by Lisa Levine
“I think I’d prefer a brother, so daddy has another boy to keep him company when you and I are doing girl things. Bear is currently the only boy in the house, but he doesn’t really count since he’s a bear.
I laughed out loud. I was relieved that Poppy was not only okay with everything but that she seemed ecstatic. This was all going much better than I had hoped. I was definitely still stressed about being a father again and about a million other things that went along with getting married and having a child. But I was surrounded by love and joy with Poppy and Annika. I couldn’t help but feel happy and excited, too.
“All right now,” I said. “It’s late, and you have school tomorrow. Time to get to bed.”
“Can I sleep in here with you guys tonight?” Poppy asked. “Bear doesn’t want to go back to my room. Please?” she asked in her sweetest and most innocent voice. “Just this once?”
Annika looked at me with the same puppy-dog eyes that Poppy was making, so of course, I couldn’t refuse either of them.
“Oh, all right,” I gave in. It was a good thing the bed was so big.
Poppy snuggled down between both of us with her bear curled under her arms. Annika and I both reached an arm over her and held each other’s hand. After a while, I let my hand fall across her stomach and fell asleep in the awe and wonderment of knowing that soon, Poppy would have a little brother or sister.
Chapter Twenty (Annika)
The wedding day was stunning, and I was a pile of nerves in my wedding dress. Jake and I had decided that we didn’t want to hesitate at all before getting married, so he gave me free rein on designing everything for the wedding and then just handing him a list and a plan so that he could take care of the rest. He hired the best of the best to orchestrate the flowers and the venue setup, the music and the food, and even the reception afterward. I took Poppy with me to pick out a dress, and after trying on what felt like a hundred gowns, I finally found one that we both agreed was breathtaking.
The ceremony was lavish, and Jake had spared no expense. That being said, it was also a small and intimate affair. We decided that we wanted to keep everything as personal and out of the public eye as possible, simply because we didn’t want to share this moment with anyone aside from our closest personal friends and family. My dad came to walk me down the aisle, and he even admitted that maybe I hadn’t done such a terrible job with my career since my nanny job not only paid me a fortune but had also landed me the happily ever after of my dreams. Lucie’s fiancé was Jake’s best man, and Lucie was helping me with all of the last-minute finishing touches before walking down the aisle.
Poppy was a ball of energy, and she looked adorable in her little ballet-pink flower girl dress. She had practiced throwing the flower petals and was jumping up and down with so much excitement that she was starting to spill them from the basket. My dad was trying to entertain her so she would calm down by showing her a few awful magic tricks that made no sense. Still, she found the tricks and my dad amusing, so it kept her occupied for a little while as Lucie finished sticking the last of the rhinestone clips into my hair.
Just before it was time to walk down the aisle, my dad came to talk to me.
“You look beautiful, Annika,” he said.
“Thanks, Dad,” I smiled.
“Your mother would be so proud of you, sweetheart. I know that she wished she could be here to see you.”
“I wished she could, too,” I said as I watched a tear fall down my father’s cheek.
“Ready?” he asked as he held out his arm for me to take.
I heard the music start to play and saw Lucie smile at me one last time before walking out to sit down with the other guests.
“I’m ready!” Poppy shouted.
I nodded in agreement with her.
“All right,” my dad said. “Let’s do this.”
I felt as though I couldn’t even feel my body walking down the aisle as I got closer and closer to where Jake stood. It was so surreal, like a dreamscape turned reality. When my dad handed me off at the end of the aisle, the smile on Jake’s face made all of my nervousness melt away. I held on tightly to his hand as the officiant read the words for the ceremony. I felt like Jake’s hand was keeping me from floating away. After we exchanged vows and shared our first kiss as husband and wife, we turned and walked back down the aisle behind a gleeful Poppy as she flung flower petals into the air, which cascaded down around her like a falling rainbow.
This was the happiest day of my entire life.
