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“I miss you, Daddy,” I whisper, his smiling face the last thing I see before the video ends.
“He’d be proud of you. Your beautiful heart, your kindness, what an amazing mom you are.”
I laugh through my tears. “Sometimes, I still think you’re an alien.”
He barks out a laugh. “What?”
“Too good to be true.”
He shakes his head. “I just know what I have when I have it. And what I have is an incredible woman I adore who has given me more than I could’ve imagined.” He grazes his fingers across my chest, just above Emmie’s head, stopping by my heart. “I know you’re hurting. If I could, I’d take that pain from you and heal your heart.”
“You do. Your love heals my heart. It can’t take my pain, but it reminds me there’s much more to life than pain.” I move closer, painting my side flush to his as I look up into his shining eyes. “And I know what I have, too. A loyal, loving, alien unicorn of a man who would do anything to make me smile and protect us.” With a sigh, I wipe my eyes. “My dad was that kind of man, too. I will always mourn him on this day, but I want to spend more of my time celebrating him—the man he was. The father he was. The same with my mom.” I stroke Emmie’s hair. “Because that’s what I’d want her to do for us.”
Again, he wraps me in his arms, being careful not to squish Emmie. “I love you. People act like you can say those words too much, but I don’t think you can. Every time I say them to you, they mean a little more. My love for you deepens with every sunrise. It’ll never stop growing.”
I shake my head. “Alien. I love you too.” Then I kiss him, letting the love that flows between us heal another crack in my heart.
Chapter twelve
Arcade Games
Amelia
I wake to the feeling of full boobs and a fuller bladder. When I flick my eyes open, I’m surprised to find light filtering from the other side of the bed. I roll over and look at Miles, sitting up in bed, reading on his Kindle. Glancing at the crib, I see Emmie is still asleep.
“Hey, you okay?” I ask, pushing myself upright.
He turns to look at me, setting his Kindle in his lap. He squeezes his eyes shut and pinches the bridge of his nose while nodding. “Yeah. Fine. Just… anxiety.”
Tilting my head, I move closer, snuggling against him. “Over what?”
He chuckles. “Emmie. I woke up like two hours ago and I couldn’t hear her soft snore, so I went to check on her. She was breathing fine, so I went to the bathroom and came back to bed, but by then my brain was hyper fixated on listening to her breathe. Then I wanted to check her swaddle sack. Since she’s in between sizes, the fabric gets bunchy, and I worry it’ll cover her face. Then I think about how she’s been trying to roll over lately, and what if she rolls onto her stomach and gets stuck and we don’t hear that she needs help?” He blows out a breath, running a hand through his hair. “Eventually I talked myself down—mostly—but I still couldn’t sleep because I was too wired. Now I’m sitting here reading a cozy romance that Rae sent me, because it turns out I’m an anxious reader who can’t handle reading thrillers or mysteries anymore without physically stressing out over what’s going to happen.” He rubs his hands over his face. “I’m pathetic.”
I wrap my arm around his stomach and look up at him. “You’re not pathetic. You have anxiety, and you know how to handle it. Sometimes you can get through it easier than others, but even on the days you struggle, you are not pathetic or weak. You’re the strong, protective man I love with all my heart.”
He reaches up and runs a hand through my curls. “Thanks, baby.”
“I honestly don’t know how you do it. It’s hard for me to wrap my mind around, and you just handle it.”
“Handle it. Obsess over.” He laughs. “It’s a part of me. I genuinely can’t fathom what it’s like not to have anxiety. Do you think about the things I was talking about? Worry over them at all?”
I pause for a moment. I’d never thought about this. I try to put myself in his shoes with anxiety whenever he talks about it, and I think I mostly understand. Or I understand it generally. It never occurred to me that he can’t imagine what it’s like to not have anxiety.
“I think of those things, but it doesn’t consume me. I guess that’s the difference between worry and anxiety. I worry about things, but I can easily let them go and move on. Your anxiety makes you fixate and extrapolate the worst possible scenario. It blows my mind that you deal with it daily and still manage to function—and by function, I mean be utterly amazing.”
He laughs, then gives me a kiss before looking over at Emmie’s crib. “I don’t know how I’m going to handle it when she’s in a different room.”
“She’ll be older then, and we probably won’t be swaddling her. She’ll be a pro at rolling over. We’ll have a video monitor. And if you’re really concerned, we can look into other equipment that might help ease your mind.”
He shakes his head. “I don’t want to add more things if we don’t need to. Somehow that might make me worry more. I’m hoping as she gets older and more capable, some of my anxiety will fade. Maybe.”
Emmie’s cry shoots through the room.
“Well, she’s awake now,” I say with a smile. “Grab her while I run to the bathroom?”
He nods and stands, walking over to the crib and picking Emmie up, talking to her the whole time. I think the more this man loves someone, the greater the anxiety he has about them, and there’s no one on the planet he loves more than our daughter.
When I get back in bed, he hands Emmie over to me, and we chat here and there as I feed her.
