Two hours later we’re getting into my car. I buckle Birdie’s car seat and drive the seven minutes to the west ridge with my hands white-knuckled on the wheel. Meanwhile Birdie kicks her feet in the back seat humming tunelessly to herself.
My heart rate comes down until I turn onto his drive. Then every emotion comes rushing back in. I just want to see him and fall into his arms.
I crawl up the driveway at a snail’s pace while I try to collect myself. But then I stop the car when I see a structure at the end of the drive that was not there four days ago.
I blink. “Wait, two structures?”
The first is a farm stand.
It is about the size of a single-car carport, cedar, with a pitched roof and a hinged wooden counter and hooks underneath. There’s a chalkboard on the side wall with one word on it in big white letters:BAKERY.The second is tucked between the stand and the cabin, on a bed of soft wood chips. It’s an adorable playhouse.
My breath comes in short bursts. This can’t be for me. That’s crazy. No one has ever done anything like this for me and I’ve only just met Ryan. There’s no way.
But I look at the playhouse again. It’s small and cedar like the stand with the same pitched roof and a tiny front door with a round wooden knob. There’s a window with shutters. Beside it there’s an iron hook with a sign dangling from it. The wobbly letters readBIRDIE'S PLACE.
I cover my mouth with my hand and take it all in. Birdie, in the back seat, sees the playhouse.
"Mine?" she says. Which is her word for a lot of things but right now it is a question she is asking me with the full, shocked hope of a two-year-old who has identified the thing as something she wants.
"Bug."
"MINE?"
I don’t answer. My hands are shaking. Then Ryan appears at the top of the drive. He’s walking towards us and I get out to pull Birdie from her car seat.
I walk across the gravel with her on my hip and she is pointing at the playhouse with her whole arm. She’s sayingmine mine minein increasing escalation. We meet Ryan in the middle.
I look up at him. "You built a playhouse."
"I did."
"And a farm stand." Tears form behind my eyes.
"I did. For you and Birdie. I’m not a casual man, I’ve shown my hand from the start. You didn’t believe me and I get that with what you’ve been through. So I thought I’d show you. I’m all in with you Cece, for as long as you’ll let me be. I knew you were supposed to be mine from the moment I saw you."
My cheeks are damp with tears and I let go of the wall I’ve built so fiercely. "Ryan, that is unbelievable. Thank you."
"I'm not done.” He presses a finger to my lips. “I want you to assume that I understand Birdie is a part of the deal. I knew it when you told me about the bakery. I knew it the second I watched you load a sleeping kid into a car in a general store parking lot." He swallows. "I'm thirty-four years old and I have wanted a family all my life. I wantthis.I want you. I want her. I want the sticky handprints and the cracker crumbs in the car. I want the whole loud terrible beautiful thing and I want ithere,with you, in this cabin, for the rest of however long you'll have me. I love you Cece.”
I put Birdie down because I cannot hold her and also not fall apart. She toddles immediately to the playhouse, because she is Birdie and her priorities are clear. I cover my face with both hands. He pulls me into his arms and I settle against his chest.
"I am in this.” He breathes the words into my hair. "I was in this from the general store. I am going to keep being in this and you don't have to be in it yet, you can take as long as you need, but I need you to know it's not a rebound. Not for me. It's not a rebound when you've been waiting your whole life."
"I looked at your kitchen and I pictured Birdie in it and I panicked."
"My kitchen?” He stifles a chuckle.
"Yes, it was so clean and not kid friendly, which makes sense since you don’t have a kid. But I thought you'd flinch. I thought you'd look at her the way her dad used to and I couldn’t bear it."
He makes a sound that’s low like a growl and tilts my chin up until my eyes meet his. "I am not that man," he says quietly. "I amnotthat man."
"I know."
"Do you?"
I nod and my lips pull into a smile I can’t control. I don’t speak. I nod again instead. His hand comes up to the back of my head. He kisses me. There, in the gravel, with the playhouse door swinging on its hinges and Birdie squealing at the top of her lungs.
Ryan makes me want to trust my instincts and everything in me is screaming that he and I are made for each other.
