“No,” I snap, though I understand what he’s saying.
He goes one further. “If you were down four points in Quiz Bowl, you wouldn’t mentally check out because you thought you’d lose. You’d fight harder for those last four points.”
I would. I channel my confidence, years of persistence in the face of adversaries of all shapes and sizes. I block out the worst. My spirits lift tenfold.
You’re coming out. And you’re going to be loved. And there’s just no stopping that.
Connor kisses my knuckles, his strength filling me whole. We’re a team. The best of the best. While this is my battle, he’s here with me. He always is.
I shut my eyes, redirecting my energy. I only think about this baby. I grit my teeth as I push. Come on. Come on. Come on. I’m so focused, I lose track of time and place.
Then soft lovely cries pierce the air and awaken me.
Light floods my eyes, and the wiggling baby is being placed on my chest. Nurses wipe him off while my gaze clouds with tears.
Dr. Amora stands. “Congratulations on your new baby boy.”
Connor strokes his thumb across our son’s head, and I clasp the baby’s fingers. His soft cries fade to pleasant murmurs. My body surges with warmth and powerful sentiments that burst through my icy defenses. I crumble at the sight of our baby. No matter how many, each one is new. Each one is different and unique, and I revel in this raw moment that strips me bare.
“He’s already horrible,” I mutter so only Connor can hear. “He’s making me cry.” So did the other three babies. I wipe beneath my eyes and look to my husband.
Connor has this profound tranquility that can only be described as the surface of a quiet lake. Weight has been added to the bottom of his lake, lifting water levels, and his blue eyes draw unbreakable lines between our child and me and him.
“What are you thinking?” I whisper.
“How breathtaking dreams are when you meet them.”
I once asked Connor what quote came to mind when he looked at Jane. I asked him the same thing about Charlie and Beckett, and his response never changed.
The quote beats at my heart, and I speak every word as assuredly and soulfully as he once did. “‘We can never give up longing and wishing while we are thoroughly alive.’” His chest rises, and my life with him starting at fourteen to his fifteen and lasting for years is all in vivid focus.
He finishes, “‘There are certain things we feel to be beautiful and good, and we must hunger after them.’” Connor tries to bar some of his emotions from prevailing, but he can’t remove the weight from the lake. He sees this too, and he just smiles what can only be called a gorgeous smile.
The nurses hover close to examine the baby as he rests on my chest. They nod to me and mention that his vitals look perfect, and when they distance themselves from us, Connor speaks again.
“George Eliot,” he correctly names the author of the quote. “The Mill on the Floss.”
Eliot. I brush a finger across the baby’s cheek, and he murmurs again. “Eliot,” I whisper. “It suits him.” George Eliot is the pen name used by Mary Ann Evans. A woman.
Connor knows this fact, and I wonder if that’s why his smile only grows. “Eliot Alice,” he suddenly adds. “It suits him more.”
“Alice from…” I think I know, but I’m surprised he’d choose Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll as the namesake. Though Alice is a female character, and since George Eliot was a woman with a common man’s name, Connor must like the symbolism of naming our son Alice in reply.
“Alice from…?” he says, wanting me to guess.
“From a story that has a smoking caterpillar and a cat that grins wider than you.”
He laughs. “Alice reminds me of Lily.”
I thought I was through crying, but another tear escapes. “How come?”
“They’re both gentle, imaginative, can be witty in their own right, and they’re prone to falling down rabbit holes.”
I laugh into a smile.
Connor drowns in my expression, and I float across the temperate, soothing surface of his. Only when the nurse announces his birthday, do I remember the goal I’d set in stone.
“This little one is born 12:01 a.m. on the dot.” She passes me a small cotton cap to put on Eliot’s head.
My eyes widen, processing and processing…
June 1st.
He was born June fucking 1st.
I try to narrow a glare at him, but I can’t do such a thing. He’s too fragile to endure the heat of my eyes. I’m so sorry, my gremlin.
