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I cast my mind back twelve months and gasped. It really had been a crazy year. “You were in England.” I shook my head. “Doesn’t seem possible.”
“I know. Exactly one year ago, Radleigh was just the asshole who broke my heart, and now look at us. Still a million miles apart, except now he’s not an asshole and I’m about to have his baby.”
“You’re not nearly as far apart now as you were then, and I don’t just mean the physical distance.”
She smiled as a tear slid down her cheek. “Having a baby has put us to the test. I’ve been a nightmare to live with, and we’ve fought over the stupidest things but we’re better at talking things through now. We’re in a really good place and I’m not scared anymore.”
As if on cue, Leah’s cell phone rang and she waddled to the table beside the bed to pick it up. After answering, she switched the call to speakerphone and Radleigh’s voice sounded in the room.
“Hey, beautiful. How are you feeling?”
Leah swiped her tears away and smiled at me; her relief from just hearing him made my heart flip over. In spite of their ups and downs, they made a brilliant couple.
“I’m okay,” she told him. “The baby’s heartbeat has been checked and it’s all fin
e but I’m only three centimetres dilated so there’s a long way to go.”
“Can you tell the baby to wait for me?”
Leah laughed softly. “I already did.”
“Did you talk to Josh?”
“Yeah. He’s still trying to find a flight. He said he’ll call me when he’s sorted it. I need to ring Jamie in a little while, too. I know he’ll be fine with Bree but he’s worried about me. I don’t think he’ll sleep much tonight.”
“We won’t either. You should try to rest now if you can.”
“I’ll try in a while. I need to calm down first. This is happening too quickly.”
“I know. It’s gonna be okay though. I’ll be home soon.”
“And we’ll be taking our baby home with us.” Leah smiled again at the thought.
If it was possible to hear a smile, I was sure I heard Radleigh’s as he said, “Yes we will.”
“I love you, Radleigh.”
“I love you too, baby.”
As Leah put the phone down I shuffled over so she could sit beside me and her head flopped onto my shoulder. “Do you want to go home for a while? This is going to take some time, so if you want to-”
“Are you kidding?” I gently poked her in the side and she lifted her head. “If you want to get rid of me, you’re gonna have to call security. If Radleigh can’t be here then I will be. If you want me to be.”
She nodded. “I need you but I didn’t want to assume-”
“Some questions don’t need to be asked, honey.”
What followed felt like the longest day of my life but I didn’t regret my decision to stay with Leah one bit. I sat with her through every contraction, tried to distract her with the DVDs she’d brought to help her take her mind off the pain, rubbed her back, held her hand, breathed with her. In between all those things, I drank coffee, fended off hourly phone calls from Bree checking whether the baby had arrived yet, spoke to Josh, Jamie, Bryce, Radleigh, Radleigh’s parents. The list was endless, but through it all, my attention stayed on my best friend. Seeing her in so much discomfort wrecked me but I did what I had to do. I stayed strong. To my relief, Radleigh arrived right on time, when Leah was just getting to the pushing stage. Leah said I could stay in the delivery room, but it was their moment and I didn’t want to intrude. After twelve hours of being unsure whether Radleigh would get there, they needed to do this together, without me, so I went out to the waiting room and sat in the chair closest to the coffee machine.
Perhaps it was all the caffeine in my system, or the adrenaline pumping through my veins at what I’d been a part of, but I wasn’t tired at all. It was past three in the morning, I’d been awake for nineteen straight hours; I should have been ready to crash. I couldn’t wait until Miguel got home so I could tell him everything about my day, and all the craziness from the moment I first saw Leah panicking in her kitchen up to when the baby was born.
Miguel.
Warmth mixed with guilt inside my body, making a shiver ripple down my spine. Will wasn’t the first person I’d thought of and I closed my eyes, waiting for the shock to pass.
Did this make me a terrible person? For thinking of someone other than Will first? Had I really gotten over him already?
When my insides clenched, I knew the answer. I wasn’t over him, I was letting reality in. I couldn’t tell Will what had happened because he wasn’t there. No amount of sitting beside his grave and talking to him would change that. I knew that all along, but at first, it had been the only thing that made me feel connected to him. I’d been hanging on to nothing, but I made it into something because I missed him so much. I couldn’t deny crippling guilt had kept me away from the cemetery over the past few weeks, but since I’d allowed myself to start living again, I’d let go of the impossible and embraced being around my friends.
