Epilogue
June
DARCY
“I can’t do this. I take it back. We can’t have a baby—because I can’t do this.”
Panic snakes up my spine, slithering into and overtaking every part of my mind.
All the positive vibes I had earlier?
Gone.
All the excitement I felt when we walked into the hospital?
Vanished.
The baby birthing mixed tape with all my favorite songs—which was essentially a One Direction album—that Archer created for me?
Fuck. That. Shit.
There is no way a baby is being birthed from my vagina. I don’t care that there’s history spanning hundreds of thousands of years ready to prove me wrong. I will not push a full-sized baby from this body.
As I pace—or more like waddle—around the delivery suite, Archer tests the water temperature in the birthing pool I was determined to book.
“Just so we’re clear …” I pant and wince as another contraction hits me. “We aren’t having any more babies.”
Shaking drops of water from his hand, Archer stands and walks toward me as I continue circling the room.
“And why did you have to wear gray sweatpants today?” I snap, clutching my back because the heat pads that are supposed to relieve pain are doing nothing but pissing me off. “You know I struggle to be mad at you when you wear gray sweats.”
His cocky smile emerges, and all I want to do is wipe it from his face. “Why do you think I wore them? I like to think of them as my mid-labor body armor.”
He tips his head to the birthing pool as I drop mine to his chest.
Archer wraps his arms around my lower back and rubs it gently. “The doctors said you could use the water whenever you’re ready.”
I sob into his shirt. “Mum never warned me that labor was this bad. Why did she lie to me?”
The soft beating of his heart causes me to breathe a little slower as Archer continues to hold me against him.
“It’s not too late if you want me to call her. I know she’s only downstairs, waiting anxiously for news.”
I peer up at my husband. He looks and smells incredible, unlike me, who has been laboring for the past ten hours with very little to show for it. Only the puke stains on the oversize Blades top I’m wearing serve as evidence of my struggle.
Shaking my head, I grind my teeth and pull at his shirt when another contraction hits me. “No. We stick to the original plan. Unless anything goes wrong?—”
He tips my chin back up to look at him, confidence the only emotion on his face. “I don’t want you to even start thinking about going down that route. Nothing is going to go wrong.”
“How do you know?” I rush out, another wave of panic slamming into me when I remember the doctor said I was only four centimeters dilated. I have another six to go. There’s no way I can sustain this; the pain is only going to get worse.
Of their own volition, my arms flop down to my sides, any energy I had remaining almost completely depleted.
Archer drops one hand into mine and slowly walks us across to the corner, where the birthing balls are kept.
He lowers me gently onto a green one and then takes a seat on a blue one opposite, this time holding both my hands in his.
We bounce on them slowly, just as we’ve done time and again in our apartment. He even brought one to the last game of the playoffs—which they lost, thanks to Tommy fucking Schneider—just to make sure I was comfortable.
“Look at me, Darcy.” His voice is gentle but demanding.
Lifting my eyes to his, I can feel the tears of overwhelm as they begin to surface, but none spill onto my cheeks.
Jesus, I’m too exhausted to cry.
“Nothing bad is going to happen because I’m here. I know I’ve said a thousand times that I’ll never let anything hurt you or Emily, and that’s because I mean it. ” He bites out the final two words of his statement, trying to hammer home his point. “My life is nothing without you in it.”
There’s a quick tap on the door before a female doctor and nurse enter, and I spin back around to face Archer.
He nods at me reassuringly, squeezing my hands in his.
“Okay, Darcy.” The doctor begins speaking, tapping the bed with her hand before pulling on surgical gloves.
“They’re latex-free, right? My wife has an allergy,” Archer quickly asks.
She smiles over at him. “Yes, Mr. Moore. We have it in our notes, and the previous doctor informed me too. Please don’t worry.”
Archer’s shoulders drop an inch as he stands and helps me off the ball.
“If I can ask you to come and lie down on the bed for me in the usual position, we can check how far along you are.”
I buckle over the bed just as I reach it, groaning into the mattress while Archer stands behind me, practically holding me upright.
