by Katie Ashley
“Such a handsome boy,” AJ said, before bestowing a kiss on the crown of Jude’s blonde hair.
Jake reached over and lifted up one of Jude’s clenched fists. “Looks like Little Man here has some guitar playing fingers.”
Brayden grinned. “I thought as much.”
As Jude squirmed awake, AJ cooed and sang to him in Spanish. Surprisingly, it calmed him, and Jude went back to sleep.
When AJ met what must’ve been my shocked expression, he winked. “Just call me the Baby Whisperer.”
I laughed. “I’ll know exactly who to come to when he gets fussy.”
Pressed up against the wall, Rhys watched AJ and Jude curiously. I jerked my chin at AJ, signaling him to give Rhys a chance. When AJ started toward him, Rhys held up his hands. “Dude, I don’t know anything about babies.”
“Just give it a whirl. Worst thing you can do is drop him,” AJ replied.
Both Rhys and I gasped. “Just teasing,” AJ mused, which earned him a glare from Rhys.
Gently, AJ placed Jude in Rhys’s arms. I bit down on my lip not to laugh at how still Rhys stood. Like if he even blinked too hard, it might hurt Jude. “He really does look like you, Lily,” Rhys said, a smile playing at his lips.
“Thank you.”
Rhys’s face lit up when Jude’s eyes opened, and he stared up at him. “Hey buddy,” he murmured.
While the guys seemed enthralled by Jude now, I couldn’t help wondering about the future. “Are you still sure about me bringing him on the bus when I come to visit?”
“Why wouldn’t we be?” Jake asked, as he ran his fingers through Jude’s dusting of fine hair.
“Well, babies are a lot of work—”
AJ held up a hand. “Are you insinuating that once you get on the bus, you and Bray are going to expect us to raise the little man while you two have a reconnection fuck fest?”
My face instantly warmed at his words while Brayden only chuckled. “No man, that’s not what we had in mind,” he replied.
“Then it’s fine. Right, guys?”
Rhys and Jake nodded. I hoped, rather than believed, they would still be sincere when Jude started crying in the middle of the night. Of course, they were all so nocturnal that it would be worse during the day when they were trying to catch up on sleep.
Speaking of crying, Jude began to wail, his fists flailing. When I met Rhys’s frantic eyes, he said, “I didn’t do anything. I swear.”
I laughed. “I know you didn’t. He’s probably just hungry.”
All three of the guys froze. “Like for a breast?” AJ questioned, his brows furrowed.
“Yes, he did really well latching on earlier.”
Rhys hurried over to the bed and deposited Jude into my arms. “Yeah, uh, I gotta go.”
“Me, too,” AJ said.
“Same here,” Jake echoed.
Cocking my head at them, I grinned. “Who would have thought three notorious manwhores would be afraid of a breast?”
Jake laughed. “Call it what it is, but we’re outta here.”
“Thanks for coming, guys. It really means a lot,” I said over Jude’s cries.
“You’re welcome, hot mama,” AJ replied, bestowing a kiss on Jude’s forehead and then mine. Jake followed suit while Rhys merely waved at me from the door.
As I pushed down my gown for Jude, I couldn’t help laughing at the guys’ reaction. Whether they knew it or not, their lives had changed too with Jude’s birth. After all, we were one, great big musical family.
BRAYDEN
THE PRESENT
“And after Jude, you waited three years to have another child.” Giovanni glanced between us. “Any particular reason? I mean, I do recall Brayden saying he wanted a houseful and for you to be started by twenty five.”
Lily and I laughed. “Actually, it was easy to talk about a houseful of kids before we actually had one. Once Jude came along, we realized the work that went into raising a child. Of course, we weren’t a conventional family considering Brayden was on the road most of the year, and I was home teaching.”
“How did you make it as a single mom?” Giovanni asked Lily.
“Well, I had it a lot easier than most single mothers. Our first home just happened to be Brayden’s grandparents’ old house, so I was right next door to my mom. My younger sister, Kylie, decided she would go to school at night and be my nanny during the daytime—as long as she got to live rent free at my house.”
