by Cee Bowerman
She sat there quietly until I finished. I waited for her response, listening to her breathing.
“Well, then. I’m going to need to buy a new dress and we’ll have to come home sooner than I planned. I’ll tell Willow and Atlas and make sure that they will be there. Is there anything you need me to do to help?”
“That’s all? You’re not going to talk me out of it?”
“Why would I talk you out of doing something that feels so right, baby?”
“I don’t know.” I laughed for a second. “I guess you wouldn’t.”
“No, I wouldn’t. Whatever you do, you have us behind you. You know that.”
“I know. Thank you.”
“I’ll get your brother and sister to follow us home on Friday so we can be there for the wedding on Saturday. Sound good?”
“Yeah. That’s perfect. It will give me time to get things arranged and situated before the wedding and before the boys come home.”
“So, I have a granddaughter named Lark now.”
“Yeah. She’s three months old. Born on March fifth. That’s Bird’s birthday too.”
“I can’t wait to meet her. I’m going to drop little nuggets about having a baby around to your boys. Get them excited for a new little sister. May even drop a few hints about them getting a new Dad in the process.”
“I trust you to do it the best way you can, Mom. Thank you.”
“Oh, sweetheart. You don’t have to thank me. You know this is how Mothers do things. They watch out for their babies, no matter how old they get.”
“I love you.”
“I love you too, sweetheart. Kiss that baby for me and tell Bird and his family I can’t wait to meet them.”
“Will do.”
I hung up and put my phone down on the couch beside me. Lark was content in my lap, her gaze focused on something behind me.
“What are you looking at, pretty girl? Something catch your eye back there?”
“She’s been staring at me since I walked out.” Bird said from behind me. “I seem to always walk in on your phone conversations.”
I felt him walking around from behind, and he sat down on the couch beside me. He leaned over so his head was on my shoulder, and we both watched Lark stare at him.
“I don’t mind you listening in. My Mom says hello, by the way. She and my sisters and brothers will be here in time for the wedding.”
“Okay. The girls have got most of the plans made already. Drea is on top of this shit. Brenda’s a big help, she plans stuff for both clubs all the time. Terra, poor Terra, she’s just swept up in their tide trying to keep afloat as they argue over each other.”
I chuckled. “So, my wedding is planned?”
“I believe so. The girls will talk to you tomorrow about some details you might want. Something about colors. They are going to take you to find a dress.”
“Oh, shit. I never even thought of that.”
“Yeah. Almost everyone left by the way. I’m sure you heard the engines pull out.”
“I didn’t even pay attention.”
“Mom, Dad, Daughtry and Clem are gone. Drea took off too. Kale, Sonny, Brenda and Terra are still inside. They are going to shop with us and help us get things set up for Lark’s room when we get back.”
“I’m excited about a shopping spree. I have some money to contribute. It’s going to cost a lot to outfit the nursery for a baby and get the stuff to child proof your house.”
“We’ll take my truck so we can put everything in the back. The prospects are going to follow us for any heavy lifting we might have. They’ll guard the stuff in the truck if we have to go to more than one place.”
“Okay. They’ll just sit there in the sun and watch the truck?”
“Yeah. If that’s what I tell them to do, they will. In the morning, we’ll get our marriage license and then go to your house for you to start sorting and packing. We’ll get the prospects to start moving your things over here. My brothers and Terra will be there for that. Drea and Brenda both have to work.”
“Okay.”
“Did I miss anything?”
“Rings. And a kiss.”
“Lark and I will get your ring while you and the girls are shopping tomorrow afternoon.”
“Okay. Now, the kiss?”
Bird leaned in and kissed me. It was long and slow but filled with heat. After a few seconds, he jerked back and grunted. “She’s got my hair.”
I laughed and helped him get her fingers out of his long locks. This was his first taste of having a tiny human cock block him. He would have to get used to it.
~*~
“If you’ll take her, I’m going to run to the bathroom and then look through her diaper bag.”
“I’m going to stay out here and call Sam and Zeke. Let them know to put the word out to their family to be here on Saturday.”
I leaned down to kiss him after I stood up. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Lark’s hand go for my hair, but I was able to dodge her.
I walked inside to see Sonny and Kale standing at the kitchen island. I picked up the diaper bag and walked over to sit with them as I looked through it. I needed to figure out her diaper sizes, check for what brand of wipes I should buy, what type of formula she is on, all the things that a Mom of a three-month-old baby should know already.
As I worked, I realized that Sonny and Kale were both watching me quietly.
