FAITHFUL: The Mountain Man’s Babies

by Love, Frankie

  “Just because you never had a good example of a man when you were growing up,” she says, “doesn’t mean you don’t have good examples now.”

  I run a hand over my jaw, thinking of all the men on this mountain. Jax, Buck, Wilder, James, Hawk, Bear, Beau, Colton, and Tanner. Men who put family first over and over again. Before they became fathers, they were making messes of their lives; they didn’t have something—someone— to fight for.

  Love changed them, forged them by fire, each and every man. And now they have legacies. They have futures that are worth fighting for.

  And now so do I.

  I don’t know when or if Faith will wake up, but I can live like she is here, like she is mine. She is the mother of my child either way.

  And I love her more than life itself.

  “I guess I have some work to do,” I tell her. “My house is still in boxes.”

  “What do you have in mind?”

  “I need to make my cabin into a home. A place where Faith and our child can return to.”

  Josie smiles through her tears. “You know, I have a few friends who won’t mind helping.”

  I brush the tears away. “Fuck, Josie, who would have imagined this?”

  “You’re asking the wrong person. I’ve been here long enough to learn that nothing on this mountain makes sense to anyone who doesn’t live here. But this little slice of heaven knows something other people don’t.”

  “What’s that?” I ask.

  “We trust that love will always, always find a way.”

  “You’ll get the girls to help with the cabin?” I ask.

  Josie nods. “Of course.”

  We stand, our food uneaten. “I need to get back to her,” I say. “It’s been a few hours.”

  “I understand,” Josie says. “And Jonah?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Congratulations. You’re going to be a daddy.”

  I nod tightly, not trusting myself not to cry. “Yeah, I am, Josie. Who the hell would have guessed?”

  She smiles. “Before it was dubbed Miracle Mountain, it was called Fertile Mountain. It got its name for a reason.”

  We say goodbye and I head to the hospital room, needing to sit by Faith’s side — trusting that one day she will wake. She will hold her child and she will be my wife.

  I have faith that could move mountains.

  Part Two

  Seven months later…

  “Don’t give up before the miracle happens.”

  — Fannie Flagg

  Chapter Ten

  Faith

  I open my eyes, as a scream escapes my mouth.

  More than a scream, a panic, a terror. Complete and utter pain.

  My hands press against my belly, it’s huge. Wires are attached to me, everywhere and I'm choking on the tube in my throat and I’m blinded by the lights and the people and I close my eyes, scared. Terrified. Cold and hot. The pain is unbearable, twisting me in two and I brace myself, unable to focus on anything, anyone. So many hands and faces and no one I know and where the hell am I?

  I fall away, to somewhere else, my brain awake but my body floating. Floating. Alone. I hear a voice as I float. I’m holding someone’s hand, running through a forest, mountain air and clear skies and the smell of cedar.

  In a bed, hands undressing me. Laughter. Smiles. I can’t see a face. His face. He kisses me. Kisses me.

  I’m melting, against him, into him. His body rocking against mine and I smile. I’m happy, so happy. The pain is gone, and I am floating, and he is mine. Who is he?

  Mine.

  “I love you,” he tells me, his voice strong, sure. His breath hot in my ear and my words soft and true. “I love you.”

  He fills me up, my body his, and he takes me to the edge, over and over again and he kisses me hard. He kisses me gently. My body takes him, and it feels right. So damn good. Perfect. A rhythm, a heartbeat. A promise of forever.

  Marry me.

  Yes.

  Yes.

  Marry me.

  Yes.

  My eyes open, blinding, fluorescent lights. “Faith, can you hear me? Stay with us, you’re okay,” a man’s voice urges. He’s in hospital scrubs, a stranger. And his voice is loud, urgent. “You’re okay, just breathe.”

  I scream instead, the pain seizing me, twisting me. Breaking me. They place a mask over my mouth, and I breathe in, deep. I close my eyes. I float away.

