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ent into the living room.
My parent’s house was a modest one. It only had three bedrooms, and since only three, now four, of us lived there, the extra bedroom had been a guest room, and they’d offered to turn it into a nursery for Danny. I declined the offer, though. I didn’t intend to forever live with my parents, after all, and I couldn’t say how long it would take before I could move out. Instead, his crib was in my room, and some of his stuff was in the other place.
I paused right outside my room and looked at Danny in my arms, who stared up at me with his father’s blue eyes.
“Would you like to take a bath first, baby? It’d been a couple of days since I last washed you, so it should be fine, right…?”
It had been a bit of a surprise for me to find out babies didn’t need to be washed every day, at least until they could crawl around on their own. It was usually hard for me to find the time to shower in the morning while he was awake, but we both loved his bath times.
I went into the guest room to pick up his things, then went to the bathroom with him. Bathing with a baby was risky business, but I had gotten the hang of it. I made sure the water was beautiful and didn’t let it get too high. Danny’s bath seat was nearby. His stuff was separate from mine, so I bathed him first, with his body lying over my chest. Then, I reached for his towel, swaddled him in it, and put him in his seat. As he watched me, I bathed quickly, then let the water drain as I stepped out. I wrapped myself in my towel, then went to get the both of us dressed.
There was nothing for me to do for the day, which meant I’d be spending the whole time with my baby, so I dressed in loose cotton pants and a t-shirt without a bra underneath. I carried the now bathed baby to the kitchen and sat at the dining table, then settled him in my arms. My stuff, I left on the table, then I got Danny breastfeeding.
I was humming to myself, watching him nurse, when my phone vibrated on top of the table. I had the sound turned off so it wouldn’t bother him.
“Now, who could that be,” I breathed out. “They’re ruining mother-baby bonding time for us.”
I was grumbling to myself as I adjusted Danny to one arm without disturbing him too much, then reached for my phone. When I saw who it was, though, my whole body stiffened.
Joshua.
When I lost my old phone, I’d lost a lot of my contact list, since I didn’t have it all saved. Like that, I’d lost contact with a lot of my friends, but besides family, there hadn't been that many stored on my phone.
There had been Joshua’s number, but I knew it off the top of my head. The moment I got a new phone, I saved it but never used it. And now, he was calling me.
For a second, I’d forgotten that I gave him my number back in the park.
Crap. Why ever did I do something so stupid?
I wanted to curse out loud, but there was some grumbling from Danny, too, as if he didn’t want to be forgotten. I looked down, and he had his eyes open and looked up at me. I’d heard from Mom that children could sense the feelings of their parents, so I made myself relax and smile.
“It’s okay, baby. You keep doing your thing. I’ll make this quick.”
It felt a little awkward for me, answering the phone for Joshua with his son nursing from me, but he didn’t have to know that.
“Hello, Joshua,” I chirped. “I’m a little busy right now. Is there something I could help you with?”
“There was…something important I wanted to talk to you about.”
His tone was severe, and I frowned, feeling concerned. Danny fussed in my arm, and I gently rubbed his back.
“What is it?”
“It’s not something I want to discuss over the phone,” he said slowly. “Do you mind if we meet up so we can talk? There’s this café that sells wonderful coffee. It opened some months ago. I can send you the address?”
It was a mistake.
I hadn't been thinking at all when I gave him my number, because if I had, then I would have come up with some excuse, like I was too busy with my current clients, and walked away.
Tell him no, my mind demanded.
“Of course!” was what came out of my mouth.
Internally, I groaned at my stupidity.
“That’s great,” he said, suddenly sounding happier. “I’ll send you the directions right now. What time do you think you could make it? I’m at work, but I don’t have a lot to do so I could take a break for an hour or so.”
“Um, since we’re having coffee, we should probably go a while before lunch. I could maybe meet you in the next thirty minutes?”
