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My parents are set to be here in three hours, and I do a full walkthrough of the house to make sure that everything is in place. As I look around at the beautiful home that I share with my husband and children, I can hardly comprehend how lucky I am to be here. I knew I was going to have a good life whether I was married or alone, but I never would have dreamed it would be this good. I could have been happy and grateful with half of this. I feel so blessed to be able to stay home with my babies, to be present for every moment of their lives as they grow and develop from babies to strong young women.
Just as I begin to get lost in my thoughts, as I tend to do lately, Saint comes back out from the triplets’ bedroom. “Annika fine, just lining up her barbies to fight in a war. It’s a little weird, but it’s kind of entertaining when she really gets into it. The other two are still sleeping.”
I laugh, reveling in the absurdity and unrestrained creativity of our daughter. “Okay, that part might come from you. Don’t pretend!”
“Well, even if it did, she still has enough of your DNA to make up for it. She has you in her, so she’s absolutely perfect.”
“You’re such a bullshitter,” I reply, unable to conceal a smile.
“So, what do you want to do while we wait for your parents to get here?” he asks, sitting on the couch in front of the picture window in the living room.
“Honestly, I just want to enjoy this for now. No stressing, no cleaning or planning for just a little bit. I want to be present with you. Can we do that?” I respond.
“I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
I walk over to him and hug him tight to my chest. He’s the only person I’d ever want to go through this crazy life with, and he’s shown me that he’s not going anywhere.
“And by present, you mean the kind that we can unwrap, right?” he asks, a smile creeping onto his face as his hand move down my body.
I laugh, pressing myself closer to him. “I’m all yours, Saint. I always will be.”
The End.
PREVIEW OF TWINS FOR THE MAFIA BOSS
JUNE
“It wasinsane. He actually asked me if he could suck on my toes for a hundred dollars,” she says, struggling not to laugh as she tries to get the words out in a cohesive manner. She’s clearly had enough to drink, but knowing Samira, she isn’t going to let anyone stand in her way of a brutal hangover.
The sun is beginning to set over the Viareggio coastline, and the last remaining streams of light cast a halo over Samira’s hair as she speaks. We all listen intently as we sip our drinks, watching her talk with her hands as if she’s reliving the experience right in front of us.
We’ve been in Italy for four days now, and it’s been the most intense vacation I’ve ever taken. I’ve only been to two other countries, France and Ireland, and that was the courtesy of my father’s workplace when I was growing up. I don’t feel like I really got the chance to experience either place when I was a girl, so I’ve been taking in as much of Italy as I can while I’m here.
There are four other women here with me – Samira, Angela, Grace, and Priya. It was Samira’s idea to come here, and we saved up for a year to make it happen. It feels surreal to finally be here after spending so much time looking at photos online.
Samira is the one who has been leading the charge for the entire time we’ve been here. It’s easy for her to do because she’s a meticulous planner who obsesses over the finest details of everything. Had she not been the person who was coordinating the trip, I probably wouldn’t have even come at all.
If someone else had taken over, we would have gotten off the plane without so much as a hotel booked in advance. Sleeping in a McDonald’s lobby might seem like a crazy adventure in hindsight, but it’s not the way I’d want to spend a vacation.
So, as crazy as she is,thank Godfor Samira.
“So, I mean... what did you do?” Grace asks hesitantly. She’s one of the more reserved, almost prudish women in the group, and watching her squirm at Samira’s story is giving me a juicy sense of satisfaction. She wants to know just as much as the rest of us, perhaps more.
“I mean, I let him do it, obviously. It actually felt pretty nice, I won’t lie. I never saw him again, though. He ended up making some comments about his ex-wife that skeeved me out a lot, so I blocked him,” Samira replies, rolling her eyes at the memory as she takes a long sip of her Manhattan.
I try not to giggle to myself at the mental image of it all. Samira is a beautiful woman, enviably thin with curves in all the right places and flaxen blonde hair that rolls over her shoulders in waves. I want to be jealous of her, but at the end of the day, I realize that she puts a hell of a lot more effort into her appearance than I would ever be willing. She’s the type to spend an hour and a half at the gym six days a week, maintain a regular skincare routine for morningandnight, and get all of her clothes tailored to fit her body and her body alone.
I’m not quite as high maintenance, though I sometimes wonder what I would look like if I were. There’s a window near us at the outdoor bar, and I periodically glance at myself to see my reflection. I have no issue with the way I look, but I know that I would probably attract quite a bit more attention from men if I justtrieda little.
My mother always emphasized to me that beauty shouldn’t be the first thing that draws a man to you if he’s worth having at all. He should approach you because he likes the way you command a conversation or the way your laugh lights up a room.
Putting too much effort into your appearance just draws men of all varieties and qualities who want to have a prize to show off. As soon as you have a baby, start getting wrinkles, or get sick, your husband will leave you for the tight little college girl down the street.
I would stillliketo be attractive to someone, though.
“Grace, you really need to get laid. I can see it in your posture,” remarks Priya, a ceramics artist from Brooklyn who can pull off any color on the planet. She’s also beautiful but in a more down-to-earth way than Samira. She and I would be more likely to share clothes, but they would look better on her.
Grace scoffs. “I would rather stick hot needles in my eyes than date any man that’s approached me in the past two years. They’re all the same. None of them have jobs, they all live with their parents, and at least half of them have kids from some woman that has a restraining order against him.”