  This time a voice, reading to me. Letters. Books. Poems. Hands on my hands, fingers laced with mine.

  “I built a crib,” he tells me. “For our baby,” he says. I look for him, but I can’t see him. All I see is bright white lights and I reach for him. I see a statue, an orca on a mantle, a protector. I trace a tattoo. A grey whale. He kisses me. Kisses me. I want to see his face.

  “I’ve been writing,” he tells me. “The memoir. But the story, Faith, I don’t know how it’s going to end.” Tears. His salty tears are on my arms, he rests his head on the edge of my bed, praying. Whispers all night long. Faith that can move mountains. Faith in us.

  I want to reach out and touch him, turn his face so I can see his eyes. See him.

  I can’t.

  I sleep.

  When I wake, I’m in a hospital room, this time, the lights are low. The pain is gone. I look down, the belly still there, but different. A nurse turns to me. “Oh, Faith,” she gasps. “You’re awake.” She says it as if it’s a miracle.

  Me. As if I’m the miracle.

  Chapter Eleven

  Jonah

  I run to labor and delivery, desperate. The day came when I wasn’t here. After how many months of sitting by her side, holding her hand all night long, she wakes up.

  “Tanner,” I pant, rushing into the waiting room. “Tell me she’s okay.”

  His face breaks into a smile — the same smile I saw when Virginia gave birth to their twins this September.

  “She’s okay. I just saw her. The nurses are with her right now. She’s in shock, Jonah. It’s a lot to absorb.”

  I nod. I’ve spent months preparing, imagining this day, the day our baby was born — but it was my deepest prayer that Faith would be out of the coma to behold the miracle herself. And somehow it came true. The labor pain triggered something in her subconscious and she woke up.

  But for Faith, this is all so much to process.

  “And her words, was she…” Our greatest fear has been that when Faith wakes her brain activity will have changed. So many people never regain full functionality.

  Tanner chokes on a sob, pulling me into the first hug he has even given me. “She’s perfectly healthy, Jonah. My little girl was all there. Not missing a beat, though panicked over the baby. But it’s been hardly any time. Once she sees you,” he says, wiping his eyes. “Once she sees you and holds the baby. She’ll be okay.”

  “The baby…” I have been so focused on Faith that I didn’t ask about our child.

  “Jonah, breathe. It’s okay. Everyone’s healthy. The baby is in her room, go on, and go meet your family.”

  I nod, in a state of shock, barely registering that Virginia and their children are here.

  “We all peeked in her room for a moment, but we didn’t linger, knowing she needs her energy for the baby.”

  Clover gives me a big hug.

  “Can you believe she had the baby on her birthday? November first, isn’t that a crazy coincidence?”

  Crazy is one way to put it. But I know it is no coincidence. Nothing about Faith and me has been by accident.

  All of Faith’s siblings and I have grown close over the last few months. Once they realized I wasn’t going anywhere, they latched on. I’ve been fishing on my lake with her brothers, Levi and Cash, and her sisters, Lily, Willa and Clover helped Josie and the other women on the mountain with setting up the nursery.

  “She was so happy to see us,” Clover says. “But she’s gonna be so much happier to see you.”

  I walk to the hospital room door with nerves. S
uddenly my stomach is all twisted, the moment I’ve imagined for so long, finally here. Faith in my arms again, our baby between us. It’s all I’ve been envisioning. Gratitude swells through me. How goddamn lucky we are, to have our Faith, here again, whole.

  I step into the room, and there she is. She’s lying in the hospital bed, a swaddled baby in her arms. Our baby. A nurse is with her, helping, and I know from reading up on it that she can’t hold the baby on her own after the C-section, especially considering how weak she is after having been in a coma for so long.

  Her hair is to one side, her eyes on our child, and serenity on her face. Peace. Thank god, that is exactly what she needs.

  I step toward her, tears in my eyes. She lifts her chin, seeing me and I smile, moving closer, my heart surging with pride. I will finally meet my baby after so many months of resting my hand on Faith’s belly, watching our child move in her womb, as she grew our little masterpiece.

