Chapter 17 Failure Cara #2
Emmett’s grip on my shoulder tightens, his other hand covering mine, stopping me from closing the screen. My pulse skyrockets as his eyes move over the words.
It’s one thing to feel hopeful in the face of endless failures. It’s another thing entirely to let someone else see that delirious hope.
But Emmett is not just someone else.
His eyes move to mine, and I breathe in his endless love as the corner of his mouth hooks, pulling into a beautiful smile that he drops softly to my lips. And as his hand slides over my belly, hugging me from behind while he whispers, “I love you,” I let myself live in that hope a while longer.
Even if it is delirious.
IDIDN’T SLEEP. Not a single minute. That hope turned into confidence, certainty, after scouring Reddit pages dedicated to fertility journeys, IVF warriors, and pregnancy support.
The butterflies fluttered all night, and I pressed my fingers to my stomach, imagining how it would feel a few months from now.
Ten minutes on Pinterest to help me fall asleep turned into one hour, and one hour turned into three.
When Emmett blinked his bleary eyes against the sunrise, wrapped an arm around my waist, and tugged me into his hard chest, I was putting the finishing touches on a board titled Baby Brodie, sub-boards for announcement ideas, the baby shower of my dreams, nurseries, family photoshoots for every season and holiday, and their first birthday.
Emmett peeked at my phone, then buried his whispered words against my neck.
“I hope they have your heart, whoever they are.”
But as he sits at my side in the clinic, one hand covering my thigh while the other holds mine, dotting each knuckle with a kiss, I hope, whoever they are, that they have his.
I look away as the nurse ties a tourniquet around my bicep, swallowing the familiar fear as she cleans the bend in my arm with an alcohol swab. My chest heaves as I focus on Emmett’s lips, the way they glide across my skin, the fire that never seems to fade no matter how many times he kisses me.
“Did you start a folder for names on that app of yours?”
My gaze meets Emmett’s. “They’re called boards.”
A playful eye roll. “Did you start a board for names?”
I shake my head, then squeeze my eyes shut as I hear the nurse pick the needle up off the metal tray. “I looked, but none of them were right.”
“Mmm. Needs to be perfect.”
“That’s why I think the most logical choice is Cara Jr., if it’s a girl. Perfection, right out the gate. Or vagina, in this case.”
Emmett snorts a laugh. His thumb gently sweeps across my cheekbone. My eyelids flutter, and my heart warms at the love in Emmett’s gaze. The pride. “You did it,” he murmurs, and my head swings around just in time to watch the nurse set my vial of blood down and press a cotton ball to my arm.
“That’s it? But I didn’t even… I didn’t even feel it that time!” My gaze moves between them, and I frown as Emmett pulls out a small box from his pocket. “What’s that?”
He opens the box, holding up a Band-Aid to the nurse. “Can I?” When she nods, he peels the paper wrapper off, then carefully fixes the bandage over my cotton ball, backing up to let me see it when he’s done.
Soft shades of red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple. Two little clouds.
Emmett takes my face in his hands, and I close my eyes as his lips press against my forehead in a feather-soft kiss that brings a single tear rolling down my cheek. “There will be a rainbow after our storm too, Cara. I know it.”
I DIDN’T MEAN TO BUY all this stuff.
I just went to look. To bask in that hope.
And then I saw those tiny slippers, fluffy and beige with a sleeping lamb face on the toe box. The teensy sleeper, LITTLE MIRACLE scrawled across it. The softest swaddle, covered in rainbows in rich autumn shades.
I run my finger over the soft bamboo material, tracing one of the rainbows as I imagine the littlest bundle of joy wrapped inside, making teensy noises as he or she wriggles and squirms. Without thinking, I gather the items in my arms, hugging them to my chest. My throat burns, a desire so bone-deep it wraps around my heart, squeezing, and that desire isn’t just a want anymore.
It’s a need, as essential as my next breath.
If I can’t be a mom… if Emmett can’t be a dad…
I shake my head, forcing the thoughts away.
The sound of the garage opening makes me jump, and I tuck the baby items away in the closet before hurrying back to the bed, where the rest of my purchases are laid out with a gift bag.
I smile as I set each item inside the bag: one sleeper that says CRAWL, WALK, HOCKEY, another with a picture of a hockey stick and puck, DADDY SLIPPED ONE PAST THE GOALIE beneath it.
A men’s T-shirt that says DILF, and another nearly identical, except with a picture of Charlie Swan beneath it, because duh.
