Chapter Fifteen
~ Macon ~
The future looked like a skeleton, all ribs and bones, jutting up from the earth where the foundation had barely cured. I stood on the edge of the construction pit, boots dusted with limestone and sawdust, eyes on Carter as he bounded over the plywood catwalk with the reckless optimism of a puppy who hadn’t read the warning sign. He wore overalls rolled up at the ankles, a t-shirt so stretched at the belly it looked like it might split, and a grin that took up the whole topography of his face.
“Check it out,” he called, waving me over. “They framed the kitchen already!” He slapped a stud for emphasis, then pressed his palm flat against the raw wood, like he could taste the future through his fingertips.
I picked my way across the planks, hyperaware of every warped board and loose nail, because the idea of him falling—five months and change pregnant, center of gravity already working against him—made my teeth ache. The baby wasn’t due for another week, maybe two if we were lucky, but I moved like the floor was booby-trapped and Carter was made of blown glass.
He pointed out the ghost of the pantry, the way the window would throw light on the breakfast nook, the corner where he wanted to put a reading chair for late-night bottle duty.
“And the mudroom’s huge!” he said. “Enough space for boots, goats, a stroller—hell, we could start a daycare in there if this whole ‘retirement’ thing gets boring.”
I let him rattle on, half-listening, half-scanning the site for hazards. There was no one else I’d trust to build this place, but that didn’t stop me from sizing up every worker like I expected sabotage. They moved through the framing with thefast, efficient choreography of men who’d done this a hundred times before.
The air was a punch bowl of wet cement, resin, and high-altitude pine; every breath was a reminder that the house was real, not just a fever dream sketched on napkins at the dining table at Black Butte Ranch.
Carter twirled, somehow, in that half-finished shell of a kitchen, one hand bracing his lower back, the other cradling the ledge of his stomach. His cheeks were pink, hair pulled back with a bandana that looked like it had come from a 4th of July parade.
“Can you believe it?” he said, voice hushed. “It’s really happening.”
I took it in—the grid of the beams, the blue chalk lines on the slab, the sunlight spearing down through rafters like a promise. “Yeah,” I said. “It’s a miracle nothing’s on fire.”
He flipped me off, but the smile never faded. “You’re just mad I won the bet.”
The bet in question was whether we could get the place framed before the baby arrived. Carter had wagered a hundred bucks and a full week of dishwashing duty that he could hustle the permits, find a builder, and have walls up by the end of June.
I’d told him he was out of his mind—this was Montana, not Manhattan, and good help was harder to find than a sober cowboy. He’d proved me wrong in spectacular fashion, probably by threatening the contractor with a Yelp review.
The foreman—a blocky, sunburnt guy named Larry—wandered over, hardhat tucked under one arm. “Afternoon,” he said, nodding at me, then Carter, then back at me like he was waiting for a translation.
Carter grinned. “He doesn’t bite,” he told Larry, gesturing at me. “He just looks like that.”
“Noted.” Larry thumbed a roll of plans, half his fingers stained with ink. “Just wanted to update you—we’re aheadof schedule. Might even start on the roof trusses by Friday if weather holds.” He squinted at Carter. “You sure you’re comfortable walking the site like this?”
Carter planted his feet, hands on hips. “I’m fine. I promise I won’t go into labor in your porta-potty.”
Larry looked at me, then at Carter, then at me again. “All right. Just don’t sue if your water breaks on the slab.”
“Deal,” Carter said, and Larry trundled off, muttering something about “city people.”
When we were alone again, Carter threaded his fingers through mine, squeezing just hard enough to remind me who owned which part of my soul. We walked the perimeter, his pace slow but steady, pausing every few feet so he could point out another feature.
“I want a woodstove right here,” he said, marking the spot with his heel. “And an old-school mailbox at the end of the drive. None of that fiberglass crap.”
I let him talk, committing every detail to memory. The shape of his dreams had changed so many times since I met him—Houston skyline, Barcelona beach, Portland’s endless gray—but here, at the edge of a Montana hayfield, he looked more at home than I’d ever seen.
We stood in what would be the living room, sunlight pouring through the empty window frame. He leaned against the plywood, catching his breath, and looked at me with that unfiltered joy that still scared the hell out of me. “You think the baby will like it here?”
I shrugged, but it was all for show. “Not like they get a vote.”
He rested his head on my shoulder, hair tickling my jaw. For a second, everything else—the workers, the foreman, even the whine of the generator—faded out. All that was left was the two of us, and the space where the next chapter would grow.
“You’re quiet,” he said, the words feather-light. “You nervous?”
I thought about it. About all the ways the world could go sideways. About the memory of a hospital corridor, the sight of a birth gone wrong, all the things that could be lost in a single flicker of fate. I watched his hand trace the curve of his stomach, protective and proud and impossibly brave.
“Yeah,” I said. “But that’s normal, right?”
