“I can’t believe I just felt our baby,” James whispers.
“I guess it’s good you took your sweet time leaving.”
He grins, holding my face in his hands. “I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
“No, I mean, I love you.”
“Do you think I don’t mean it?” I ask through a laugh. He’s nearly bouncing on his toes, unable to contain his excitement.
“No, no. I just want you to know that I love you,” he explains. He kisses me, placing insistent pecks across my lips. “I don’t want you to say it back or anything. I just want you to know…I love you. And I know this whole pregnancy wasn’t what we planned, but I’m really happy it happened.”
All the anxiety and fears crawling under the surface disappears.Poof. It vanishes into thin air, making me wonder what the hell I was worried about this whole time. We love each other. We make each other happy. We fit so perfectly. Like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle, held together by the curves of our shape. So who cares if we’ve only been together for a few months? Or that this pregnancy happened so quickly? We’re going to do this. And we’re going to be so fucking happy doing it.
My eyes grow blurry as I sniffle back a fresh wave of tears. “I really love you, too.”
He kisses me again, deep and passionate. The ache of being so happy causes a sob to whimper from my lips.
“Okay, you have to go,” I say, tearing myself away from him. I wipe at my face, wearing a stupid smile from how ridiculously happy I am.
“I’ll call you when I land.” One last kiss. One last caress against my belly.
“Bye.”
He watches me the whole time. As he walks through the sliding glass doors. As he walks away into the lengthy security check line. As he throws one last wave and disappears into the crowd.
“Can I get the tape, please?”
I glide the tape across the floor, letting it skitter and hit Sylvia’s foot. She reaches for it without taking her eyes off the slip of gift wrap barely containing the toy car she’s meticulously wrapping. I finish off a roll, left with the cardboard innards, and I boink it against Sylvia’s knee.
“Hey!” she exclaims.
I grin at her. “Sorry. Had to do it. I don’t make the rules.”
Another boink, this time on her other knee, and the spring-like echoeythwackhas me laughing with glee. I have my guard down and she uses the moment to jerk my makeshift weapon out of my hand. I cross my arms over my face when she rears her arm back, cardboard brand in hand.
“You can’t hit a pregnant woman!” I cry, the weight of my claim lost in my laughter.
“I can if she started it.” A hollow thunk bounces off the top of my head and Sylvia follows her attack with a set of uncontrollable giggles. “I came here to wrap gifts and all I’ve done is make some kind of paper burlap sack for this toy truck.”
She holds up the crinkled paper and the gift falls right through the mesh of tape.
“I give up.”
“Pizza break?” I offer, nodding at the pizza box sitting on my kitchen counter.
“Pizza break,” she concurs. She stands from her spot on the floor and struts to the kitchen. I follow, though it takes me about half a second slower. The pep in my step has slowed with my gradually budding stomach, and getting from the floor to a full standing position requires some effort. And a long-winded groan.
Sylvia hands me a slice thrown on a paper napkin. “Thanks.”
She chews loudly, smacking her lips as she licks off a sliver of grease at the corner of her mouth.
“Did James already make it to Boston?”
I shrug, glancing at the clock on the stove. “I don’t think yet, but probably soon. He said he should land around five our time.”
A gentle knock interrupts our meal, and I roughly wipe my mouth before tossing the hard crust back in the box with the hard thunk and opening the door.
