They smiled at each other, and for a moment, the years fell away. Jonah didn’t look like a single father starting his life from scratch. He looked like her big brother, gearing up for another day of school after pounding down three eggs and way too much toast while Meredith barely touched a yogurt.
“We had a good childhood,” he said as if he could read her mind. “I mean, until we didn’t.”
She gave a sad smile. “Yeah.”
“And you,” he added, leaning in, “look pretty darn natural with that little beast.” He gave her a look with enough weight to make it more than a casual compliment. “Honestly, Mer… when are you gonna find a good guy and be the world’s most overachieving mother?”
She blinked. Her heart stuttered. She stared at him.
He didn’t know. Of course he didn’t. The words hadn’t been said aloud yet. Not to anyone. And now, here he was, standing in front of her, innocently tossing a grenade into her morning.
“Uh…I’m so busy trying to be the world’s most overachieving architect.”
Jonah chuckled. “You? Do both. But then, I suppose you need to find some idiot to fall in love with you.”
She looked down at the baby, his eyes blinking up at her with sleepy trust. Her throat went tight. “Idiots I can find. It’s the good ones that are few and far between.”
“Hey.” He touched her shoulder. “I was just kidding. Any guy in the world would be lucky to have you, Miss Perfect.”
She smiled and leaned over to kiss the top of Atlas’s head. “Well, this is the only man I need for the time being.”
Jonah gave her a hug and a kiss to his son. “Good luck. You’re the best. I’ll text if I get out early.”
“Don’t get out early!” she exclaimed. “Schmooze the professor. Get extra credit. Make your fellow students look lazy. Have I taught younothingin life?”
He cracked up and jogged out the front door, keys jingling, bag swinging.
And then, for the first time in what felt like weeks, she was alone.
She turned slowly, the house unusually quiet. Atlas gave another tiny sigh, still nestled in her arms.
“Okay, little man,” she whispered. “Let’s own this domestic goddess morning.”
She padded down the stairs to the lower level and set him gently into the cushioned bassinet next to Jonah’s unmade bed. He didn’t fuss, just gurgled sweetly and shifted his blue-eyed gaze to the window and the light.
Meredith crouched beside him. “You are dangerously precious, you know that? I’m already in love with you. And I do have the power to give you a cousin, you know.”
But would she?
Meredith had done an astounding job of compartmentalizing her pregnancy since she’d arrived, but could she do that forever? She was clearly staying here for a while…shouldn’t she get a doctor? Tell someone? Do something?
It certainly wasn’t like her to be paralyzed.
“Let’s just start with making this room fit for two human males, shall we?”
She kissed his forehead and got up, grabbing the overflowing laundry basket near the door. It was loaded with bibs, onesies, burp cloths, and Jonah’s many spit-up-covered T-shirts.
“Might as well do his sheets,” she muttered, proceeding to strip the bed. And pick up clothes. And do a little cleaning in the bathroom.
Before long, she was up in the laundry room, with Atlas on the floor in the bouncy seat that Aunt Vivien had produced. It made him very portable.
“Do you think these baby socks multiply overnight?” she asked him. “Because I swear, I didn’t even know socks this small existed.”
She started the washer and moved into the kitchen, bringing the little guy along. There, she found sterile pre-made bottles in the fridge—it did help that the place was teeming with aunts who treated formula prep like an assembly line.
Atlas made a contented little chirp from the bouncy.
“Coming, sir,” she said, swooping in to gather him again. “Let’s change that diaper and then dineal fresco, shall we?”