Giovanni smiled. “That seems reasonable.”
“The hardest part was not having Brayden with me, but more the fact that I hated he was missing being with Jude.”
“How did you feel about the separation, Brayden?” Giovanni asked.
“It fucking sucked, frankly,” I replied.
With a smile, Giovanni questioned, “Can you elaborate on that for me?”
“I felt I was being pulled in two separate directions. My band mates needed me because we continued to skyrocket in popularity in the business, and then my wife and son needed me to be the father I’d always wanted to be.
Giovanni nodded. “How did you two stay connected?”
“Technology still wasn’t at the level of Facetiming and Skype, like we had later with Melody. We did do video chats and talk to one another every day. Then I would fly out with Jude to see him two or three times a month,” Lily answered.
“That sounds intense,” Giovanni remarked.
“It was,” Lily replied. Glancing over at me, she said, “I think we waited as long as we did for Melody because we hoped things would calm down some. When I got pregnant with her, I decided I would finally quit my teaching job.”
“Finally is right,” I said, with a smile.
“And how was it going out on the road with two children?”
Lily and I both groaned. “Very, very hard,” Lily answered.
“My greatest regret is we didn’t get our own tour bus earlier,” I said.
Lily shook her head. “It wouldn’t have mattered because I wasn’t ready to live on the road full-time yet.”
“What changed your mind?”
With a smile, Lily said, “When I saw Mia doing it with Bella, I realized I could do it with two children. I also decided then that I wanted to homeschool the kids while Brayden was out on the road.”
I bobbed my head. “Even though I wish we had the bus sooner, I’m still glad that Jude and Melody got to start out their lives with a little more normalcy.”
At that moment, a knock came at the hotel door. When I got up to get it, I found it was Melody. “Hey, sweetie, you’ll have to go back to AJ and Mia’s. We’re not finished yet.”
She shook her head. “No, it’s Lucy.”
I didn’t even have to call for Lily. She was off the couch in a flash and heading out the door. When I came back to the couch, I gave Giovanni a sad smile. “I guess that makes a good segue into talking about our third child.”
“I hope I didn’t appear to be treating it as a sensitive subject.”
“No, you’re fine.”
“I know that you and Lily have been very open in the media about her being on the Autism spectrum with Sensory Processing Disorder.”
“Yes, we always felt it wasn’t something we should hide. Since I was in a position of celebrity, I could raise awareness and funds. With Rhys’s help, we’ve done a lot of fundraising.” I shifted in my chair. “Of course, there’s a lot of research that argues that SPD isn’t a part of the Autism spectrum while other research does. We figured it would be best to combine our efforts with the two.”
“I have to be honest that while I was with your children earlier, I didn’t notice anything different or out of the ordinary. She seemed a bit shyer than your other daughter.”
“She is naturally shyer and quieter than Melody.” I couldn’t help laughing. “Considering Melody started talking when she was barely old enough to be walking, it wouldn’t take much to be quieter.”
Giovanni smiled. “I see.”
&n
bsp; “But you’re right. You wouldn’t notice anything right off hand. If you wanted her to give you a hug when you left, she would refuse not just because she doesn’t know you, but because she doesn’t like to be held or touched. Certain noises that wouldn’t bother you or me can send her into a meltdown. To some people, it would seem like little quirks, but it runs a lot deeper than that.”
“When did you first discover something was…different about her?” Giovanni questioned.
“Probably when she was nine or ten months old. We thought she was just going through a phase where she hated to be held, which broke Lily’s heart. She was used to rocking Jude and Melody to sleep until they were far over a year old, but Lucy began to cry until she was put in her bed. Then she would scream during diaper changes, baths, and anytime we had to change her clothes. Then as soon as we were finished, she would be fine.” I sighed as I relived those scary days where we didn’t know what was wrong with our sweet little girl, and then the day when we finally found out.