I rub small circles across his back and then look to Connor. “There’s still time to name him Brutus.” Before he can even reply, I whisper to Eliot, “I’d never name you that.” Forgive me.
“You’re in love,” Connor states the obvious.
“You’re in love,” I combat.
“Two truths. What shall we do with those?”
“Have another,” I declare. Have another truth. Have another baby.
“More love,” he says, reading my subtext clearly. “I can agree to that.”
Long before now, he’d never utter these words in this way. And yes, I may have lost my small goal but I see the future and I see now.
I’ve never felt more triumphant.
Connor & Rose Cobalt welcome the birth of their baby boy
ELIOT ALICE COBALT
June 1st, 2019
{ 15 }
November 2019
The Hale House
Philadelphia
LILY HALE
“Did you pack an axe? A machete? What do you use to kill bears again?” I ask in all seriousness.
Ryke shoves a neoprene water bottle in the side pocket of his duffel and then gives me a look like I’m weird and waaay off-base.
I rest my butt against the armrest of my couch. My heavy, pregnant belly likes gravity. I have this need to sit or lounge or just splat on the floor like a beached jellyfish. Everything aches in the third trimester, but my brain still constantly reroutes to Loren Hale. In my bed. On my bed.
Naked. On me.
In me.
Hormones. I love and hate them. The fact that I’m focusing on something other than Lo and sex is a huge win, even if I’ve replaced sex with worry.
“It’s a real question,” I say in the lingering silence.
Ryke zips up his duffel. “You don’t kill bears.”
I lower my voice. “But if they eat him…” I don’t want my four-year-old to hear this hypothetical horror scenario, but he should be out of earshot since he’s upstairs packing a bag with Lo. Garrison isn’t around either. He flew to London for the week to see Willow.
“It won’t happen, Lily,” Ryke refutes. “You can trust me with him.”
“It’s the woods. Anything can happen in the woods.” Is it just the woods though? Moffy has experienced the wilderness plenty of times. We frequent our lake house in the Smoky Mountains so often that he keeps asking when we’ll return.
“It’s not any different than the lake house,” he brings up, “or all the other times I’ve spent with him while you and Lo aren’t there. It’s all the fucking same. So why are you flipping out now?”
“I’m not flipping out,” I snap.
“Then you’re being fucking weird about it.”
“You always call me weird.”
Ryke sighs, frustrated, realizing that he’s being coarse with me, and I know he doesn’t want to be. He slowly unwraps a piece of gum from his pocket but doesn’t chew it.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
“Trying not to ride you hard—fuck.” He pinches his eyes. “Not like that.”
I smile because it’s funnier than it used to be. “I know you said it’s the same, but this feels different. This is a camping trip with a tent and no electricity and…” It clicks.
“And what?”
“You take a lot more chances and risks than I would with kids.”
It clicks for
him too. “It’s about the fucking climbing wall, isn’t it?”
“You put it in her nursery. You’re the insane one!” I point at him.
He rolls his eyes at me. “It’s fucking safe.”
I get hives walking into Sullivan’s room. Ryke built a climbing wall with footholds and handholds for his one-year-old daughter. Neon warning signs blinked in my head when I saw it yesterday. Broken arm! Broken leg! Broken toes and fingers!
Sulli ascended the wall higher than I’ve ever seen a baby climb anything. Daisy and Ryke were spotting her, and I was hugging the door frame. I could tell their daughter loved it, but if Moffy loved running in front of cars, I’d say no.
I don’t know where the line is for someone like Ryke. “What if Moffy asks to run through the fire?” I step towards him, investigation mode on. “What would you do?” I poke his chest.
He stares down at me like I haven’t changed in a million years.
He’s right. I’m still a terrific sleuth.
“I’d say fuck no.”
“Would you?”
“Yes, Lily.” He rakes his hand through his hair. “I care. I’d never put them in harm’s way.” He rubs his jaw. “You know why I teach Sulli how to climb?”
I shake my head. Paparazzi ask him all the time: do you want Sullivan to be a climber like you?