“It’s crazy to me that things are moving so fast. I was shocked that he brought you home with him, and now y’all are getting married!”
I turned to look at Kale. “Why would him bringing me home shock you?”
“He has never, in all our years, invited a woman to stay the night at his place. Not once.”
“Oh.” I wasn’t sure Kale was telling me the truth. “I call bullshit. He had condoms in his nightstand drawer.”
“Really?” Kale asked me with one eyebrow raised.
“Maybe he has women over here and you just don’t know it.” I started packing the stuff back into the diaper bag.
“Maybe he wanted to be prepared, just in case.” Sonny threw that option in, and I thought it was a good observation.
“Or maybe those condoms were in there because I left the box in my nightstand when I moved out of here into my own place.”
“We were in his bedroom.”
“Yeah. When he remodeled the house, he took the furniture out of my old room and put it in his. I used to make fun of him for having a shoe box beside his bed to set his lamp on.”
“Why are we arguing about this?”
“Because I moved out of here six years ago.”
“And?”
“What’s the shelf life on a box of condoms?”
I felt the blood drain from my face. I was the most fertile woman in the history of the world. John used to joke that I could get pregnant if he threw his clean underwear on my side of the bed.
Kale threw his head back and laughed. Sonny slapped Kale on the bicep and reached his hand over to pat my arm. “It’s okay, honey. What are the odds that you’re going to get pregnant after one time?”
“There’s only one condom left. We started out with twelve.” I whispered.
Kale just laughed harder.
I’m not going to think about it. Seriously. What were the odds? He used a condom every time we had sex. Even if they were old, they still had stopping power, right? I felt my stomach turn over. Surely, they weren’t old. He would know that about an expiration date. Men knew that sort of thing, didn’t they?
I shook my head. It was all going to work out. Everything would be just fine.
Suddenly I had the urge to stand up and do a thousand jumping jacks, just to make it harder on any swimmers that might have escaped the condom.
I looked up from the bag when I felt the men beside me tense. I heard the ladies walking across the floor, the heels of their boots tapping as they got closer to us.
“What’s wrong, Terr?” Kale asked gruffly as Terra t
hrew herself in his arms.
“Bren? You okay?” I glanced at Sonny to see that he was putting his arms around Brenda, her head was tipped down and touching his chest.
I turned around to see that Bird had come in through the back door and he was standing with Lark just a few feet away. I moved to him, wanting to give the other two couples a little bit of space. I got closer to Bird and he nodded to his brother and friend. I shrugged and put my eyebrows up to let him know I was just as clueless about the situation as he was.
I saw Brenda lean up to whisper in Sonny’s ear while Terra leaned up to whisper to Kale. In perfect sync, both men yelled, “You’re pregnant?”
Both men grabbed their women in bone crushing hugs. Kale’s mouth went to Terra’s and they started kissing passionately. Brenda and Sonny were nose to nose. Brenda had tears running down her face.
I tried not to groan as I thought of mine and Kale’s conversation just a few minutes ago. I had a feeling that jumping jacks weren’t going to help. Apparently, something was in the water.
11.
“Babies cry in the middle of the night because they don’t want you making more babies.”
Carlie discussing parenthood with Summer
BIRD
Summer and I ended up shopping alone after all. With this afternoon’s blockbuster news, my brother and Sonny had taken their women home to celebrate and make plans. Both couples swore me and Summer to silence until they could each see a doctor to find out details and to make sure everything was as it should be.
I was overjoyed for Kale. If anyone was meant to be a father, it was my brother. Children of all ages gravitated to him and babies were instantly soothed just by his presence. Sonny would make a good father too. He and Brenda were part of that destiny thing I had been trying to convince Summer of.
Speaking of destiny, I thought about her little boys. Crow, Hawk and Phoenix. What were the odds that I would meet a woman whose children had names in common with me? And now, my daughter.
I wondered what Summer and I would name our kids if we had any? I looked up and flinched when I saw what aisle we were on. Summer was inspecting the packaging of a box of condoms. She put that box back and then picked up another and looked it over closely. When she put it back on the shelf, she let her head fall down and bump into the shelf above it. She pulled her head back and bumped it again. And again.
I moved around the cart holding Lark and her carrier and pulled Summer away from the shelf. She fell into me and her head thumped against my chest.
“What the hell?” I asked her.
“Did you know that condoms have an expiration date?”