BRAYDEN
THE PAST
I rolled over in bed to find Lily’s side empty. Raising up, I squinted my eyes in the darkness. When I didn’t see her, I threw back the covers and hopped out of bed. After a glance in the bathroom turned up nothing, I went for the bedroom door. I had three good guesses where she might be, and the strongest led me to Lucy’s room.
It had been a hell of a day. Well, if I was honest with myself, it had been a hell of a few months. But today had us sitting in plush leather chairs in the office of Pediatric Neurologist, Dr. Peter Robsten. After our pediatrician had been unable to diagnose what was wrong, we had come to Emory desperate for answers as to what was wrong with our Lucy. She had been through a gamut of testing, which was terribly intense for a fifteen month old.
Then Dr. Robsten gave us the diagnosis we had been expecting to hear: Sensory Perceptive Disorder with Sensory defensiveness, which basically meant she experienced SPD with defensive actions to sound and touch. Although we had a name to go with what our fears and research on the internet had uncovered, it still didn’t give us a clear plan ahead on how to raise Lucy.
With the door to Lucy’s room already cracked, I slipped inside. Standing beside Lucy’s crib, Lily looked like an angel in the moonlight with her white, gauzy gown and flowing blonde hair. I came up behind her, wrapping my arms around her waist. After kissing her neck, I said, “I woke up, and you were gone.”
“I couldn’t sleep.”
“Babe,” I murmured.
When she turned back to me, tears glistened in her eyes. “I just kept lying there, searching my mind for what I did differently with her that I didn’t with Jude and Melody. Was it because I didn’t breast feed her as long? Was it because she was on the bus so much when she was just an infant? Was it because I gave her those vaccines on time? I mean, we were back and forth on the road with Jude and Melody, so they didn’t get theirs until they were a few months older.” Her agonized gaze went back to Lucy. “What was it I did wrong?”
A sob tore through Lily’s chest. The sound caused Lucy to stir in her cocoon of downy pink blankets. Wrapping my arm around her waist, I drew Lily to me. When she began to cry harder, I led her out of the bedroom. I steered her down the hall and back to our room and onto the bed.
Pushing her long hair out of her face, I stared into her eyes. “I want you to listen to me. There is nothing that you did wrong that caused Lucy to have a sensory disorder. Things like this happen. It isn’t a punishment for us or for Lucy. It’s just something we have to handle.”
“Deep down, I know that. I just want someone or something to blame. She’s just a baby. She doesn’t deserve to have to go through so much.”
I shook my head. “While I agree that is unfair that Lucy is going through this, I’m not going to let you beat yourself up. You’re the best mother in the entire world. No one has sacrificed for her children as much as you have.”
“Thank you, Brayden,” she murmured before she leaned forward to kiss me.
“Do you feel better now?”
She shrugged. “Aren’t you scared?”
Taking her hands in mine, I gave her a small smile. “I’m terrified.”
“That makes me feel a little better,” she admitted.
My brows shot up in surprise. “Really? I thought I was always supposed to be the strong as steel man.”
“I like it when you’re strong, but I also like it when I know that you’re struggling just like I am.”
“Just don’t forget for one minute that we’re in this together. You don’t have to go through this alone. I’m here for you.”
“I think I love you more right now that I have our entire time together,” she said, with tears pooling in her eyes.
“I love you, too, baby.” I kissed her once again. “Come on, let’s get some sleep.”
And then I drew her in my arms, and we lay back together. I felt the safest, the securest, and the most loved when I held Lily in my arms.
BRAYDEN
THE PRESENT
It wasn’t long before Lily rejoined us. “Everything okay?” I asked.
She smiled. “Just a minor meltdown due to some of the noises on one of the video games the boys were playing. She’s got her headphones on now and is watching a movie. She’s fine.” Lily turned her attention from me over to Giovanni. “I guess Brayden explained about Lucy in my absence.”
“Yes, he did. As a parent of a five year old, I would have to say that you guys are doing amazing with her, as well as your other children.”
“Thank you. That means a lot.”
