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“I’m glad, Tina,” Libby said and reached out to hug her. Tina clung to her taller friend for a moment, comforted by her embrace.
Harris couldn’t sleep; his thoughts were too chaotic to settle down. And he was concerned that the stress of that night would result in another nightmare for Tina. When hours passed without a sound from the other side of the wall, he wondered if her thoughts were keeping her awake too.
“Tina?” He used his normal voice. His bed, like hers, was flush against the wall, and, bizarrely enough, because of the way the house had been divided, it was easier to hear Tina moving around in her room than it was to hear Greyson, whose room was separated from Harris’s by the bathroom.
His phone pinged, and he dragged it out from beneath his pillow.
I refuse to talk to you through a wall.
His lips tilted, and he put his palm against the wall, picturing her on the other side, doing the same.
I was worried you’d have a nightmare.
Hard to have a nightmare when you can’t sleep. Her response was immediate. She was typing again, so he refrained from responding, waiting to see what she would add.
Are you okay? The question made him blink repetitively in an attempt to clear the blurriness from his eyes.
I should ask you that.
I’ve had ten years to come to terms with what happened. You’ve had two hours.
He stared at those words for a long time, not sure how to respond to them. Ten years, two hours, the loss remained the same, merely a bit blunted by time, in her case.
Would you mind sending me pictures? Of Fletcher?
He stared at the screen fixedly.
Nothing. Not even typing.
Please? Seconds after he sent the word, he received a veritable barrage of pictures.
Ping! Ping! Pingpingping!
About fifty photos in thirty seconds, and they kept coming. By the time the welcome onslaught had stopped, he was already scrolling through the more than a hundred pictures, and a few clips, of Fletcher and Tina that she had sent him.
His phone pinged again while he was watching a sweet little video clip of Fletcher dozing off, his pink mouth blowing bubbles as he drifted off. He could hear Tina’s gentle voice singing in the background. Alicia Keys.
Of course.
Do you want to come over?
Because he was scrolling through the pictures, the message appeared at the top of the screen in banner form. He blinked at it, then clicked on it. But in his haste, he missed the banner and enlarged the clip instead. Fumbling with his phone and swearing under his breath, he finally managed to get back into his messages.
I’ll be right there.
Tina was waiting for him just inside her front door, barefoot and wearing her fuzzy pajamas. Harris was also barefoot, and dressed in nothing but a T-shirt and his boxer briefs. She turned away silently when he entered the house, and he closed and locked the front door before trailing wordlessly behind her as she padded back to her room.
“This doesn’t mean anything,” she said when she reached her room. “I thought we could look at the pictures together and I could tell you about them?”
“I’d like that.” His voice was husky with gratitude, and she nodded before getting into bed and scooting to the wall. She held the covers up invitingly, and he climbed in next to her.
They took a few moments to get comfortable. Harris was on his back, and she had her head on his chest, while his right arm curled around her shoulders and his hand found its favorite resting place in her hair. She had a hand palm down on his chest. In his left hand, he held his phone, and he brought up the pictures again.
“They’re in chronological order,” she said. “He was only a few hours old in this one.”
“Tiny,” Harris observed, his voice rough with emotion as he gazed at the sleeping infant, so fragile and helpless in a terrifying-looking incubator.
“He was. He slept so much. All of that saved energy going into growing bigger and stronger every day. This was the first time they allowed me to hold him . . .”
She detailed every moment, trying her best to describe sounds, smells, movements; for nearly forty minutes she talked, and her voice grew hoarse and her words started slurring. She fell asleep in midsentence, about halfway through Fletcher’s sixth week. She went boneless, her head heavy on his shoulder. He placed his phone on the bedside table and turned slowly until he had her completely cradled in his arms. She sighed contentedly in her sleep, nuzzling against his chest. Her arm crept around his waist, and one of her legs happily snuck between his.
Harris sighed, too, breathing in her apple-scented hair, with one of his hands still entangled in her hair while the other was tucked around her waist.