  “Faith,” I say, my voice etched with love. Ready to start our next chapter. “Oh, golden girl.”

  Her brows lift, knit together. Worry between them, a frown on her face as she takes me in. She blinks as if torn, lost. Confused.

  “I’m sorry.” She shakes her head, looking straight at me. “Who are you?”

  Chapter Twelve

  Faith

  The man walking toward me is ruggedly handsome, bright blue eyes, dimples. Flannel shirt and blue jeans and I have literally no idea who he is.

  “It’s me, Jonah,” he says. “Your…” His words fall, he moves closer and I reach for the nurse.

  “I’m sorry, I don’t know who this man is. Can you have him leave?” I shake my head as the man named Jonah wipes his eyes. “I’m really confused.”

  “It’s me. You know me,” he says, trying to meet my gaze. “We’re getting married.”

  “Married?” My eyes widen and I pull the baby closer to me. Baby. How in the world am I even holding a baby? I’m a virgin, a teenager. I don’t understand anything anyone is saying.

  The baby begins to cry. My baby. The baby they say I grew for nine months. Nine months where I was in a coma and I can’t remember that let alone this man.

  Married?

  “Faith, our baby—”

  I cut him off, imploring nurse Lydia to help me. The last hour has been completely overwhelming and now this man is here, saying he is… I can’t even. My chest tightens as I try to breathe, to calm down.

  The baby keeps crying and this man reaches for her and I push him away. “Don’t touch her,” I say.

  “Her?” he asks, tears filling his eyes. “It’s a girl?”

  “Get the doctor, please,” I tell the nurse, who takes the baby from my arms, setting her in the bassinet.

  “Doctor Martin will be here in a moment, Nurse Janelle is here for you,” she says to the other woman in the room. “I’m technically the baby’s assigned nurse.” Lydia’s eyes are on Jonah’s and together they leave with the baby.

  I turn to Janelle. “Do you know that man?” I ask. “He said his name is Jonah?”

  Janelle turns to me, and I see she is in tears too. Everyone around me is crying and I don’t understand. I don’t understand anything.

  “Oh, Faith,” she says. “Jonah has been by your side for seven and a half months. Everyone at the hospital knows him.”

  “They do?” I press a hand to my forehead, exhausted, as Doctor Martin enters my room.

  He asks me to explain the series of events, to describe what just happened, asking Janelle to confirm it.

  “I just saw Jonah in the hallway,” Martin says. “He is quite upset.”

  “Well, I’m quite upset too. Apparently, I have a baby!”

  “And, it appears, some sort of selective amnesia.”

  My shoulders fall, my heart too heavy. This can’t be happening. This can’t be my story. I was supposed to… to… I close my eyes. It’s too much.

  “It’s alright, Faith, this is perfectly normal.”

  “Normal?” I sob. “Normal to not remember falling in love, getting pregnant, carrying a baby for nine months? Normal to not remember the father of your child?” I’m shaking, heaving, and I’m only slightly aware of the fact that the doctor and nurse are having a conversation about me. I remember my entire family, every detail… yet the most important pieces of my puzzle are entirely blank.

  Somehow, I became a mother while I was in a coma, and now this stranger says I’m going to be his wife.

  I close my eyes, and whatever medication the nurse gives me works. I fall asleep, but this time I’m not dreaming. I’m living a nightmare.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Jonah

  In the nursery of the hospital, I stand with Nurse Lydia. While I need to speak with Doctor Martin, it’s more urgent that I meet my daughter.

  Daughter.

  Never in a million years did I imagine it would be under these circumstances. I prayed Faith would be awake to experience this first moment with me, and she is in technical terms… but she’s still so far away. She saw me and thought I was a stranger. Am a stranger.

  How could she forget me when our time together has been forever etched onto my heart? I try to still my breaking heart, can’t have it shatter here — when I am about to hold my little one for the very first time.

