“Oh.” I’m not sure if the tears in my eyes are from relief or from pain. The throb in my head feels like someone implanted a jackhammer in there. But so much existential weight has been lifted from my life it’s almost disorienting. There’s suddenly so much less to be afraid of.
The car pulls to a stop and Dallas carries me into his building. We take the elevator to the third floor, where a nurse greets us. “Good evening, Mr. Wilder. Miss Thibodeaux. Dr. Lee is waiting for you. Follow me, please.”
We enter a doctor’s office and Dallas places me on the raised bed. There are introductions. The doctor has kind eyes. He checks my head. The nurse takes a blood test. I’m given some pills and a glass of water. The doctor cleans the cut at the back of my head, but he tells me there’s no need for stitches. Headwounds tend to bleed a lot, he says, and sometimes look worse than they are.
Dallas is sitting in a chair in the corner watching everything.
Then the doctor leaves for a few minutes as the nurse chats with me, to keep me awake, I suspect. She asks me where I’m from. How I like New York. Have I seen any shows? Which one was my favorite?
I answer her questions sort of vaguely, and I feel like I’m doing it from outside my own body, floating somewhere above it.
The doctor comes back into the room and tells me he has some test results. Would I like privacy to discuss them?
“No. He can stay.” I need him here. Because I think I might know what the doctor is about to say. I reach out my hand to Dallas and he comes to me, standing close, taking my hand in his.
“Amelie, you have a very mild concussion,” the doctor says. “I’ve given you some pain relief, which should help with the headache. You’ll need to get plenty of rest for the next 48 hours but make sure you get some sun and light activity too. Keep any strenuous activity to a minimum for five days to a week. You’re also mildly anemic. I’m prescribing an iron supplement as well as a prenatal supplement.”
“A pre …”Does that mean …?
“Your pregnancy test was positive.” Maybe the doctor is able to read both mine and Dallas’s expressions because he adds, “Congratulations.”
44
I tryto open my eyes but I can’t. Something’s covering them.
I reach to remove the silk eye mask Dallas must have put on me to help me sleep. And it worked. I sleptsodeeply. There’s still some soreness but my headache is mostly gone.
It’s very dark. He must have lowered the blackout shades, but I don’t have to wonder where I am. I can feel him, warm and wrapped around me like a big bear.
He feels my movement and nuzzles into my neck, kissing me, licking my skin, pretending to bite me. “Yum. I’ve got a knocked up New Orleans goddess in my bed. Thank you, universe.”
It’s theknocked upthat fully wakes me.
It’s really true.
Dallas brought me home after the doctor’s visit and tucked me straight into bed because I could hardly keep my eyes open, so I haven’t had a chance to fully absorb the enormity of it.
A part of me already knew. I can admit that a part of me wastryingto make it happen. A part of Dallas—or maybeallof Dallas—was trying to make it happen too.
And I don’t have to be scared anymore. He methodically removed every single one of my fears and replaced them with hopes, plans and an entire future that’s so glitteringly bright it’s hard to even think about how it’s all going to unfold. It’s like trying to contain sunshine inside my mind.
I get to go home.
We’re going to return the hotel to its former glory. We’re going to honor every detail and take it to the next level. We get to choose the colors and the wallpapers and the new light fixtures. We get to fix the roof and paint the balconies.
We won’t just have a hotel, we’ll have a house.
I never even imagined such a thing. We’ll have a home.For our baby.
Little Jack or little Sabine will grow up in the hotel, just like I did.We’ll be a family.My heart feels like it’s overflowing.
“Dally?”
“Mmm?”
“Thank you.”
His eyes open and they’re green even in the darkness. “Thankyou, angel girl, for walking into my life and lighting it up.”
