Total pages in book: 162
Estimated words: 153946 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 770(@200wpm)___ 616(@250wpm)___ 513(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 153946 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 770(@200wpm)___ 616(@250wpm)___ 513(@300wpm)
She slid me a grin. “Pretty sure you gave me a run for my money, August.”
“Pretty sure nobody was looking at me.” Sammy’s hands were just so tiny.
“Also, she’s remembering wrong,” Morgan said, dragging a cushion from a patio chair and dropping it on the other side of me before joining us. “I heard some horror stories from Yvonne about your birth experience in the hospital, Bernie. You were just too blissed out and in love with your bundle of joy to notice. Like Phoebe was today.”
Bernie’s smile softened. “She’s going to be a great mom.”
“Speaking of Yvonne, she and Phoebe are asleep now. Todd and Wade are taking turns holding Sammy and making breakfast.”
Another Sam in the world. Samantha Lane.
“I can’t believe your kid just had a kid, B.” I looked over at her, wide-eyed. After the last hour I’d thought I was all cried out, but saying it out loud, I felt more tears welling. “How did we get here so fast?”
“Your guess is as good as mine,” Bernie said a little morosely. “At least she waited to make me a grandma until she was a grown woman with an education and a reliable partner.”
“You sound so grown up right now,” I whispered, and she elbowed me with a laugh. “You’ll have to get a new tattoo to balance things out. Or maybe beat all the men on the racetrack three weeks from now.”
“I approve of both of those ideas.”
“To Bernadette,” Morgan raised her glass with a tired smile. “Officially the sexiest grandmother I know.”
“Why thank you. You’re a lovely and devoted dogmother yourself.”
She smirked. “Yes, I’m very proud. They may shed on all my clothes and poop outside, but they’ll never ask for my car keys, invite me to be at their home birth or tell their therapist what a bad mom I was.”
They turned to me expectantly.
“Don’t look at me. I can’t even keep a plant alive, and I’m the human Merlin barely tolerates.”
“But you handled this whole experience like a pro.” Morgan sounded impressed. “Wade told me you kept Todd’s brain from exploding, stood up to the evil grandmother, and distracted Phoebe between contractions.”
Bernie cleared her throat. “She also helped a certain someone make it to the sink before she could get sick all over my floor.”
“I thought we promised never to mention that again.”
I snickered. “Yay me.”
“Oh, and you got a haircut and sent your book in yesterday,” Bernie added. “So, we can call you the hottest writer we know again.”
“Huzzah.” I’d have another drink to that.
Morgan laid her hand on my arm, her expression intense. “You finished your book? Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Well, between your Exorcist impression, all the bodily fluids and the screaming, we were kind of busy,” I told her. I mean, giving birth was a beautiful thing and I adored my godchild and her new baby with all my heart and soul, but there was no denying the process was also a teensy bit…gooey? And Phoebe hadn’t held back her feelings or her volume at all. My ears were still ringing.
I seriously loved that girl.
“There is a lot of bullshit involved in being a woman, isn’t there?” Bernie said thoughtfully after taking another sip of her mimosa. “Think about all we have to deal with throughout our lives. And I’m only talking about the biology, because I could rant about male privilege for the next year.”
She absolutely could.
“The painful periods you hate until they start to go away,” she went on. “The hormones, the cramps, the aching boobs and unexpected hair growth. Then pregnancy, which is always one wrongly positioned fetus or maternal health issue away from being a life-or-death emergency. And what do we get at the end of it all? When we’re done growing the next generation of humanity with our own bodies, so our entire species doesn’t perish from the earth before the boys figure out how to get their sex-bots to do it instead? Menopause.”
“Hot flashes, chin hairs, and a desperation for collagen supplements that actually work,” I added as the champagne started kicking in. “Meanwhile, men get to pee standing up and somehow look better with wrinkles. Although there is a ball-length issue that Wade was telling me—”
“Stop.” Bernie burst out laughing. “Please, I don’t need to hear about my brother’s balls. Morgan? Are you okay?”
My sister was crying beside me. Not only crying but holding back sobs behind her clenched fist and looking like she might start hyperventilating at any moment.
I set down my glass to put an arm around her and she shuddered against me.
“I was so scared, August.”
Bernie got to her feet quickly, backing away and shaking her head at my look of abandonment. “I think you two need to talk. And I need to hold the baby again.”
Morgan took my hand and held it so tightly my fingers turned white. It was terrifying, to be honest. She never cried like this.