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“After Benji was born, I just had to see her. I could since it was an open adoption. I went over there and played with her for a few hours. Turns out her parents had been able to conceive naturally after they adopted Poppy and didn’t want a baby that wasn’t theirs anymore. They didn’t want her and gave her back to me.” Agatha wiped her face dry with her shirt.
“That is not how it works. Once you adopt, they are yours forever. I’ll have Harrison make sure they never get a chance to see our baby again. Papers will need to be filed,” Sera said, pulling out her phone with one hand, the other still holding Poppy.
Agatha took her phone from her hand. “I went straight to Aspen, my lawyer, on Friday. It’s all taken care of. You had just had a baby, so I didn’t want to bother you. Aspen knew a judge and got everything done that day. That’s why I wasn’t there for Violet.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Sera wiped away her tears and hugged the baby to her.
“I ruined Violet’s birthday. I didn’t want to ruin Benji’s too! I wonder if I did something shitty on Emma’s?” Agatha said.
“I don’t remember, but what happened on the day Violet was born didn’t ruin anything. You losing your own baby made having her that much more precious. Yeah, it’s sad, but that day we didn’t walk out of the hospital empty-handed; we came home with a baby we have shared ever since. And now we’re mothers again. I have one, and you have one. But they still look the same.” Sera grinned and ran her hand over the baby’s head.
“I never looked at it like that,” Agatha admitted. She’d never managed to see a positive from the babies being born on the same day. Just the shadow it had cast on Violet’s birth.
“How old is she? No wait, I was on my honeymoon so, just over nine months?”
“January third,” Agatha confirmed. The best and worst day of her life.
Running her hand over the baby’s hair again, Sera asked, “Does Chris know he is the father?”
Shocked, Agatha stammered, “W-what? How did you know?”
“The curls, his smile, and the fact that he was at a football party the girl’s catered around the time you would have gotten pregnant. A party you worked.” Sera turned the baby so that Agatha could see her, as if she needed to see her to know the truth.
It was something she hated herself for hiding but couldn’t bring herself to tell him. Because then he would hate her also.
“No, he doesn’t. He doesn’t remember me. Then or before. I don’t think he’ll be happy when he finds out,” she admitted, which was why she wasn’t telling him. Maybe he never needed to know. Maybe it would never come up.
“He might be okay with it. She’s a cute baby. She looks a lot like my favorite daughter. What’s her name?” Sera asked.
“Poppy Joy. I have to get her name changed to Lovely. Maybe Harrison can handle that since you’ve done it twice over the last year for your girls.” Agatha took her baby from her mom.
“She does look like a Poppy, though,” Sera said and laughed. “Can I tell everyone about her? I want to tell everyone.”
“I wasn’t looking forward to that at all. You tell them and explain everything. Just not the Chris stuff.” Her family didn’t have to know everything.
“There are some things you have to explain yourself. But first, you have to tell Chris. From what I saw, he might not be so against being a dad,” Sera stated.
Agatha hugged Poppy. “I don’t know.”
But she knew her mom was right. Chris needed to know. He needed to know everything. Only then could he decide if he really wanted to be there.
“Now I have to tell all my girls. Oh, and come over around 6 p.m. for supper. I’m sure Lucy and Harper can whip something up by then. Besides, all the girls will want to meet their new niece. And I need to spoil her! I’ve missed so much time with her.” Sera got up and hugged them both, grabbed her baby still sleeping in his seat, and headed down the stairs.
Now everyone would know about her biggest secret. Hopefully, they would be as happy about Poppy as had been about her last secret.
