I love you so much, little boy.
I kiss her stomach, and she groans into her hands. She thinks I’m nuts. But I think. . .I think you’re smiling behind your palms, baby.That roguish smile that shows her true feelings because she is bat-shit-crazy. Just like me. Rubbing my face against her stomach, I feel her smooth, tanned skin beneath my cheek. I can’t fucking wait until she is swollen and has those badarse tiger stripes pregnant girls get. Her body is amazing. It’s a fucking gift. She is wondrous, and I’m in awe of everything she is.
“What about medical school?” she grumbles, her words muffled, but I can still decipher them.
“I’ll stay home with him,” I say, the idea making me smile so hard I want to cry. I’ve never cried from happiness, but I’ve seen her do it before. I think I want to, thinking about him hanging out with his daddy. . . Teaching him about the world. Life. How things work and go together. “I wanna be home with him, baby. You can still go to medical school. Make us proud.”
She drops her arms, flopping them to the mattress. Peering up at her from her stomach, I grin at her beautiful face, which is tense with apprehension.
“And money?” she asks with that half-arsed tight smile of hers.
I laugh. “I have plenty of money.” Chuckling, I lower my face to meet her stomach again. “Hear that?” I whisper to him, having our own private conversation. “I’m going to spoil the shit out of you, buddy. You and your mummy.”
“Where will we live?”
Glancing around my room, at the overly boyish décor, and I know she can’t live here. Don’t want her to either. Not with my mum. “I don’t care,” I admit, looking back up at her. “We can buy a house somewhere. Just the three of us. Maybe in Brussman? I’m eighteen in two months, baby. I’ll sort something out.”
“Where will we-”
“We made a life, Shoshanna!” I laugh, bouncing to my feet, planting them on either side of her body. “We made a life. And he won’t be angry or sad or broken.” I can feel the heat behind my eyes now. I let my grin break my face, too consumed by happiness to stop the tears. “He’ll be perfect. Causeyouare. And I’ll learn to be, baby. I swear it. I’ll be better. A good citizen. Pay taxes and shit. I’ll get a part-time job or whatever. Fuck, I’ll work on bikes. I’d like that.” I stare into her big amber eyes as they gloss over too. Sheishappy. “I’ll cook dinner for you every damn night. We’ll never eat in front of the TV. We’ll sit at the table and talk about our day. I’ll sit at the head, and you’ll sit beside me, and he’ll make a mess on the floor, but the dog will clean it up-”
“The dog?”
“Yeah. A staffy. And it’ll be fuckingperfect.”
Excitement fills my every cell. I feel light, like I could fly. Swallowing, I plead with my eyes as hers bounce around with uncertainty. They are teary and unsure. I wait for a sign she is with me. That she agrees we can do this. . .
“What if someone doesn’t let us? What if someone tells us we’re too young? We’re underage.”
I just grin. “Then I’ll kill them.”
She chuckles through a little sigh because she’s crazy and I’m mad and we love it. “Okay, nutcase.”
“Fuck yes!” I get to my feet, accidentally knocking my head on my ceiling fan. She giggles. As I jump on the bed like a child, her body bounces above my blue sheets. “We are having a fucking baby!” I expect her eye-roll, and when she does, I beam harder. Beam and tear up like a fucking man who loves his girl and baby and isn’t afraid to fucking show it.
Laughing with puddles in my irises and peaceful silence in my mind, I drop on to the mattress beside her. Pulling her body into the larger frame of mine, I cocoon her tightly and protectively. As I hold her against me, a wave of trepidation casts a shadow over my happiness. Just for a moment. I squeeze her tighter. “You know. . . good things don’t happen to people like me.”
My baby and our baby nestle deeper into me. “What about me? Aren’t I a good thing?”
“You’re the best,” I state. “But this means I get to keep you forever. And him. And more babies. So many babies.”
She scoffs on a laugh. “Fuck off. What about my body?”
I laugh and kiss her crown, her dark hair like silk beneath my lips. “I want you plump with my babies. You’ll never be hotter to me than you will be then.”
She shakes her head in the crook of my neck. “You’re so fucking crazy.”
“I don’t think you should swear anymore, baby. You’re a mummy now.” I laugh because she instantly scowls and everything about her makes me smile. Even her scowls. “It’s all good anyway. I got this, baby. I’m going to take care of you. I actually got what I wanted, and I’m never fucking letting you or him go.”
Shoshanna
Seventeen years old
A horn beeps.
I rush from my house, halting when I see Clay Butcher’s Chrysler parked at the curb. I expected Max’s Range Rover or the Ducati. Not in a million years did I expect to see a city vehicle. I peer around for the Ducati but see nothing, just the big black looming presence of the District’s newest and youngest board member’s entourage.
Slowing, I close the gap between me and Clay’s vehicle, moving to gaze through the passenger’s panel of glass, knowing he can see me even though I can’t see him.