The party after the wedding celebration was amazing. The food and drinks flowed as all of our close friends and family members enjoyed themselves and relished in our happiness. Poppy danced until she was too tired to stand up anymore and then came to curl up behind the table where we were sitting to take a nap. I made her a comfy bed of blankets beneath the table, like a little fort, where she could catch a bit of quiet amidst all of the revelry. I lifted the table skirt to peek-in on her and saw that even despite the noise of the party, she was sound asleep beneath the table, all snuggled up with her blankets and her bear. Jake peeked his head down, too, and took a picture of how sweet she looked.
When I glanced up again, I noticed a guest staring at me that I didn’t recognize. “Jake,” I said as I tapped him on the shoulder. “Who is that man over there?”
“Which one?” he looked up and followed the direction that my finger was pointing. “Oh, he’s a special friend of mine who is here to see you.”
“Why is he here to see me?”
Jake smiled and took my hand to walk over toward the man.
“Mark,” Jake said as he introduced the two of us. “This is my lovely wife, Annika.”
“Annika, it’s a pleasure to meet you,” Mark said. “Jake has told me a lot about you. I am looking forward to working with you.”
“Working with me?” I asked in confusion.
“Mark is the CEO of another record label in Silicon Valley,” Jake said. “I knew that if I offered to sign you myself that you would refuse and say that I was just doing it as a favor. But Mark’s company is just as strong as mine; actually, he’s kind of a friendly rival, one might say. I sent a recording of your singing to him, and he listened to it.”
“How did you get a recording of my singing?” I asked. I had a dozen questions about what was going on here, but that was the first one that came to mind.
“At the park,” Jake grinned. “Granted, the audio quality on my phone sucked, but Mark was able to hear you regardless.”
“Cell phone sound quality or not, Annika, your voice is amazing,” Mark said. “I am highly interested in signing you on with my company and am willing to make you a lucrative contract if you’ll agree to let me represent you.”
How can this even be happening? I thought to myself.
I turned to Jake. “Why did you do this?” I asked.
“I was afraid you might be a little mad,” Jake said with a slightly worried expression on his face. “But It’s my wedding present to you. You have a beautiful voice, Annika. I’m not the only one saying that. Mark is an amazing judge of talent, too. And I want you to be able to live out your dreams as an artist. I didn’t want to represent you myself, that ended so badly with my last marriage, so I found a way for your talent to be heard by someone else. If you want to chase this dream now, you have everything you need to be able to do it, and I will support you one hundred percent.”
“But what about my situation?” I asked.
“What situation?” Mark said as he looked at us both curiously.
“Annika is pregnant,” Jake answered before turning back to me. “That doesn’t matter at all. It won’t stop you from singing and pursuing your dreams. If anything, it will mean the baby gets to hear more of your beautiful voice.”
“It’s completely your decision,” Mark said to me. “But I’d like an answer from you before the end of the night. I’ll give you two time to discuss it and think.”
“Thank you,” I said as M
ark turned to walk away.
“But Annika, please do know that I do think you have the talent to be successful.”
Jake smiled at me with the ecstatic look of a child on Christmas Eve. “Well?” he said eagerly. “Are you mad, or are you happy?”
“I’m astonished,” I said.
Jake’s nose crinkled as he made a sour face. “I don’t know if that is a good thing or a bad one,” he said.
“It’s the most wonderful thing anyone has ever done for me,” I said. “Thank you.”
“Does that mean that you’re considering doing it?”
“No,” I said.
Jake looked as if someone had poked him with a pin and deflated all of the air out of him.
“I don’t need to consider it because I’ve already decided that I want to do it.”
“Really?” Jake asked.
“Really,” I smiled.
He picked me up and spun me around, and the train of my wedding dress flew around us in a sparkling circle that swished in the moving air.
“Annika,” Jake said with a huge smile covering his face. “I think you should sing now, here at the wedding.”
“Oh no, I don’t even have anything prepared.”
“Sing anything,” he said. “It will be beautiful.”
