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For once in my life, I wanted to be loved by someone–desperately. It was something I hadn’t felt from my parents, and Steve and Kennedy filled the void admirably but that still wasn’t what I was looking for. I wanted the sort found in the books Kennedy kept trying to get me to read: all that passionate longing and ridiculous heaving, something I always laughed about but secretly hoped was real.
Adam already gave my heart arrhythmias. He made my stomach do jumping jacks and my stupid ovaries quiver. But I had no idea whether the feelings were reciprocated in any way, and I’d pinned my hope on a few vehement reassurances from Kennedy. They were straws to grasp at when I didn’t feel like there was much hope at all.
Hailey’s expression was kind when she met me at the door to hand me Daniela. She didn’t leave right away though, she’d simply known that I needed to hold the baby, and I cuddled and kissed the tiny girl until she squirmed to be put down, so I set her back in the playpen and Hailey gave her a bottle.
It was Hailey who read the stricken expression on my face and moved toward the coffee pot, filling a mug that she slid in front of me as I collapsed on the island. I hadn’t expected her to add a generous glug of whiskey, something she must have found in one of the cabinets, but I certainly wasn’t going to argue with her.
I felt Adam walk into the house before I heard him. Something about his presence spoke to me, as it always had. I’d always known, as a kid, when Adam was in the house and it was no different now, some kind of weird communing of our souls.
You’re going to miss this,my brain chanted as I leaned into the bathtub later that night. I didn’t know what to do with a man who ran me a bath and brought wine. One who didn’t crawl up my butt with “What’s wrong, babe? Are you ready to talk about it? Can I help at all?”
To be fair, there had been a few less serious relationships since Garrett, but they’d never lasted long. They seemed to tire quickly of the fact I didn’t need them enough.
When Adam brought Daniela to me I cuddled her close, and since he couldn’t see me in the gathering dark of the room, I let the hurt leak out that I’d stored up over the last day. It had been hit after hit and even I could only take so much.
When Adam came out of the bathroom after his shower, he very gently took Daniela from me as I pretended to be asleep. I knew I wasn’t fooling him, but I wasn’t ready to have three very important conversations with him, let alone one.
First, he needed to know that I was all in on this marriage thing, because I got the feeling he hadn’t gotten that memo. That was a conversation I needed to have with him before the other two: the full story about Mario, so he knew exactly what had happened and how I’d moved on, and lastly the gut punch that had leveled me on a New York City sidewalk.
I felt him crawl in and scoot up hesitantly behind me. He was careful not to touch me and I contemplated scooting backward to make him the big spoon, but touching him would have broken the dam. I’d have either burst into tears, or rolled and started mauling him and I wasn’t sure he could handle either.
I felt the movement of him crossing himself and I waited until he fell asleep to creep out of bed to blow my nose and creep down the hallway to Daniela’s room. I needed to hold her again and know she was safe, because we were still weeks off from the court date that would establish her as unquestionably ours, and now it was possible that those short weeks were just enough time to lose her.
18
Adam
Ourcourtdatetofinalize Daniela’s adoption wasn’t until the beginning of November and I was watching Madelyn’s sanity fray right before my eyes.
I was pretty sure that was what was driving her to distraction, but she wouldn’t talk to me about whatever it was that was bothering her.
Often I woke in the middle of the night to an empty bed and I knew where I’d find her: In Daniela’s room, lying on the tiny daybed we’d put in there for nighttime feedings, her body curled protectively around the baby as they both slept.
It broke my heart to watch her struggling alone, because whatever it was, it was eating her alive. But in true VanBuren fashion, she wasn’t about to let anyone help her and it drove me out of my mind.
She was already on a UN rotation with her team and though it was one week on and one week off, I knew the time away from the baby was killing her. The time away from me, I thought, might be something she found a relief. She looked at me with haunted eyes, something that terrified me because I couldn’t imagine what could have happened to put that look on her face, but I was scared it had something to do with me.
As the court date drew closer, she stopped sleeping in our bed altogether, opting instead to co-sleep with the baby in her room every night.
Some nights I crept in and sat with my back against the crib, butt on the floor, arms around my knees as I watched the two of them sleep.
I’d had something so sweet, so pure and beautiful, for just weeks and I didn’t know what I’d done, but somehow I’d fucking lost it.
Talk about timing, right?
I had put my little townhouse up for sale by owner, and that week I accepted a cash offer and a one-week closing, something I’d wanted to discuss with Madelyn but my very presence seemed to burden her.
Steve asked me to meet him for coffee on one of my days off and since Madelyn was on rotation in the city that week, I strapped Daniela into her carseat and took her with me.
“Aren’t you just a picture though, Beckman?” Steve teased as I walked into the coffee shop with Daniela strapped to my chest in the baby carrier.
I was exhausted and I knew I looked it. All my spare time had been at the townhouse, packing and putting things into storage, cleaning the place and closing. I was so busy, I hadn’t had time to worry about what the future would bring beyond the court date. If we could just get through that part, I had hope we could sort everything else out.
“My man, you look like death. What’s going on, this little angel keeping you awake all night?” He reached out to wrap one huge hand around the back of Daniela’s tiny head and she gave him the massive dark eyes on full blast.
“Whew, Beckman. You’re gonna have a real problem with this one. These eyes aren’t going to break hearts, they’re going toliquefythem.” Didn’t I know it, though. Much like what her mother was doing to my heart.
“You two starting to get the routine sorted?” Steve asked over his shoulder as he walked to the pickup counter and grabbed the two huge coffees the barista had just set down. “I mean, you know…you sort of decided to do a lot of big things all at once this summer.”
