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She took a deep breath and let it out and then smiled big at me, her eyes bright. “I’m pregnant.”
“Oh my God,” I squeaked. “Oh my God,” I said again, beyond shocked. I hadn’t seen that one coming. Maybe because I’d been too caught up in my own shit and vowed to do better in my friendship with Miranda in the future. “This is so exciting!” I leaned across the space between us and hugged her. “How far along are you?”
She backed out of our embrace excitedly, ready to tell me everything. “Twenty weeks. We’ve been waiting until we had a big ultrasound to tell everyone. It’s been so hard.”
“Gosh, I can imagine.” I remembered when me and Andy had found out we were pregnant with Parker. We hadn’t had any family to share it with really, but we’d told all of our friends on base as soon as we’d found out. We couldn’t wait. It was such a special time for us.
I envied them being able to experience that for the first time. It was such a momentous thing, having a baby. There really was nothing like it. It was the greatest gift I’d ever received, motherhood.
“I’m so happy for y’all. You and Holden are going to make such great parents. Speaking of Holden, how excited is he?”
“Oh, he’s over the moon. A little nervous but mostly excited. We’ve been working on getting the house fixed up and the baby’s room ready so that’s been a good distraction from thinking about it too much. Which Holden tends to do about things that make him anxious.”
I nodded, understanding. Holden hadn’t just lost his leg five years ago. He’d lost Andy, too. And his military career. It had been a hard pill for him to swallow and he’d struggled. Fortunately for him, Miranda had helped him pull through. And I saw how much he loved and adored her. There wasn’t a doubt in my mind that it would be the same for this baby.
“Do y’all know if it’s a boy or a girl?” I asked, standing up and attempting to finish Miranda’s haircut.
“Yep,” she said softly. “It’s a boy.”
“Oh, how wonderful. Any ideas on names yet?” I asked, finishing her hair but holding the sides in my hands and staring down at her, making sure it was even.
She grabbed those hands from her hair and held them in hers. “Well, that’s what I wanted to talk to you about. And when I ask this, you can tell me it’s a no good rotten idea and I will tell Holden no way, absolutely not and we can move on like this never happened. No hard feelings at all.”
I looked at her like she was crazy because she was totally being a nut and I had no idea what she was talking about.
“What in the hell are you talking about?” I said, trying not to give into a hysterical fit of laughter.
“Well,” she said, squeezing my hands. “Holden really wants to name this baby Andrew and I wanted to make sure it was okay with you.”
“Oh,” I breathed in shock, feeling like the wind had been knocked right out of me. I pulled my hands out of hers and settled in my chair again, taking in her words.
They wanted to name their sweet baby boy after my dead husband. The familiar burn of tears prickled in my eyes.
“Ems,” Miranda called, leaning forward and touching my leg, looking like she was going to cry, too. “It’s okay. I told Holden you might not be okay with this and we totally understand. It’s no big deal.”
I leaned forward, covering her hand with mine because she had it so wrong. So very wrong. “No, Miranda. I’m sorry. I’m just surprised, is all.” I pulled my hands from her and wiped under my eyes, embarrassed I was crying in front of her. “Andy would have loved that. I love it, too,” I finished, barely getting the words out without sobbing all over the place.
“Really?” Miranda asked, trepidation hanging there in her gaze, and I realized I needed to put an end to that right then. “Are you sure?”
I stood up and held my arms out. “Hug me, damn it,” I ordered, and she stood up and wrapped me in a big hug. There I was the no hugger begging for one. I pushed my face into her neck and squeezed her hard before saying into her ear softly, “I am absolutely sure. What an amazing gift you gave me today,” I stuttered out, feeling like I was hanging my heart out there right on my sleeve and hoping that I wasn’t a fool for doing it.
“Thank you,” she said back, softly pulling me closer. “Holden will be so happy.”
And I couldn’t believe for one moment that I’d ever questioned if this beautiful, wonderful, kind human being wasn’t the most perfect person for Holden Steel on the planet. Because she was. She was so, so special and I prayed to God that he knew it.
I hoped even more that they always had each other.
I pulled back, my arms still wrapped around her. I wanted her to know what this would have meant to my Andrew. So, looking into her big brown eyes, I said, “Andrew received a lot of awards and accolades throughout his life. But this? This would have been his greatest honor. Thank you.” I sucked in a sob.
She pulled me back to her and held me tight. Both of us sniffling and holding in our cries as best as possible. It was a total hug fest and I had no clue when I was supposed to pull out of it since this kind of thing wasn’t my jam. I was hoping like hell Miranda would let me know when it was okay by breaking up the hug, when I heard a noise outside that made my body go straight.
It was loud and sounded like it was right outside my living room window. Miranda finally pulled back and let me go and hustled over to the window in question and pulled back the blinds a little to peek out.
I stood there, eyebrows sky-high, waiting for her to tell me what she saw.
She turned back to me with red eyes and a grin that somehow seemed evil and angelic. “He’smowing your lawn.”
I raced to the other end of the window from her and pulled back the blinds, thinking surely she had to be wrong. Weston was not out there mowing my lawn. But there he was, sure as the day I was born, pushing a mower, moving right past the window we were creeping on him out of. We both shot back quickly, the blinds falling back into place so we didn’t get caught.