“I’ll sing with you,” Poppy said from beside me.
I lifted her up into my arms and looked at her sleepy eyes. “I thought you were asleep,” I said as I gave her a small kiss on the cheek.
“I was, but then the smell of cake woke me up.”
Jake and I both burst into laughter.
“Please, can I sing with you?” she asked.
“Of course you can,” I said.
Jake set up the mic for us and brought around a stool for me to sit on with Poppy on my lap. I hadn’t sung for such a long time that I really didn’t have the first clue what I was doing. But I held Poppy in my arms and closed my eyes and when I opened my mouth, my voice came out and knew what to do all on its own. It felt like I had only been singing for a few seconds, and then suddenly, the song was over. I opened my eyes to see Poppy gazing up at me in awe.
“Hey,” I whispered to her as the crowd burst into applause. “You didn’t sing with me.”
“I didn’t need to,” she said. “It was already beautiful.”
I smiled at Poppy and then looked up and smiled at Jake. He came over to stand next to us, and I felt like we were the perfect little galaxy—Jake and Poppy and me all on our own. Mark came up with a contract in his hand. He pulled a pen out of his pocket and handed it to me. I took the contract and the pen and Poppy turned around so that I could use her back as a surface to sign the paper on.
Jake laughed. “Rule number one in the music industry; you should never sign anything without reading it over first.”
“Oh!” I said as I pulled my hand back up, but it was too late because I had already finished writing my name.
“It’s okay,” he laughed. “I’ve already read over the whole thing. Just making a recommendation for future contracts that you might end up with once you become a big star.
“I think you might be getting ahead of yourself,” I teased. “Singing a song at my own wedding is far from making it big in the music industry.”
“Oh, don’t worry, I have no doubt that you’re going to make it big,” Mark said. “Consider this song at your wedding your very last amateur night.”
The rest of the evening was magical, and as the guests started to leave the reception, Jake and I scooped up Poppy and got into the car to head home. Jake had offered a glamorous honeymoon, but I told him that the thing that would make me the happiest was to spend our first night as husband and wife in our home with Poppy—our daughter.
When we got home, we tucked Poppy into bed with Bear and then went to take off our clothes from the wedding. As Jake unzipped my dress, I felt his lips against the back of my neck, and they sent shivers down my spine.
“This was the most wonderful day and night of my life,” he whispered, and I felt his warm breath against my skin. “How did I get so lucky?”
“How did we get so lucky?” I said as I turned around to kiss him, letting my dress fall to the ground. “Who would have thought that after all of the things we had to go through, that we would be here in this very moment tonight, at home together, with Poppy and Bear, and a new baby on the way.”
“You know,” he said. “I need to give Lucie a raise.”
“Why?” I asked with a raised brow. What odd timing to say something about employee raises.
“Because she’s the one who told me to get a nanny.”
I laughed and leaned up onto my toes to kiss him as he lifted me off the floor, leaving my dress in a glittering heap on the ground. He carried me over to the bed, and I sat on the edge of our bed in the alluring ivory lingerie that I had gotten for this special night. I unbuttoned Jake’s shirt as he stood in front of me and then kissed his chest. Then I undid his pants and pulled them off his hips as he stepped out of them and climbed onto the bed with me.
Tonight, we would make love for the second time, and it would be every bit as wonderful as the first. Our new baby was conceived during the first time that Jake and I had ever been intimate, and our new life together would be conceived during this second experience.
“I want to make love to you every night for the rest of forever,” he said as he came down over me and laid his swollen cock against my pelvis.
“I want that, too,” I said. “Except, I’m not quite sure that will be enough.”
“What do you mean?” he said with a look of slight concern and wonder.
“What about the mornings?” I teased.
Jake grinned and leaned down to kiss me with a long and seductive kiss that made my body quiver and my skin tingle everywhere.
“I thought that you weren’t much of a morning person,” he said as he pressed his body down against mine and made me squirm with desire.