His response: fuck off.
“Because it’s a huge part of my life, and if I barred her from it out of fear, I’d be shutting out my daughter. My goal isn’t to push her to become a fucking professional climber. That’s her choice.”
My shoulders relax only a little. “Are you hoping she’ll choose climbing?”
He’s rigid. “I’ve only ever said this to Daisy, so don’t go around telling Lo and Rose and the lamp and the bathtub.”
“Hey,” I say, “I broke up with the bathtub long ago.”
Ryke almost smiles, but it vanishes fast. “After what happened…no. Fuck no.” He means the climbing accident where his friend died. “I hope she chooses something else. I’d worry about Sullivan. Every ascent where I’m not on the other end of the rope, I’d fucking worry, but like Daisy, if that’s what she loved, I’d let her do it.”
I must be grinning wide and uncontrollable because he looks at me weird again. So I say what I’m thinking, “You’re a worrier too.”
“For fuck’s sake.”
“You just admitted it. No take-backs.”
He sighs. “We’re not the same, Lily.”
That’s what he said when I called him a sex addict years ago. I know you wish I was, he once said, so I could join you in your little sex addicts not-anonymous club, but it’s not happening.
“You worry,” I say. “I worry. Worriers United, us.” I motion between our bodies.
He re-wraps his gum. “I’m not worried about an overnight camping trip at a little state park. I’m worried about my daughter falling from three-thousand fucking feet.”
Good points.
I grow hot, and I’m not sure if it’s my anxiety mounting again or just the heat in the room. I grab the nearest thing I can find—which happens to be a comic book on the couch cushion. I waft the glossy issue at my face, small gusts of air cooling me.
“Is it hot in here?” I ask. “I feel faint.”
“Sit the fuck down.”
“I am seated…sort of.” I’m still leaning on the armrest. “I think I’m just nervous.” I have to face the facts. Moffy will be attending his first-ever camping trip, and I should be thankful it’s with Uncle Ryke. He’s a wilderness pro.
Lo even said it was the best-case scenario since Ryke spends more time outdoors than indoors. In comparison, Lo can barely start a fire with a match. He has no patience for fire-making.
“What’s the worst that can fucking happen?” Ryke pockets his gum. Before I can utter the words, he adds, “Besides a bear.”
I slowly set the comic book back down. It’s Wolverine. Give me strength.
“Paparazzi,” I tell him. “What if paparazzi follow you and then give you hell in the woods where you can’t escape? It’s happened before, so it’s a rational fear.”
“Price and Declan are coming along. If something fucking happens with the media, they’ll take care of it.” Price is Daisy’s bodyguard. Declan is Moffy’s.
“What if Moffy doesn’t do well? I won’t be there to comfort him.” Ryke isn’t me. He’s said as much.
“Look, I promised Rose that if Janie freaks out, I’d bring her to the nearest hotel. I mapped it out. Same promise extends to you about Moffy.”
“Thank you.” My worry starts to subside, especially at the idea of Rose, my older and wisest sister trusting Jane’s life with Ryke. I bet she grilled him for a solid hour about safety.
I sink on the couch cushion, and Ryke leaves his duffel to take a seat next to me. I splay my hands on my abdomen, the baby kicking nonstop.
Ryke puts his hand on my stomach, feeling her wiggle around. He’s asked many times before if he could touch. I used to freak out by our physical interactions when I was pregnant with Moffy, but I’m much better now. So I always give Ryke permission.
“Are you scared?” he asks.
I frown. “Do I look it?”
“You look a little fucking tired.”
“She moves a lot and keeps me up at night sometimes.” She. Luna Hale. I’m a little scared to have a girl, but only because of other people. I don’t want them to hassle her the way they hassled Daisy. Future sex addict, they said about my little sister. Just because of me.
I have to believe that Luna will have an easier time than Daisy had.
I say softly, “I wish Daisy was going camping with you.” My sister decided to expand a section of Camp Calloway in the “off-months”—which includes paperwork and Skype meetings.
