sound.
Monty’s steps have this blunt purpose to them when he’s worn down.Like he’s pushing through something and refuses to admit it’s pushing back.
Callaway moves quieter than people expect.He’s six-foot-three and built like a threat, but his feet land like someone who learned early how to keep himself out of the way of other people’s moods.It’s one of the first things I noticed about him—and one of the things that breaks me open if I let myself think about it too long.
Keys drop into the bowl by the door.A bag hits the floor.The soft scrape of a zipper.
Then Monty appears first.
Hair damp, like he showered too fast and didn’t give himself time to breathe afterward.Sweatpants, plain T-shirt, the uniform of a man trying not to show his insides on his outside.His face is calm in that goalie way—control as religion, restraint as survival.
His eyes find me and the control slips just a little.
