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ChristmasinNewYorkCity is as gorgeous as I imagined. Last night, we walked to the big tree to see it all lit up. I almost cried. This morning, we took a carriage ride around and then Luke took the boys skating. Now we’re back in front of the big tree, as Luke takes pictures. The boys make all kinds of silly faces as Luke snaps picture after picture while our daughter, Avery, sleeps happily in the sling he’s wearing.
God, he looks delicious. A sexy, bearded, tattooed, long-haired, baby-wearing god of a man. As usual, he does devastating things to my insides.
“Mom! Come on!” Alex yells.
I hurry over and stand next to him as Luke takes more pictures. We start out smiling but quickly devolve into silly faces until A.J. yells, “Dad! Come on, you have to be in one too!”
My heart swells. The boys started calling Luke “Dad” not long before Avery was born. They insisted she would need to hear him called Dad, so they might as well. Of course, really, they had been wanting to call him that for months. At first I was uncertain. While Luke deserves the title a thousand times over, I never want to openly hurt someone else—even Tad.
But when monthly visits became every-other-month visits and a month long summer visit became two weeks, I realized he wasn’t in their lives enough to notice. We agreed that as long as they don’t refer to Luke as “Dad” in front of Tad, it was fine. What do they call him in front of Tad?Papa Bear.Which I think is pretty damn perfect.
Luke hands his phone to another nearby parent, who he had snapped some pictures for earlier, and we take a few nice and a few silly ones before finally stepping away from the tree.
“Hey, Dad, can we get hot chocolate?” Alex asks.
“Of course,” Luke says with a giant smile.
He’s not a pushover, but he loves to make the boys happy. If he can say yes, he always will.
Avery fusses, and Luke starts bouncing up and down, easily soothing her right back to sleep.
I shake my head a little. I couldn’t have asked for a better partner to raise a child with. He’s attentive to both my needs and hers. He’s incredibly hands-on. In fact, sometimes I think he’s trying to keep her all to himself. But I also know how happy he is to be her father.
Luke walks over and takes my hand as the boys walk in front of us, pointing out everything they see.
“Is this what you imagined it would be?” he whispers in my ear.
“More than that.” We sneak a quick kiss as we wait for a light to change so we can cross the street. “Thank you for wanting to do this with me.”
“Oh, I want to do everything with you,” he says in a sultry voice. Then he looks at me tenderly and says, “Mostly, I just want to make you happy,Mrs. O’Brien.”
My heart soars when he says that, and I give his hand a little squeeze.
One night in late pregnancy, when I could not get comfortable to sleep, Luke sat up with me while I watched one of my favorite movies,Pride and Prejudice. When he saw how hard I swooned at the end, when Darcy called Elizabeth “Mrs. Darcy,” he started calling me “Mrs. O’Brien” to flirt with me or make me smile. Which is pretty much all the time. I love it. And I swoon.
How could I not? He’s sweet, caring, considerate, sexy, and part growly alpha. There’s no better combination than that. I love it. And him. Our kids.
I truly couldn’t ask for anything more.
Well, maybe one more kid.
We are nailing this parenting thing, after all.
Avery cries in the front pack, probably getting hungry. A.J. punches Alex in the side, so Alex smacks him on the back of the head while Luke tries to intervene. I laugh for a moment before stepping in to help.
This is my life.
And I love every crazy second of it.
