Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 74554 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 373(@200wpm)___ 298(@250wpm)___ 249(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 74554 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 373(@200wpm)___ 298(@250wpm)___ 249(@300wpm)
So, no, I didn’t really have to do much.
But we had a baby on the way now.
I wanted to pick out paint, choose a crib, do a gift registry. And, you know, tell my parents. I was really dragging my feet about that part. Mostly just because I didn’t do the whole having-a-baby thing “right.” And “right” would be to do it after a tasteful wedding and a solid year of house-building.
The last time I talked to them, they’d still asked me when I was going to go back to college. Despite having a thriving business and a comfortable personal income.
Kylo had met them briefly when he’d taken me to New York City to spend a week in another of Teddy’s hotels—this one a boutique one that was more trendy than fancy—and see all the shows on Broadway that I’d been wanting to for years. My parents just so happened to be in town for some work meeting. We’d all met up for lunch.
Everyone had been cordial. But I could sense that my parents didn’t like that Kylo also hadn’t gone to college. And while he obviously didn’t tell them what he did for a living, he’d informed them that he was in imports and made a six-figure income (yes, they’d been rude enough to ask). That still wasn’t good enough.
I found, for the first time in my whole life, though, that I didn’t care what they thought when it came to Kylo. They would never understand what we had. I didn’t need them to.
Maybe, once I was rested and not so sick, I wouldn’t care what they thought about me doing the marriage and baby thing out of order.
My grandmother was over the moon.
She and her friends were all working on baby blankets. And I heard they were going to start a sewing club to make onesies and old-fashioned outfits—dresses and frilly diaper covers for girls, sailor rompers and dungarees for a boy.
Traeger was pinning the cutest baby accessories to a board he shared with me.
The club old ladies were giving me all their advice.
This was the family that mattered now.
My parents could get on board… or not be involved.
That, I realized, was a huge breakthrough for me.
No more worrying about their expectations or being upset that I was always falling short in their eyes.
“That feels nice,” I said when Kylo’s fingers moved to my scalp, massaging in little circles.
“Sink into it,” Kylo invited.
I did just that, focusing on his fingertips, the calm, steady thump of his heart under my ear, the steady reassurance of his arm around my hips.
Just like that, all the anxiety slipped away.
And I slipped into a deep sleep.
Kylo - 6 Years
“What’s the matter, bub?” I asked, walking up to our son and sitting down next to where he was throwing a tantrum in the backyard at the clubhouse.
“He… they… I can’t…”
He was hyperventilating, his little chest rising and falling rapidly, his cheeks ruddy with his unspoken outrage.
“Okay. How about we take a big, deep breath like Mommy does sometimes?”
“Kay.”
“In with me. One, two, three, four, five, six. Hold, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. And out, one, two, three, four, five, six.”
He followed with me, his little face stern and focused.
“What are five things you can see right now?” I asked.
“You,” he said, holding up a finger. “The flowers. Ernest. The pool. Bee.”
“Good. What are five things you can hear?”
“Bee. You. Music. Bangs,” he said when we both heard the sound of gunshots off in our makeshift shooting range. “And… the pool thing.”
“Filter.”
“The pool filter.”
His cheeks weren’t so red. The tears had dried up.
Rue and I weren’t sure how much of what he was exhibiting was just the normal kid tantrum, just the common inability for small brains to process big feelings, and how much might be a hint of actual anxiety issues.
We knew that things like that could run in families. So we were keeping an eye on it, and had the names of several reputable child psychologists saved, just in case.
Our younger child was the opposite in every way. She was easy-going, carefree. When she wasn’t around, we called her Teflon. Because nothing stuck to her. True, she was younger. Maybe by the time she was five, she would have tantrums and big feelings too. But we were enjoying her ability to just keep on keeping on even when nothing was going her way.
“Do you want to talk about it, or do you want to come with me?”
“Where?”
“Go see Grammy?” I asked.
To that, he lit right up.
Much like how Claudia indulged Ernest, she did the same for her great-grandchildren. Any toy or sweet or task, she was all too happy to do for the kids.
“Yeah!” my son said, throwing an arm up in the air. “How about you go find your sister and bring her out too?”