“Me fucking too,” Ryke says, “but she’ll have a good weekend with Sulli.”
I don’t doubt it.
While we wait for Lo and Moffy to come downstairs and for Rose and Connor to drive Jane over, all I picture are bears. Brown bears. Grizzly bears. I’m losing my mind when a polar bear pops up.
Ryke half-interestedly flips through the Wolverine comic.
I squint at him. “Remind me why we’re not going with you?”
“For one, you’re fucking pregnant.” He roughly turns a page, and it tears. Shit! He freezes.
I freeze. Lo is so possessive over the state of our comics. When I reanimate I whisper, “Stuff it in the couch cushion, he’ll never find out.”
Ryke checks over his shoulder before he lifts the cushion beneath his ass and slides the comic underneath.
“Lo can go with you.” I pick up where we left off. “He should go with you.”
“He can’t even light a fucking fire with a match, and he kicked a canteen into a bush the last time we went camping together. I love my brother, but he’d be more trouble than help. I bet you anything he doesn’t even want to fucking go.”
“He’d rather stay at home?” I thought he’d rather go with Moffy.
Ryke clears his throat like he’s hiding a secret. “Yeah.” What a lying liar.
I fasten the best glare I have, and it must do the job because he cracks under the pressure of Lily Investigator Hale.
“Look, I’m the fun fucking uncle who gets to take his niece and nephew on a camping trip. And it just so happens that it gives you and Lo all weekend to fuck each other as much as you want.”
My jaw unhinges. “That’s the reason this”—I wave my arms around—“is going on?”
“Why can’t you just fucking say camping trip?”
“Ryke,” I snap.
“Part of the reason. There are multiple fucking reasons, Lily.”
I cross my arms the best I can over my large belly. “I don’t want to fuck him.”
“Bullshit.” It’s one of the firmest bullshits I’ve heard all year.
I let out a long, heavy sigh. With my hormones raging, it’ll be nice to have more alone time with
Lo. I just don’t like the whole orchestration for sex. I constantly have to remind myself that this doesn’t make me a bad mom.
Most people would like alone time, not just sex addicts. Right? Right. Right?
I’m confusing myself.
“Thanks then,” I tell him, “for giving us the weekend.”
“I’m the fun fucking uncle. It’s what I’m here for.”
The door blows open. “MOFFY!” Four-year-old Jane shouts as she enters the living room from the foyer. “CAMPING TIME!”
I stand with Ryke.
Jane, in a pale pink coat, searches the room with eager eyes.
“He’s upstairs,” I tell Jane.
“Thank you, Aunt Lily!” She darts up the stairs, falling on the second one, before hastily picking herself up and shouting, “MOFFY!”
As soon as Rose sees us by the couch, she reroutes her course towards Ryke. Connor right behind her.
“Do you have everything?” Rose’s fiery yellow-green eyes wield a million threats.
Ryke returns to his duffel and casually stuffs his hands in his pockets. I resume my leaning-against-couch position.
“Yeah.” He taps his duffel with his boot as proof.
Connor gently sets a pink princess bag down beside the black duffel. He seems calmer than I imagined he’d be. He is sending his only daughter off into the woods with Ryke Meadows, but I’ve never been good at reading through Connor’s poker face.
“Are you concerned?” I ask him. “At all?”
He barely blinks. “That it may rain, yes. There’s a fifty-five percent chance.” Obviously he’s not worried about the possibility of bears or cameramen lurking behind trees.
That’s all you, Lily.
Rose is even subdued. No verbal threats about Ryke’s balls and penis. I cringe. Stop thinking about his dick.
Rose and Ryke did have a conversation yesterday about the camping trip. He was over her house, fixing a fence, and maybe that’s when he made the promise to bring Jane to a hotel if she freaks out.
Footsteps patter down the staircase. Lo enters the living room with Moffy and Jane on his heels. He dumps Moffy’s Black Widow bag on top of the princess one.
Some Kind of Perfect (Calloway Sisters #4.5) Page 18