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“Good genes, I suppose.”
“Mine might have won out a little more.” He laughs and winks at me. Clover squirms in his arms as if she doesn’t like him flirting with other women. “I’m kidding. She takes after her mommy, obviously.”
I blush at his compliment.
“Oh, she’s making those sucking lips,” he says. “Good thing you woke up.”
Now my anxiety ramps up. I’ve yet to be able to produce enough milk to breastfeed her, so I’ve had to supplement with formula.
I stand and head over to change positions with him, my heart already beating out of control from my nerves. He hands her to me, and we’re still perfecting the exchange, so we laugh, not knowing which way the other person is going with their arms.
“I’ll go make a bottle,” he says and walks downstairs.
“Just you and me, baby girl.” I rock her a little, but she’s already arching for my breasts. “We can do this, right? One day soon I’ll have enough for you.”
It’s the one area where I feel as if I’m failing us. I know how important it is to breastfeed. Everyone’s been nice about it—the nurses and my mom and Damon especially—but I can’t help but worry. They all said the more I stress, the worse it might become, but I cannot stop myself from fixating on it.
I unbutton my pajama blouse and slide over one side of my bra. She attaches easily, and I relax in the chair as she suckles, but I never have that overfull feeling like I need to release milk.
Damon comes in with a warm bottle. “How’s it going?”
“She’ll probably start screaming in a second.”
He gives me the same look as he always does. The small purse of his lips as if he’s apologizing for the fact my body is failing us.
As I predicted, she stops sucking and cries. I pick her up and pat her back to get her to burp before we give her the bottle.
“If you want me to feed her, I can.” Damon sets the bottle on the table next to the chair, and I catch him staring at my tit.
“What are you looking at?”
“You can’t expect me not to look. Plus, I kind of wondered if it was going to look… different?” His gaze doesn’t move from my breast.
“We’re not doing that ‘you get a taste’ thing. Breast milk isn’t your kink, is it?”
He shrugs. “I don’t know. This is my first opportunity to find out.”
“Damon!”
He chuckles, and Clover relaxes in my arms. She feeds off her dad’s energy. I swear I think she’s going to have his personality more than mine.
“I had to lighten up the mood. Adeline, everyone said there’s nothing you can do. I was a formula baby, and look how I turned out.” He holds his arms out at his sides. “You know how perfect I am.”
I laugh. I always appreciate it when he lightens the mood.
When I lower Clover back down and feed her the bottle, she quickly starts sucking again. Damon takes my spot on the floor by the door, his back resting along the wall, his knees propped up as he watches her.
“Go back to bed,” I say.
He shakes his head. There’s something going on in that beautiful head of his that he’s not sharing. I’m afraid to pry, afraid of what I might find out. So we sit in silence and feed our baby.
The next afternoon, Damon’s sitting on the couch, Clover in her bassinet next to him, while he watches the Colts baseball game.
“We could be on the rooftop right now,” he says absentmindedly, reminding me that he has a very different life than mine. At least he did. He’s become so much a part of my life as of late, I can’t imagine either of us just going back to our old ones.
“With Clover, I’m sure that would be fun,” I say, arranging a veggie tray for his parents and brother, who will be here soon. I spent most of the morning making dips and appetizers. My mom is bringing over lasagna. His dad isn’t my biggest fan, and now his brother is coming too, whom I’ve never met, so nervous doesn’t aptly describe how I’m feeling.
“She’ll grow up going to a lot of sporting events. I’m thinking by next year, she can go to a football game, right?”