“I’m not,” I said, feeling my breaths start to quicken. “But with the right motivation, I can definitely learn to be.
“Oh, I can absolutely give you the right motivation,” he smiled.
I felt his hand run down my leg and between my thigh as he gently nudged apart my thighs.
“Let me amend my previous statement,” he whispered as I felt his hands on me. “I want to make love to you every night and every morning for the rest of forever.”
I smiled and got ready to say something witty in reply, but before I could speak, Jake thrust himself into me, and I moaned with a pleasure that I never wanted to end.
Epilogue (Jake)
“Poppy, if you keep swinging Owen around like that, he’s going to barf up all those strawberries he just ate.”
“Sorry, Dad!” she said as she set her little brother down onto the grass.
She loved swinging her baby brother around in her arms. Almost as much as I loved watching her play with him.
Annika laughed from beside me. “At least we’re at the park instead of on the new white carpet at the house.”
It was hard to believe that two years had gone by so quickly, and I had cherished every single moment of it. Sure, there had been some ups and downs, but overall, things had been pretty smooth.
Poppy was now almost ten, and she was no longer getting into any trouble at school. Actually, on the contrary, she had become a model student and a role model for her baby brother, Owen, who she was constantly trying to keep out of trouble with his curious nature.
Annika had started her singing career and had already released a single album which had received rave success. She had declined to do any touring because she wanted to stay home with Owen and Poppy, but she was still creating and had a second album in progress. Mark’s company was doing her right, and he respected her both as a client and as a working mother, which took a lot of the burden off of her trying to balance both her career and her family. She always looked so happy to me every day that I looked at her. She se
emed like she was finally content with what she was doing and able to have the singing career that she had always dreamed of with many future albums planned ahead.
Seeing her and Poppy happy made my whole life better than I could have ever imagined.
My company was charting its most successful year yet. Although I was still highly motivated and constantly signing on new artists, I was getting better at balancing my time at home and my time with my family.
Maleah had ditched her crappy boyfriend after Blake landed himself in jail for several months. She was still touring a lot and had signed on with a different label and manager, but she was finally trying to become a better mother to Poppy. She made sure to take short breaks between tours to come and spend some time with her daughter. Poppy had a better relationship with her mom now that she was able to voice what was bothering her and had set some boundaries. It was a skill that Annika had helped her with when she told Poppy about how she dealt with her father about certain things. Annika’s father had come around to being less invasive and bossy about her life and more supportive. He loved being a grandpa, and he doted on both Poppy and Owen at every chance that he got.
“Today is a beautiful day,” Annika said as she laid back against the picnic blanket and looked up at the sky. It was cool, but not cold, and there was a beautiful blue sky that was just overcast enough to keep the heat of the sun at bay.
She was so beautiful as she laid there under the sky, against the soft, earthy ground. I lay beside her but kept myself propped up on my elbows as I watched Poppy push Owen around in a little wagon that we had gotten him for his first birthday. She had made him a little blanketed bed inside so that he could lay comfortably as he was driven around the small patch of the park. Every so often, Poppy would stop to pick up an interesting-looking stone or leaf and stuff it into her pockets. I started to wonder how her pants weren’t falling down, yet from all of the things, she kept jamming into them.
If she happened to pass a squirrel or a sitting bird, she would get very hush and would crouch next to Owen, pointing in silence at whatever creature was peering at them. She would make up the most fantastical stories to tell her little brother about how the birds were actually supernatural beings from other realms that were sent here to watch over them, or how the squirrels were actually fairies in animal form that were just playing tricks on all the humans and getting free nuts that they would take home and use to make tasty desserts with. Poppy’s imagination knew no bounds, and Owen would be better for it. He was lucky to have an older sister like her. And she was lucky to have him, too, and Annika. Annika had given Poppy and me something that we thought we’d never have again—a family. Of course, Poppy and I had been family even before Annika came into our lives, but now it was just so much better in every way.
