Chapter 24 #2
They place the baby on Isla’s chest. She’s crying. Kit’s crying. I’m pressed against the wall with both hands over my mouth, trying to take up as little space as possible, trying to give them this moment that belongs entirely to them.
Kit kisses Isla’s forehead, staring at his son like he’s looking on the universe for the first time and seeing the answer to every question that’s ever been asked. Then he straightens, wipes his face with the back of his hand, and walks to the door.
‘Where are you going?’ Isla murmurs.
‘Brynn and Jude are outside. They should know.’ He pauses in the doorway. Looks back at his son on Isla’s chest. ‘It’s a boy,’ he says again – quietly, to himself this time, testing the weight of it. Then he goes.
I hear him in the corridor. His voice, hoarse and cracking. ‘It’s a boy. We have a boy.’
Brynn, who’d rather kick something than cry, sobs so loud it comes through the wall. Then Jude’s voice, low and warm, and the sound of bodies colliding – a hug, I think, the kind men give each other. A full body hug when words can’t be found.
Isla looks at me. Her face is streaked and swollen and incandescent.
‘Well,’ she says. ‘That was hideous.’
I laugh. It comes out wet.
Isla looks exhausted. Radiant. Wrecked. Her hair’s a disaster and there are shadows under her eyes and she’s the most beautiful I’ve ever seen her.
Because she’s holding her son.
He’s tiny. Scrunched-up face, a tuft of dark hair, the smallest fingers I’ve ever seen on a living thing. He’s wrapped in a hospital blanket, making small snuffling sounds against Isla’s chest, utterly unaware that he’s just rearranged the world.
‘Nina.’ Isla’s voice is rough. ‘Come meet him.’
I cross the room. Sit on the edge of the bed. Look at this impossible, brand-new person.
‘He’s beautiful.’
‘He’s a nightmare. That took forever.’ But she’s looking down at him with an expression that doesn’t need a name. ‘Peter,’ Isla says softly. ‘Peter William Harding.’
She looks up at me.
The room goes very quiet. Or maybe it was already quiet and I’ve only just noticed – the hum of machines, the distant corridor sounds, the baby’s snuffled breathing. My hands are shaking. I press them together in my lap and hold on.
‘Is it still okay?’ Isla whispers. ‘If it’s too much—’
‘It’s not too much.’ My voice doesn’t sound like mine. ‘It’s perfect.’
‘Do you want to hold him?’
I should say no. Should protect myself. Should keep some distance from this beautiful, devastating collision of the past and the future.
But she’s already lifting him, placing him in my arms, and then he’s there – this warm, tiny weight against my chest. Peter. Not my Peter. A new Peter.
He snuffles against my jumper. His fists are curled tight, his eyes closed, his whole body fitting in the crook of my arm as though he was always meant to be there.
I can feel his heartbeat – fast, hummingbird-fast – and the rise and fall of his breathing, and the impossible lightness of him, barely seven pounds, the weight of a bag of flour and the weight of the entire world.
My throat locks. My eyes burn. I look down at his face – Peter William Harding, two hours old, who will grow up in Sea Salt Bay hearing stories about a man he’s named for, a man who was kind and brave and loved, who sailed this harbour and fished these waters and who would have held this baby with the same stupid grin Kit is wearing right now if the sea hadn’t taken him first.
I cry. Not delicately. Not the way you cry when you’re trying to hold it together.
The tears fall on the hospital blanket and I don’t wipe them and I don’t apologise and I don’t try to stop.
Because this isn’t just grief anymore. This is grief and gratitude and terror and love, all of it at once, too much to hold and too important to put down.
Kit stands by the window. He doesn’t speak.
He just stands there, this man who pulls boats through storms and barely says ten words a day, watching me hold his son with an expression I will remember for the rest of my life – gentle, steady, the face of someone who understands that some things are too large for language and the only decent response is silence.
‘Nina.’ Isla’s hand is on my arm. ‘There’s something else.’
I look up, blinking.
‘Will you be his godmother?’
The question lands softly. A gift wrapped in trust.
