It was like everything just…fellinto place.
All the things I’d been scared of, all the ways I thought people would judge me, it was all for nothing. It became clear in those days, those weeks after we started going public, that the world I’d come from was not the one I lived in now.
Juniper Hill was different.
It was where I belonged.
With Nash and Nell…my family.
We hadn’t told Nell yet that we were expecting; we didn’t want to disappoint her if it didn’t work out, so we waited those first few agonizing weeks and kept it to ourselves. Still…we got to do other things.
For the moment, Nash and Nell moved into my place—so that we didn’t have to live next to the bar.
We started looking for a house.
I made pancakes for Nell every Saturday morning, and Nash made love to me every night.
And on those nights, on those long and wonderful nights, he made me promises.
Lying on my back with his mouth between my legs, he told me he was going to keep me full of him, that I was going to be the happiest woman in the world.
Inside me, his eyes gazing into mine, he told me he was going to give me as many babies as I wanted.
Bent over the bed, he rasped into my ear that he was going to make me his wife.
And I believed every word.
It was a Tuesday in November when we sat in the waiting room of the only doctor’s office in Juniper Falls, a small, cozy office on the second floor of the hospital. We had the benefit of having doctors here because of the influx of tourists in the fall—didn’t have to go all the way to Burlington, very much to my relief. Nash kept his hand wrapped around mine, my knee bopping up and down with nerves.
“Hey,” he said under his breath. “You’re still doing that.”
“I know.” I sighed, shaking my head. “I’m nervous. My anxiety has just been…through the roof.”
“The baby is fine.”
“You don’t know that.” I closed my eyes, inhaling…exhaling. “I hate that I can’t feel it? Like…what if it doesn’t have a heartbeat? Or it’s—or something’s wrong with the way it’s growing?—”
“It’s going to be good news,” he said, his thumb moving across my knuckles. “I’m sure of it.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I have a sense for when things are gonna work out,” he said. “Plus…you cried at a cereal commercial yesterday.”
I frowned. “It was a good commercial!”
“The dog found his family, Maggie. It was thirty seconds long.”
“I said what I said.”
He smiled, his hand tightening around mine. I took a second to look around the waiting room…to remember that I wasn’t the only one doing this.
“Nash,” I said.
“Yeah?”
“What if there’s two?”
He side-eyed me.