“Well, I think that just about wraps it up.” Giovanni put his notepad into his briefcase and rose off the couch. “Once again, I cannot thank you two enough for allowing me to sit down with you. I have such a good feeling about this article. I think the entire issue is going to be a hit.”
Lily flushed a little at his words while I merely laughed. “Here’s hoping our story can sell some copies.”
“Oh, I’m sure it will.” Giovanni glanced between us. “You two still don’t quite understand what an amazing thing you have, do you?”
Taking Lily’s hand in mine, I brought it to my lips. “Trust me, I think we get it.”
Giovanni smiled. “I’m glad to hear that.” As he started over to the door, he said, “Best of luck. I’ll see you tomorrow at the wedding.”
“Thanks again for coming,” Lily said, as she showed him to the door.
When he was gone, I collapsed back onto the sofa. “Oh no, don’t get comfortable. We have exactly forty-five minutes before we have to meet the others for the rehearsal.”
I groaned. “I’d forgot all about that. I’m dying for a nap.”
Lily giggled as she came over to me. “You’re showing your age if you’re needing a nap, Vanderburg.”
“I’d forgo the nap for a quickie,” I replied, wagging my eyebrows.
“Thinking about all our past sexcapades has you hot?”
“Mmm, hmm.”
Nibbling on her lip, I could tell Lily was giving a quickie some serious thought. “Come on. The kids are being looked after, and we have the whole place to ourselves.”
Without taking her eyes off of mine, she started backing up to the bedroom. When she crooked her finger, I was off the couch like a shot.
BRAYDEN
THE PRESENT
I stood at the altar of the awe-inspiring Cathedral of St. John the Baptist in Savannah, anxiously awaiting the appearance of the bride. With bated breath, I watched as the precocious Jax and Jules came down the aisle as ring bearer and flower girl. Glancing next to me at Jake, I watched with amusement as he clenched and unclenched his jaw. I’d witnessed firsthand the drama last night when Jax and Jules refused to walk down the aisle. After spending the day at the bridal luncheon, I actually couldn’t blame them for wanting to stay back at the hotel to play with the other kids. Of course, I didn’t voice my opinion on that one. As Jake kept a watchful eye on them, I’m sure he
was just waiting for them to throw another tantrum. But they performed like the absolute angels they looked like.
My attention immediately left the twins and went to the breathtakingly beautiful bridesmaid coming up the aisle in a lavender dress. With her hair swept back on the sides with glittering combs, the rest of Lily’s long blonde hair cascaded in waves down her back. It was hard to believe she had just turned thirty four. She looked just as youthful as the day I’d first seen her picking apples. When she met my gaze, she smiled and winked. And after all this time, my heart still did a little shudder and restart.
Just after Lily was Mia and then Abby making their way down the aisle. Because of Allison’s eclectic fashion sense, each bridesmaid wore a different color of dress. Abby was in pink while Mia was in light blue. When Andrea, Allison’s half-sister and matron of honor, came down the aisle, she wore a mint green dress. While she wasn’t standing up in the bridal party, Rhys’s sister, Ellie, wore a pale yellow dress and held the same bouquet as the other bridesmaids in her lap on the front bench.
Gazing over at Rhys, I surveyed how he was doing. He appeared relatively calm, but I knew on the inside he was probably panicking a little. All grooms did no matter how ready they were to get married. I knew there was no one else in the world for Rhys but Allison. He had just wanted to give her a little time to grow up more before they tied the knot. Now at twenty four, Allison was more than ready to take on the role of being his wife.
The music changed from Pachelbel’s Canon in D over to Ave Maria. The doors at the back of the cathedral opened, and Allison appeared on her father’s arm. She certainly was a breathtaking bride. With her dark hair swept back and a glittering tiara on her head, she didn’t look like the little girl I’d met so many years ago. She was a grown woman now.
Lily had told me that Allison’s dress was reminiscent of Grace Kelly’s and Kate Middleton’s. Of course as a self-respecting dude, I had no clue what their dresses looked like. All I knew was that Allison looked elegant and beautiful as she glided down the aisle. Her smile was radiant and focused on one person only—her groom.