“The contractions are definitely getting stronger and closer together.” Archer speaks for me. “She’s exhausted.”
When I try to swing a pathetic leg onto the bed, Archer takes my entire weight, and he carefully lifts me onto it. I don’t miss the swoonworthy look the nurse gives him.
I internally roll my eyes . First it’s the phlebotomist, now my nurse.
“Well, I’m pleased I can bring you good news.” The doctor pulls a white sheet back over my lower half and snaps off her gloves, tossing them into the medical rubbish bin. “You’re now seven centimeters dilated and making great progress.”
I could cry. Both from the pain and the fact that, finally , my labor is starting to move forward. I’m aware that some poor women labor for days without much progress, but I couldn’t be of those women. I was ready to wilt at the first contraction.
The doctor points toward the birthing pool. “Do you want to try now, Darcy? I suspect the baby won’t be all that much longer.”
Another contraction rips from me, this one much stronger. “I don’t know if I’ve got it in me to get off this bed and in there,” I wail, throwing my head back into the pillow as I grit my teeth through it.
“I’ve got you,” Archer says, curling his arms under my body.
“Sir, I’m not comfortable with you carrying your wife anywhere.”
We’re already halfway over to the birthing pool when Archer turns with me in his arms.
“My wife made it clear that it was her dream to birth our daughter in the pool with yellow sensory lighting. And that’s what she’s going to get.”
He leans down, placing a kiss on my forehead. “I’m going to lower you into the water now, okay? Then I’ll take off your shirt so you don’t overheat. I’ll reduce the lighting to get it all cozy for you, and we’ll work through this together.”
Partly because I don’t have the energy for words, but also because I’ve now joined the nurse’s involuntary swoon session, I nod and let Archer do as he described.
When the nurse and doctor leave the room, Archer walks over to the lighting panel and sets it up just as I originally planned.
A couple of seconds later, another contraction hits me, but the weightlessness of the water takes the slightest edge off it. Don’t get me wrong; I still want to scream blue murder, but somehow, the warmth against my skin helps to alleviate the unbearable, gripping pain.
“Are you sure you don’t want pain relief? It’s not too late, and you don’t need to be a hero about it,” Archer asks, swishing a little water against my baby bump.
“No. I’ve come this far,” I say, shaking my head and closing my eyes. “This is a battle I’m having with myself.”
“Okay, we’re starting to crown. We only need a couple more really big pushes from you, Darcy.”
Nope. It’s a hard nope from me.
I shake my head profusely as Archer takes me into his arms. Around ten minutes ago, he stripped down to his boxer briefs and climbed into the pool with me.
“You can, Darcy Doll. I know you can. What do you need?”
“I j-just n-need this baby out.” My cries are now full-blown wails. “Can you push her out for me?”
Another contraction builds, and I wrap my arms around Archer’s neck, digging my fingernails into his shoulders.
“That’s it. Take it out on me. Just keep pushing.” He kisses my sweat-soaked forehead, murmuring against my skin, “I’ve never loved you more than I do in this moment.”
The midwife leans down into the pool. “One more, Darcy, and we’ll have her.”
I have no idea where the strength comes from when I lift my head to look at Archer. The burning and pain are unbearable, but I know we’re so close to starting a family.
“One more,” he whispers. “One more, and she’s ours.”
On a cry I know will summon my entire family upstairs, I deliver Emily into the pool, and the midwife quickly reaches down and gathers her up, immediately placing her on my chest.
“She’s got your features; I can tell she’s just like her mama.” Archer’s shaking voice is the only sound I hear between my own sobs and the tiny cries leaving my daughter.
Emily’s eyes are still closed, but as the nurse quickly takes her from me to clean, weigh, and wrap her, I can already see the resemblance.
“I’m so fucking proud of you, Darcy.” Archer wraps his arms around me, pressing his forehead against mine.
The weight of my exhaustion has fully lifted, replaced with a pure exhilaration I’ve never felt before.
“Do you want me to ask everyone downstairs to leave visiting for a while? We can have people around when we get back home.”
