At least I know that about my eldest son.
Sage and I stand in her sitting room in the silence he’s left behind, the baby still in my arms, and the other two making their preliminary sounds from the bedroom, and the morning light coming through the window at that low, winter angle.
“Well,” Sage says. “I suppose that’s that.”
“The dramatic portion, at least.”
She exhales, long and slow, and some of the tension she has been carrying—and she has been carrying a great deal of it, quietly, in the set of her shoulders and the particular careful control of her expression—seems to go with it. She sits down on the sofa. She looks, for the first time since I walked back into her life almost a week ago, like someone who has set something heavy down and is deciding whether she wants to pick it back up.
She looks at me, and something in her expression shifts—the guard coming down a fraction, the way it does occasionally when she isn’t fully managing it. “Can I ask you something?”
“Of course.”
“Do you actually want this? Not the babies—I know you want the babies, because you wouldn’t be here otherwise. But…” She gestures between us. “This. All of it. Because you don’t have to want it. I’m not asking for anything you aren’t genuinely offering.”
I look at her for a moment. Then I look down at the baby in my arms, who is looking at her mother with an expression of absolute, uncomplicated devotion.
“To be utterly and completely honest with you, I have spent nine months thinking about you.”
“Why? It was just a hookup.”
“That was the intent, wasn’t it?” I smile, thinking back. “Regardless of our intent, regardless of going out and trying to connect with someone else, none of that appears to matter to fate. Fate put you at my hospital. On my shift. I don’t know if there’s something else here…” That feels like a lie, but safety too. “But I’d like the chance to find out.”
She holds my gaze. The silence between us is warm and full and entirely different from the one Connor left behind. “Okay,” she says softly. “Good.”
“The age difference is noticeable. Obviously. There are three children involved. There are all kinds of reasons to keep things low-key. I have three other children?—”
“Three? There’s more besides Connor?”
Right. Not sure I’ve mentioned the girls. “Myrna and Orla are my daughters from my marriage. Twins. Identical when born, not so much now. Too many tattoos and piercings and other styledifferences between them.” I feel the same smile that stretches my face every time I speak of them, and there’s no stopping it. “Myrna is an artist. Any medium you put in front of her, she can shape it into what she wants. Beautiful work. Orla is a photographer, mostly of celebrity portraiture. You’ve likely seen her pictures in magazines or online. They are far too talented for me to claim anything regarding their artistry.”
Sage grins. “You are a very proud papa.”
“I am. They have always given me a reason to be.”
“It’s sweet how you adore them so much. I hope it’ll be that way for me with the kids.”
“No, it won’t be.”
She stares at me. “Why would you say that?”
“It’ll be better.” I settle into my seat. “My girls were born to me when I was a haggard medical student. I didn’t have the time I needed for them. I was… The early years were a blur of tests and work and all-nighters. Truly, the worst time to have kids…”
She lets me drone on about college and residency, and the longer I do, the deeper the triplets sleep in the next room.
As I wrap up, I realize it’s gone dark outside. “Strange day.”
“How’s that?” she asks.
“I haven’t gone on about my uni days in a very long time.”
“I like listening to you talk.” Sage comes closer. “I like watching your mouth move.”
“Do you?”
She smiles and slowly nods. “I like thinking about what that mouth can do.”
I shoot my gaze to her lips. “Same here.”