A shirt for me too, I LOVE HOT DADS on it, because I’m nothing if not honest. A board book called I Love You, Daddy for them to read together, and a mug for his morning coffees, because he’s definitely going to be a SUPER DAD.
“Baby!” Emmett’s voice rings through the house as he steps in from the garage, and I hide the gift bag in the closet, behind a row of summer dresses.
I smile to myself at the lightness in his voice, the happy song that carries up the stairs with the thud of his fast footsteps.
It’s not just me breathing easier these last two days, floating around on the idea that miracles exist, but Emmett too.
He slides into the room in his socks, toque halfway off his head, those blue eyes lighting when he sees me.
“Are you singing ‘Our Song’?” I ask, arms crossed, brow arched as he ambles toward me.
“Nobody slaps like Taylor Swift circa 2006.” He snakes an arm around my waist, hauling me into his chest. His fingers thread through mine, his other hand settling on the dip in my back as I sink against him, laying my cheek on his shoulder, swaying with him.
This is our song. Me and him, together. Chest to chest, sunshine wrapped around my body, holding me close.
The slow patter of his heart and mine as we sway to their rhythmic beat.
His forehead pressed to mine, one hand gliding along my jaw, tilting my face to his.
His breath, warm as it brushes my lips. The way it catches in his throat, right before he dips his mouth that last inch and steals a kiss that’s always belonged to him.
Two people woven together, a tapestry of smiles and laughter, late-night whispered dreaming, coffee at the kitchen counter, me in nothing but his T-shirt and the marks his mouth left as the sun came up over the mountains.
A leisurely dance we know by heart, tangling us together as one, the way we were always meant to be.
That is our song.
I follow Emmett downstairs, where we work side by side in the kitchen, prepping a honey-mustard chicken and avocado salad that will double as a late lunch and early dinner before his game tonight, while we delicately dance around the elephant in the room, which is that we’re waiting on a phone call that might change our lives forever.
Emmett’s phone rings, and he sucks his thumb into his mouth, cleaning the avocado off it before pulling his phone out of his pocket.
He rolls his eyes, declining the call from his brother before going back to slicing avocados.
“Craig texted while I was at morning skate, asking if I had extra tickets for tonight. I said no.”
“Emmett,” I snicker, flicking his shoulder. He and the boys always keep our row clear for us and any other friends and family who want to tag along.
“Don’t flick me,” he mutters, pinching my ass.
“The one thing I can count on during every home game is looking into the crowd and seeing my gorgeous wife enjoying herself. Last time him and Sasha tagged along, you looked like your head was gonna explode. I can’t have that happening.
Your hair is too pretty to be covered in blood. ”
I snort a laugh. “They have a tendency to remind me how lucky we are to be childless, because we get to sleep in.” And then there was the last game, where Sasha groaned about the long walk back to their car, pouted at the expectant-mother parking spots, and then said she understood why I wanted to be pregnant so badly.
As if a shorter walk was the basis on which Emmett and I had built our dreams, enough of a reason for me to put myself through two and a half years of turmoil and heartache, months of hormone injections, for nothing but a goddamn parking space and a shorter walk.
Shaking the thoughts away, I place the marinated chicken in a pan. “What’s he calling about now?”
“Probably to bug me for tickets anyway. I’ll call him back tomorrow. We’ve got a lot on our minds today. Don’t need him taking up space there.”
I nod, grateful for a husband who’s always thinking of me when he makes decisions. Sometimes I think he cares more about my brain than he does his own.
He clears his throat, and a smile tugs up the corner of my mouth as I watch him, the pink splotching his cheeks as he struggles to snap the lid over the salad bowl.
Propping my hip on the counter, I cross my arms over my chest and arch an amused brow. “Spit it out, Brodie.”
He grins, and the sight is so disarmingly boyish, equal parts mischief and innocence, my heartbeat trips. He glances at his feet, rubbing the back of his neck before his eyes meet mine. “I thought of a name.”
“A name?”
He wrings his hands, and that pink dotting his cheeks? It runs rampant, the tips of his ears dipped in ruby red. “For our rainbow, if they’re a girl.”
My heart patters. “A girl?”
“I was thinking… Lana. For your—”
“Mémère,” I whisper, and he takes my hands in his, sweeping his thumbs across my knuckles.
“She’s special to you, and to me too. She’s strong, brave, and funny, just like you.”