I shake my head, ready to get out of the pool and hold Emily again as she begins to cry. “No. Invite them up. They’ve all waited, and I want them to see how beautiful she is.”
A half hour later, I’m tucked up in bed with a fresh set of nightwear and my messy hair somewhat controlled in a bun Archer attempted for me.
My husband shakes his head in awe as he slowly walks around the room, holding our daughter in his arms. “I can’t believe she has emerald eyes. I was sure they would be blue.”
He’s a complete natural, and it’s already obvious who Emily favors.
A girl after her mommy’s heart.
“Oh, I can,” Mum adds, readjusting my bedsheets in the usual fussing way she does. “She has her grandma Morgan’s eyes.”
“I don’t know about that,” Julia chimes in, tucking the sheets on the other side. “I’d say mine are more of a bluey-green and I can see that color in Emily’s.”
Archer takes a seat in the corner of the room, smiling at me as he cradles Emily to his bare chest, her tiny hand curled around his little finger. “That’s you right there, Pip. Etched onto Daddy forever.” He drops his eyes to the tattoo on his left pec, and my heart squeezes.
“Do you have enough baby clothes in this bag?” Mum asks sarcastically, taking a few sets out and laying them down on the dresser in front of her. “I was just wondering if you’d packed for a vacation or a stay in the hospital.”
I snicker when Archer rises from the chair and walks over to me, lowering a sleeping Emily down on my chest.
“Are we okay to come in?” Kendra knocks lightly on the door, peeking her face around the side.
With a finger to his lips, my husband silently nods at Kendra.
She enters, Jack and Jon following closely behind. All three head straight over to me, and Archer lies down on the bed beside us, wrapping an arm around my shoulders.
Kendra’s hands come straight to her mouth, hearts bouncing in her eyes when she takes Emily in. “I don’t even know what to say. She’s absolutely beautiful.”
“Eight pounds of pure perfection,” Archer coos.
“Can I hold her?” Jack’s voice is broken when he speaks. “Or will I wake her?”
“Yes, of course,” I whisper as Jack steps forward and carefully lifts her from me.
“Make sure you support her neck,” Archer instructs, rising from the bed and showing Jack what to do.
“Actually, can you do me a favor?” Jack asks Archer. “I have something in my hoodie pocket that I need you to show Emily.”
Everyone in the room is intrigued when Archer dips his hand into the front pocket of my brother’s hoodie, pulling out a red top.
Holding it by the collar, he lets it unravel. “This is what you picked up for her in town that time, isn’t it?”
Jack snickers, loving arms wrapping tighter around his niece. He looks so proud of her. “She’s a Morgan and no one can tell me otherwise.”
Despite his disapproving headshake, I see the emotion in my husband’s eyes as he places the tiny jersey over the end of my bed, my brother’s last name and number stamped across the back.
Jon stands there, a palm over his mouth as he takes it all in.
“Are you okay?” I ask, offering my hand out for him to take.
He wraps his big palm around mine, still no words materializing as he motions toward Emily.
“Wait, what’s this?” Mum speaks up, pulling something round and brown from my bag. I don’t immediately register what it is until she drops a piece of string between her fingers. “Darcy”—she chuckles softly—“why on earth did you pack a conker?”
“I didn’t,” I quickly reply, gaze resting on my husband as he takes it from Mum and turns it around in his hands.
“I did,” Archer confirms, and it’s then I see the E neatly carved into the side of the conker.
“Someone once told me that conker fights make a great family game.” He shrugs a shoulder and walks over to Emily and Jack, handing my brother the conker.
“I figured that we could revive that tradition and you could teach my daughter how to kick some butt.”
My eyes might be blurry, but I don’t miss the moment as it passes between both men.
“Oh my.” Mum is the only one to speak as Archer makes his way over to me, leaning down so only I can hear what he says next.
“Here’s your sixth and final lesson, Darcy Doll: your brain might be able to recall everything I’ve ever said, but my heart hangs on your every word. Forever living in our DARCher bubble.”