‘Isla—’
‘I can’t think of anyone better.’
I look down at the baby. At his perfect, peaceful face. At his fist, still curled, still holding on to whatever babies hold on to in their first hours – warmth, sound, the heartbeat of whoever’s carrying them.
‘Yes,’ I say. ‘Of course, yes.’
‘Thank God.’ Isla sags against the pillows. ‘I was terrified you’d say no.’
‘Why would I say no?’
‘Because it’s a lot. Because of everything.’ She shrugs weakly. ‘But you said yes.’
‘I said yes.’
Kit comes to the bedside, reaching carefully for his son. I transfer the baby into his arms – watching the way his hands dwarf the blanket, the way his whole body stills, the way he looks down at this child like he’s trying to memorise every detail before the world gets hold of them.
‘Hello,’ Kit says quietly.
The baby yawns.
‘Strong start,’ Isla murmurs. ‘He’s already bored of you.’
‘Get some rest.’ Kit’s voice is gruff. Low. ‘You were incredible.’
‘I know.’ But she’s already fading, eyes heavy. ‘Now give me my son back. You’ve had him for thirty seconds. That’s enough.’
The door opens and Brynn appears with Jude, holding Maisie’s hand. Maisie is practically vibrating with excitement, clutching a stuffed rabbit that’s seen better days.
‘Someone wanted to meet her brother,’ Brynn says.
Kit crouches down, baby Peter still cradled carefully in one arm. ‘Mais. Come see.’
Maisie approaches slowly, suddenly shy. She peers at the bundle in her father’s arms, nose scrunched.
‘He’s very small.’
‘He’ll get bigger.’
‘He’s all wrinkly.’
‘So were you. Like a little raisin.’
‘I was not.’ She looks outraged. Then, softer: ‘Can I touch him?’
‘Gently. Just his hand.’
She reaches out one finger, touches the baby’s tiny fist. Peter’s fingers curl around hers, instinctive, and Maisie’s whole face transforms.
‘He’s holding me,’ she whispers. ‘Dad. Dad, he’s holding my finger.’
‘He knows you’re his sister.’
‘I’m going to teach him everything.’ She’s fierce now, protective. ‘How to swim and catch crabs and which rocks are best for climbing. And I won’t let anyone be mean to him. Ever.’
Kit’s eyes are bright. ‘I know you won’t.’
Isla reaches for my hand, squeezes it. ‘See?’ she whispers, eyes blinking heavily. ‘Family.’
Brynn and Jude drive me home.
The sun’s setting over the coast, everything turning gold and pink, the kind of evening Cornwall does better than anywhere – the light so saturated it doesn’t look real, the sea flat and burnished, the sky going through colours that don’t have proper names.
I sit in the back seat. Exhausted. Full. Emptied out and filled back up with different things.
‘You okay?’ Brynn asks, twisting round from the passenger seat.
‘Yeah.’ It’s true. For the first time in a long time, it’s actually true. ‘Yeah. I am.’
The village appears around the bend. The harbour. The boats. The café with its lavender shutters.
And Lavender Dreams at her mooring. Waiting.
‘Drop me at the harbour?’
Jude pulls over. I climb out, wave them off. Their taillights disappear up the lane and then it’s just me and the harbour and the evening.
The air smells of salt and cooling stone. The water is flat, barely lapping at the harbour wall. Somewhere a halyard clinks against a mast – that small, persistent sound that means home to me the way nothing else does.
I walk to the harbour wall. Rest my hands on the stone.
A new baby. A new name for an old love. A boat that’s becoming a café. A life that is, slowly and painfully and without anyone’s permission, reassembling itself into a shape I didn’t expect and couldn’t have planned for.
I stand there until the gold drains from the sky and the first stars appear over the headland.
Then I push off the wall, and I walk home.
My hands smell of hospital soap and new baby, and my chest aches in a way that isn’t grief – or isn’t only grief – and the café is waiting, and the boat is waiting, and tomorrow there is work to do.
I don’t know what comes next. But for the first time in ten months, I want to find out.