27. Blair #2
“Three hours?” He scrubbed a hand over his face. “It felt like three minutes.”
Henry was already at the bassinet, standing on tiptoe to peer at his sister. His face was pressed against the plastic side, his breath fogging the surface.
“She’s so tiny,” he said, his voice awed. “Like a doll. Like one of those dolls you’re not supposed to play with because they’re worth money.”
“Smaller than a doll, even.”
“Was I this tiny?”
“Even tinier. You were early. Couldn’t wait to get here.”
He studied her face with scientific interest, taking in this new person who had just arrived in his life.
“I didn’t have hair,” he decided. “There are pictures. I looked like an egg.”
Trip laughed from the doorway. “He’s not wrong. I have those pictures saved. For blackmail purposes.”
“Uncle Trip!”
“Henry! My favorite godson!”
“I’m your only godson.”
“Which makes you my favorite by default. It’s simple mathematics.”
Henry turned back to the bassinet, his expression suddenly serious.
“Can I hold her?”
“Sit down first. Use both hands. Be very careful with her head.”
Will helped Henry settle into the big chair by the window, arranging pillows to support his arms. Then he carefully lifted Lili from the bassinet and transferred her into Henry’s waiting arms.
Henry looked down at his sister with the fierce concentration of a child faced with a momentous task. His arms were stiff, his back rigid, his whole body focused on the task of not dropping this precious cargo.
“She’s really mine?” he asked.
“She’s really yours.”
“Like, I get to keep her? Forever?”
“Forever. She’s your sister. That doesn’t go away.”
“Even when she’s annoying?”
“Even then.”
“Even when she cries?”
“Even then.”
“Even when she takes my stuff?”
“Even then. Though you should hide your favorite things now, while you have the chance.”
He studied her face for a long moment.
“Cool,” he said finally. “We’re a real family now. A complete one.”
“We were always a complete family, buddy.”
“Yeah, but now we have an even number. For games.” He looked up at me, suddenly concerned. “She can be on my team, right? When she’s bigger?”
“When she’s bigger, absolutely. You two against Mom and Dad.”
“We’re going to crush you.”
“I have no doubt.”
Trip had produced champagne from somewhere, because of course he had. Nan immediately confiscated it and replaced it with sparkling cider.
“She just gave birth,” Nan said. “She’s not having champagne.”
“It’s celebratory champagne. It doesn’t count. Celebratory alcohol has no calories and no consequences. Everyone knows this.”
“That’s not how alcohol works.”
“It’s how champagne works. Champagne is magic.”
“Give me that bottle.”
Trip surrendered the champagne with exaggerated reluctance. Luca was examining the baby with the careful attention of someone who hadn’t spent much time around infants.
“She’s beautiful,” he said to Will. “She looks like Blair.”
“She looks like herself. She’s perfect.”
“Spoken like a new father.”
“Spoken like a man stating the obvious truth.”
Nan had settled into the corner chair, watching the chaos with her usual sharp eyes. She caught me looking at her and nodded once, a gesture that conveyed more than words could.
We made it, that nod said. Against all odds.
Will reached into his jacket pocket, and his face shifted, private and guarded, like he’d been carrying this a long time. I watched his hand close around a small object, watched his happiness deepen into gravity.
“I have something,” he said. “I’ve been waiting for the right moment.”
He pulled out a small gold box, battered now, the ribbon frayed at the edges from months of handling. I recognized it immediately. The box I’d pressed into his chest the night I’d told him about the baby, and never seen again.
“You kept it.”
“I opened it that first night. Alone, on the floor of my study, after you’d gone.
” His voice was rough. “I couldn’t do it when you handed it to me.
I was too much of a coward to look you in the eye and see what was inside at the same time.
But that night, when the house was empty and I’d finally run out of ways to lie to myself, I opened it.
” He swallowed hard. “And I’ve carried it every day since.
In my pocket. Against my heart. It’s the reason I did all of it.
The therapy. The letters. Every morning I looked at what you’d chosen for us and remembered exactly what I almost threw away. ”
I hadn’t known. All those months, I’d assumed it sat on his desk untouched, the way he’d left everything else untouched. I’d been wrong about that too.
“Open it,” I said softly. “Put them on her.”
He untied the ribbon with careful fingers.
Lifted the lid. Inside, nestled in tissue paper that had gone soft and yellow with handling, were the tiny baby shoes I’d bought all those months ago.
Tiny white canvas, little anchors embroidered on the toes.
The gift I’d meant to give him at our anniversary party, before everything fell apart.
“I remember shopping for these,” I said. “I wanted something that would mean something. Something connected to our life, our family.”
“They’re perfect.” He lifted them from the box. “They’re absolutely perfect.”
He crossed to Henry, still holding Lili, and gently took the baby from his arms. Then, with the careful precision of a man performing a sacred ritual, he slipped the shoes onto her tiny feet.
They fit perfectly. Impossibly small. Exactly right.
“There,” he said. “Perfect fit. Just like her mother.”
I was crying again. I seemed to be doing a lot of that lately, tears that came from somewhere deep, tears of exhaustion and relief and joy.
“Will.”
“I know.” He looked at me, and his eyes were bright with tears of his own. “I know.”
The room was full of people I loved. Nan was scolding Trip about one thing or another, her voice sharp but her expression fond.
Luca was showing Henry pictures on his phone, probably of the vineyard or the architecture projects he was working on.
The baby was asleep in Will’s arms, the tiny baby shoes bright against the hospital blanket.
And Will was kneeling beside my bed, holding my hand, looking at me with an expression I’d never get tired of seeing.
“I want something,” I said.
“Anything. Everything. Whatever you want, it’s yours.”
“I want to renew our vows.”
His whole face changed. Hope and wonder and a terror so raw it hurt to watch, all of it warring across joy, breaking through the exhaustion and the emotion.
“Really?”
“Really. A real ceremony. Just us and the people who matter. I want to do it right this time. Not with all of Newport watching. Not with champagne and seating charts and everyone performing their version of happiness.” I squeezed his hand.
“I want to stand up in front of everyone and promise to love you again. Knowing everything we know now. Knowing how badly it can go wrong. Choosing you anyway.”
“Blair.”
“You don’t get a choice,” I added. “I’m telling you, not asking.”
He laughed, a wet sound, tears and joy mixed together.
“I’d choose you.” His voice was rough with emotion. “Every time. For the rest of my life. If I had a thousand chances, a million chances, I’d choose you every single time.”
“Then say yes.”
“Yes.”
Lili fussed in his arms, making a small sound of protest. Trip made a noise that might have been a sob, which he tried to cover with a cough. Nan muttered a complaint about overwrought nonsense, but she was smiling. Henry was asking Luca if babies could eat pizza yet.
And I lay there in my hospital bed, exhausted and happy and surrounded by everyone I loved, knowing that whatever came next, we were going to be okay.
More than okay.
We were going to be extraordinary.