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“Not at all.” I smiled, wanting to hold Journey from the moment I saw her. “Are Jackson and Jagger their sons?”
“Yes. Just wait, they’re more of a handful than this one.” She nervously chuckled, carefully handing the baby off to me. “Well, Jackson more than Jagger. You’ll see soon enough.”
I cradled Journey in my arms, positioning her flailing body next to my heart. There was something about the rhythmic beating that reminded babies of their time in the womb. It used to work for my siblings whenever they were losing it.
“How old are they?”
“Jackson is going to be thirteen, and Jagger is going to be eleven.”
“Wow. That’s quite the age gap between them and her.”
“Yeah.” She cautiously nodded with an expression on her face I couldn’t quite read. “They tried a long time for Journey. She was so loved and wanted before she was even born. They all were, but she was on a whole different level. Especially for Aiden.”
I wanted to ask why the sudden sadness in her tone, when she was talking about such a beautiful creation. A baby girl who was obviously made from so much love.
It almost seemed as though everything Skyler had shared up until that point was laced with heartache and sorrow.
But why?
What happened?
Nothing made sense, and the more I tried to analyze the situation, the more I came up empty. These emotions were playing with my mind, and they were starting to give me whiplash. There was already this gravitational pull toward a family I hadn’t even met but felt a profound connection to.
“I’ll be right back,” Skyler stated, reverting my attention to the screaming baby in my arms.
“No worries, I got her. By all means, take your time.”
She gave us one last look before she turned and left the room. Slightly shutting the door behind her, leaving baby girl and me alone.
“Alright, Little Miss, no need to show off. I get it, you’re here, and you’re fierce and mighty,” I coaxed, gazing down at her adoringly. Immediately noticing how much she resembled her mother. “You are a beauty, Journey. Do you have any idea how beautiful you are? Even with all this crying and all those tears, you’re still a stunning baby.”
Her wails started getting louder and louder, rumbling out of her full force. If she didn’t stop soon, she was going to make herself sick.
“Alright, that’s enough of that … come on … you can do it… I know you can do it,” I soothed in a lulling tone, grabbing an old, worn down Ninja Turtle blanket from her crib. “You’re a girl. Why do you have a boy blanket? Hmm … maybe I’ll bring you back a new, soft, pink blanket if I get the job of taking care of you, Journey. What do you think? You like that idea?”
“Wahhhhh!”
“Okay, never mind. Ninja Turtle blanket it is.” Even though she was a little too old to be swaddled, I did it anyway. Seeing if maybe that would help.
It didn’t.
Her ear-piercing screams could wake up the dead.
“Phew … you got a set of lungs on ya, kid.” I moved around the vast room which was more like a suite than a nursery, still rocking and bouncing her.
My eyes scanned the space, noticing for the first time her room was something out of a magazine as well. The walls were a pale pink with white crown molding. The furniture looked vintage and expensive. Her crib was decked out in whites, grays, and pinks with Journey written in script on the wall.
The space was gorgeous. Black and white portraits lined the walls with two large book cases, and an old wooden rocking chair that had intricate designs on the back were situated in the corner by the bay window.
“Shhh, shhh, shhh. Look at all these books, Journey. Shhh, shhh, shhh. How about we try to read one?”
As if she understood what I was asking, she sucked back another sob.
“Okay, we’re onto something. What do you want to read? Hmm? Let’s see what we got.” I grabbed the furthest one in the corner. “Baby Einstein?”
“Wahhhh!”
“Definitely not that one.” I grabbed the one on the other end. “Goodnight Moon?”