  Nurse Lydia unswaddles my baby, as I take in every detail of her tiny perfection. I unbutton my flannel shirt, set it aside, and sit down in the rocking chair. Lydia hands me my daughter, and tears fill both our eyes. I’m glad she is here with me, silent support. I’m not sure I could manage this moment alone.

  She steps aside, giving us privacy. I look my daughter over, kissing her fair hair, thick and wavy like her mother’s. She smells like magic, like home. Her body is so small. She was born six weeks early and is going to need lots of love to get strong, to make sure her lungs are fully developed, to help her become the healthiest version of herself.

  But she is alive and breathing.

  She is here.

  Lydia tells me she is four and a half pounds. Even though she is a tiny wisp of a thing, her heart beats fast. Strong. She is a fighter.

  Her tiny fingers curl around mine and I hold her skin to my chest, wanting her to memorize me. Tears fall from my eyes. If Faith doesn’t know me, I pray our daughter will.

  * * *

  I try again, later. Stepping into Faith’s room. Our unnamed daughter lies asleep in the bassinet in the nursery, having around the clock care from a team of nurses and doctors. The Eagle Crest hospital is small, and that is a plus for us, it means better care and more attention. There was a brief discussion of moving baby and mom to Boise State Hospital, but thankfully the decision was made to keep them here.

  The moment I come into Faith’s room, I see her stiffen, biting her bottom lip. Scared.

  Tears fill my eyes and I try to be the man she needs. But fuck, I’m not prepared for this. To lose her right when I got her back.

  “Faith,” I try, my voice shaky, my words unable to cross the divide. “I thought we could talk.”

  She shakes her head, her eyes on the bassinet. “I don’t know you,” she tells me.

  “Try to remember, remember me.”

  She closes her eyes, sighs. “I’m trying. I swear, but… all of this is more than I bargained for. I remember going to the lake, my favorite lake, and I remember looking at the water and writing in my journal and that’s it. Then I wake up and—” Her shoulders start shaking, tears splashing down her cheeks. “I’m a mom. And I don’t even… I can’t do this.”

  “You can, Faith. You can and you will.” I sit next to her bed, praying she can open her heart to me. “When we made love. you said you wanted to be a mother. You said—”

  She cuts me off. “I don’t believe it. It makes zero sense. That I would sleep with a stranger. If we just met I would never…” She shakes her head, baffled.

  How do I explain that what we shared that afternoon was life-altering? How do I explain that when she met
me, we both knew?

  How could we have been so certain only for it to turn out like this? She is saying that meeting me is her greatest regret.

  “It was love at first sight,” I tell her.

  She wipes her eyes, long lashes catching the light of the open window. Her daughter was born on her birthday, November first. A miracle.

  “You turned twenty while you were asleep,” I say. “We celebrated, your whole family was here.”

  Faith scoffs just as the baby begins to fuss. Her first day of life has been so emotional. I reach for her, needing to hold my little girl. “I don’t remember my birthday. I missed out on so much. And now I wake up to a life I never asked for.”

  She’s sobbing now. Shaking. And I press the button to call the nurse. Faith is terrified, freaking out over the fact that an entire life has been thrust on her the moment she woke from the coma. I can’t imagine how scary it must be.

  Nurse Janelle enters the room and sees the state Faith is in. She quickly calls in Lydia to come to take the baby to the nurse. I’m torn on where to stay — with Faith or the baby.

  But Faith answers for me. “Please,” she tells me. “Go.”

  The words pierce my heart — she wants me to go. She doesn’t remember a thing. Doesn’t remember me.

  “The baby needs you now,” Nurse Lydia tells me. And though it kills to leave the woman I love, I realize Lydia is right.

  Down the hall, I walk with my hand on the bassinet as it is wheeled back to the nursery. I sit in the rocker, my darling girl once again placed against my chest, and I breathe her in, hold her close, say a prayer. For her. For Faith. For me. Lord, let us see this through.

  Hours pass. Then days. Then a week.