“Yeah. I think so. I’ve never really thought about it.” I flashed back to just a few days ago when I opened the box of condoms in my nightstand. “Well, I’ve kind of thought about it. Why?”
“Those condoms in your room. Are they old?”
“Sweetheart, I’m clean. I swear. I’ve never been with a woman and not worn a condom. Obviously, they aren’t foolproof.” I gestured to Lark. “But, still. I don’t have any diseases you need to worry about. I go to the doctor on a pretty regular basis, and I would know if I had something.”
“I am clean too. I haven’t had sex since the night I conceived Phoenix.”
“Then everything will be fine.” I turned and selected a box of condoms from the shelf. One that looked like the ones we had been using. “See, now we have some new ones. Not a problem.”
“We only have one left from the other pack.”
“Yeah. So, it’s good that we’re stocking up.” I reached over and grabbed another box of twelve for good measure.
“Hawk was a planned baby. I was going to wait until he was a little older and have another baby soon, so that my kids would be about a year and a half to two years apart.”
I nodded at her, not sure where she was going with this.
“I was on the depo shot when I got pregnant with Crow and on the pill when I got pregnant with Phoenix.”
I felt the blood draining from my face.
“Holy shit.”
“You have been doing a lot more than throwing underwear at me, Bird. And nothing you sent my way was directed at the bed.”
“Holy. Shit.”
Summer dropped her forehead to hit my chest again.
Lark gurgled from her carrier and I felt Summer’s head turn to look at the baby.
“My boys were each about her age when I got pregnant with the next one.”
I felt dizzy. I took a deep breath and thought it through. I realized that I wasn’t dizzy with fear. It was more like excitement.
“Summer?” She tilted her head back and looked at me. “Do you want more kids? You still want eight?”
She thought for a second and then nodded her head. I reached down into the basket and picked up the two boxes I had just added and put them back on the shelf.
“No sense closing the barn door after the horses are already out, right?”
“You have a six-bedroom house.”
“I do. But downstairs where the pool table is, the house was built to have three more rooms. Or, we make the library into a master and put the youngest baby’s room next to ours downstairs. We could keep the house like it is and make a couple of them share.”
“You are completely fucking mental.”
“I have been told that before, although usually in different circumstances.” I put my arms back around her and smiled down in her face. “I’ve already thought of four more names.”
“You have lost your fucking mind.”
“I’m thinking Cardinal, Starling, Wren and Blue. Get it? Blue Bird?”
“If you say its destiny, I’m going to punch you right in the nuts and you’re going to have blue balls for the next few years. Get it? Blue. Balls.”
A man close by us on the aisle laughed loudly and Summer blushed.
“God, I fucking love you.” I said with a laugh. Both of us tensed. “I mean. Well, fuck.”
“Holy shit, Bird.” We stared at each other for a few minutes. She reached up and pulled my head down to hers and laid a kiss on my lips. “I can see that you just freaked us both out. It’s too soon. We both know that, right? I’m going to grab a box and we’re going to keep using them. I know It sounds completely rational, but if I’m not already pregnant, let’s give it a few months to get to know each other before you knock me up. Now, let’s get our daughters shit so we can go home and have your minions put the furniture together. If you’re planning on knocking me up at some point, we better get gender neutral stuff for the nursery so we can just keep using it.”
Summer grabbed two boxes of condoms off the shelf and tossed them into the basket. She walked behind the cart and smiled down at Lark as she pushed it past me. I watched her walk by and the older man who was looking at vitamins smiled at me.
“You’ve got a pistol in that one.”
“I think I do.”
“How long have the two of you been together?”
“About three days now.”
The man just stared at me like I had lost my mind. Apparently, he agreed with Summer.
“We’re getting married on Saturday.”
The man’s eyebrows rose up so high, almost all the wrinkles were pulled from around his eyes. Without a word, he turned and walked away.
~*~
“I’m so tired, I think I might have to just die right here.” Summer flopped down on the bed.
“Let’s take a bath together.” Summer lifted her head and one eyebrow came up.
“You wanna get lucky, don’t you?”
“A little. I also want to make love to my fiancé.”
“That sounds so funny.”
“Why?”
“I just met you!”
“True. But you also just outfitted an entire nursery for a little girl that is going to grow up calling you Mama. You bought a shit ton of clothes that she didn’t need, and even more that don’t even fit her yet because they were all, and
I quote, ‘so freakin’ adorable!’ And, you’re going to marry me this weekend and live with me until you either kill me in my sleep or we die of natural causes. Obviously, we don’t do things half ass.”
