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I’m not sure we’ll make it home.
I glance up from the phone and see a stranger by the luggage track watching me. Can he tell I’m blushing? Does he know what I’m thinking about? It’s my husband, I feel like telling him. But the luggage track moves and the man’s attention shifts. I move closer to the doors, searching. My heart beats a little faster, like it knows he’s going to be here any minute.
It’s silly. He’s only been away since Monday, but it feels like forever. More than once I’ve wondered if we had connected earlier, when I was younger and he was still serving, subject to leave at a moment’s notice and gone for months at a time sometimes, what that would’ve been like. Would I have grown accustomed to the ache and the worry? With my brother, I always worried, but I knew he was doing what he loved. What he excelled at. He lived his life doing exactly what he wanted. And while I love my brother deeply, there’s a difference with Knox, with my husband. I miss him when he’s not with me. Heck, even during the school day we text each other, in constant contact.
Lately, I’ve been texting Knox photos of the kids at school touching my belly with big eyes, blown away that a baby is inside. My palm absentmindedly rubs over my taut, round belly as I scan the exit doors, waiting for Knox.
And there he is. Bursting through, his smile wide, and like a sun’s ray, the warmth from his gaze heats my skin.
He gathers me in his arms, careful of the belly, and holds me close. I breathe in his evergreen scent and run my fingers through his hair as my feet leave the ground.
“God, I missed you,” he groans. His rough beard scratches the side of my face, and then as my feet meet the floor, he’s kissing me.
It’s a slow kiss meant for public places, but it’s a kiss that tells me he’s speaking the truth, and he’s missed me in an aching way, just as I missed him.
He pulls back, and his fingers spread over my firm belly, hands planted on each side.
“How are you feeling?”
He glances between me and my belly with tender concern.
“Good. Now that you’re back.”
“And I’m not going again for a long while. Liam told me to stay until after my paternity leave is done.”
“That’s great news.”
“Eh. It’s not like I can’t get shit done working remotely.” His mouth opens. “Whoa. Did you feel that?”
The thing is, I did. Movement. In my belly.
“I think she moved.” I can’t believe it. My hands spread across my belly beside Knox’s.
An announcer chatters on the overhead speaker, but we’re in our own world, mesmerized.
And there it is. Another kick. But this one stretches my gray cotton flannel dress.
“She’s lively,” Knox says. “Feisty.”
This will most likely be our only child, and we’ve decided to wait to learn the gender, but I’ve noticed Knox almost always refers to our baby with feminine pronouns. Sloane strongly disagrees with waiting to learn the gender, but this is my experience, and this is how I’m choosing to live it. When she has her child, she can choose a different path.
I refer to our baby with masculine pronouns, I suppose mostly to balance Knox calling her a girl. Do I want a son? There are days when I fantasize about Knox throwing a ball in the front yard with our little boy. But then an hour later I’ll imagine Knox running alongside our daughter as she learns to ride a bike. Really? I just want healthy. Boy or girl, I’ll be thrilled.
So far, all signs point to healthy. But my parents didn’t know I was sick at first. It’s a scary thought, but my doctor assures me they know more than they did back then, and her heart is perfect.
My classroom kids couldn’t be more supportive. Crayon colored cards line our refrigerator. One shows me in stick figure form with my baby. Another shows a baby head and blue blanket. And many are squiggly lines or the sun and brown trunks with green circles. All are given to me with an endearment along the lines of “I’m gonna miss you, Mrs. Williams.”
Yes, I took Knox’s last name. It’s yet another thing Sloane disagrees with. She said he should take my last name, or I should hyphenate. Knox would’ve gone along with either option, so long as I wore his ring. But before we even discussed it and before Sloane got her two cents in, I was scrawling out Sage Williams in my down time at school. When I told Sloane my final decision, she grumbled something about that on the bright side, my monogram won’t change.
I believe Knox is my destiny. Sloane says there’s no such thing. But I point out that if our last name, Watson, wasn’t close to Williams, then Sam and Knox wouldn’t have ended up in the same home room all those years ago. For that matter, if Knox’s dad hadn’t taken a job in Rocky Mount after retiring from the military, our paths would’ve never crossed. To me, that’s destiny. To Sloane, it’s chance.
I believe one day Sam will come home. Sloane—and everyone else, for that matter—disagrees.
What do Sloane and I agree on? That Knox and I are good for each other. That I’m happier than she’s ever seen me. That finally, I’m more confident than I’ve ever been. Love will do that. I no longer hide my scar. I’ve even been known to wear tops that reveal the raised scar tissue along with dangly necklaces that draw the eye to the raised skin. What I once thought of as ugly, I now don’t mind. If anything, I’m proud. As Knox says, it’s a symbol of my strength and perseverance.
I informed Knox the other day that I’m getting stretch marks. They’re faint, and I swear I’m using the creams, but I worry they won’t go away. And he said if they don’t go away, they’ll be additional battle scars and will only make me more beautiful to him.
“Has she calmed down?” Knox asks.
