Chapter 35
HARLOW
Standing in the bathroom, I stared down at the unopened package. Two tests. Two little sticks that could change everything. Two pink lines or one. Yes or no. Pregnant or not pregnant.
My entire future, reduced to a science experiment in a bathroom.
Could I really be pregnant?
The thought kept circling my brain. I always wanted to be a mom. Ever since I was little, playing house with my dolls, imagining a future filled with tiny humans who had my eyes and someone else’s smile.
But not like this. Not now.
I was twenty years old, and I hadn’t finished college. I didn’t have a career or a house or any of the things I always imagined having before bringing a life into the world. I had a boyfriend of... what, a few months, and a family that didn’t even know we were together.
This was not the plan.
Then again, nothing about Owen and me had ever been part of the plan.
My mind drifted to him, to the way he looked at me when he asked about my period. The fear I expected to see hadn’t been there. Or if it was, he’d hidden it well. He was calm.
I wished I could borrow some of that steadiness right now.
The bathroom door creaked open behind me.
I didn’t turn around, but I felt the warmth of him. My gaze lifted to the mirror, finding his reflection behind mine.
Owen’s smile was soft as he stepped closer and wrapped his arms around me from behind. His chin rested on my shoulder, and we both stared at our reflection. The two of us, tangled together, facing something neither of us had planned for.
“Hey,” he murmured against my ear.
“Hey.”
“Whatever happens,” he said, “we’re in this together. Okay?”
I searched his face in the mirror, looking for cracks in that calm exterior.
I didn’t find any.
“You’re not scared,” I said. It wasn’t a question.
“I didn’t say that.”
“You don’t look scared.”
“I’m terrified.” His arms tightened around me. “But not of this. Not of us.”
“Then what?”
“Spiders, mostly. Also clowns. Have you seen It? Deeply unsettling.”
A laugh bubbled out of me, unexpected and slightly hysterical. “Owen.”
“What? I’m trying to lighten the mood.” He pressed a kiss to my temple. “Is it working?”
“A little.”
“Good.” His eyes found mine in the mirror again, and all the teasing drained away, leaving something raw and real. “I love you, Harlow Cruz.”
My heart stuttered. “What?”
“I love you.” He said it like it was simple and obvious.
“Owen...”
“I know what I want.” His reflection held my gaze, unflinching.
“I want to spend the rest of my life with you. I want to wake up next to you every morning and fall asleep with you every night. I want to make you breakfast, watch terrible movies, and argue about whose turn it is to do the dishes. I want all of it. Every mundane, boring, beautiful moment.”
Tears were pricking at my eyes now, blurring our reflection. “That’s very romantic.”
He shrugged. “I have my moments.”
I turned in his arms, facing him. His hands came up to cup my face, thumbs brushing away the tears that escaped.
“I think we should fly to Vegas and get married,” he said.
I blinked. “What?”
“Vegas. Marriage. This weekend.”
“You’re joking.”
“I’m completely serious.”
I shook my head, a disbelieving laugh escaping. “You can’t just... You’re being insane.”
“Probably.” His grin was crooked, self-aware. “But I’m also being honest. I want to marry you. Regardless of what that test says, I know you’re my forever. I don’t need a fancy proposal or a long engagement or any of that. I just need you.”
“People usually have an engagement ring when they propose,” I pointed out, still trying to process the fact that this conversation was actually happening.
His smile widened. “Have you met us? We’re not exactly traditional.”
“You’re making rash decisions again.”
“There’s nothing rash about this.” His thumbs continued their gentle path across my cheekbones.
“I’ve known you for years, Har. I’ve seen you at your best and your worst. I know how you take your coffee and what movies make you cry and the exact face you make when you’re pretending to be annoyed, but you’re actually trying not to laugh.
There is nothing irrational about knowing you’re my person. ”
“But I also understand,” he continued, softer now, “if you’re not ready. If you want the proposal, the big wedding, and all of that. I understand if you’re not sure about me yet…”
“I’m sure.” And I was. I loved Owen, and I knew he was my forever.
Owen went still. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.” I reached up, covering his hands with mine, where they still cradled my face. “I’ve been sure about you for years. I’ve just been waiting for you to catch up.”
His laugh was a mixture of surprise and delight. “Ouch.”
“You deserved that.”
“I absolutely did.”
I bit my lip, considering. “I’ve never really thought of myself as traditional, either. My dream was always a small, intimate wedding with just the people who really matter.” I paused. “And then traveling the world for the honeymoon. Seeing everything. Together.”
“Me too. That sounds perfect.”
I turned back to the mirror, my eyes dropping to the pregnancy test still sitting on the counter.
“Do you want to be a mom?” Owen asked quietly.
My gaze lifted, meeting his through the glass. I nodded slowly.
“I’ve always wanted to be a mom,” I admitted. “I just always thought it would be after I was married. After I had my life figured out. After...” I trailed off, gesturing vaguely at everything.
“After things were less chaotic?”
“Something like that.”
“And now?”
I took a breath. “Now I’m standing in a bathroom with a pregnancy test and a proposal and absolutely nothing figured out, and somehow...” I shook my head, marveling at the truth of what I was about to say. “Somehow, I’m not as scared as I thought I’d be.”
Owen pressed a kiss to my shoulder. “Do you want to know if I want to be a dad?”
“Do you?”
“Yes.” The word was simple, certain. “The timing might not be perfect. We’re young.
We’re not married… yet. There’s a lot we haven’t figured out.
But if you’re pregnant, Harlow...” He turned me in his arms again, holding my gaze.
“This baby will be loved. More than loved. This baby will have two parents who are completely, hopelessly, ridiculously in love with each other and with them. That’s not nothing. ”
My eyes were burning again. “You’re going to make me cry.”
“Good tears, I hope.”
“The best kind.”
He smiled, soft and sure.
“I don’t want you to marry me because you’re pregnant,” he said carefully.
“I want you to marry me because you want to spend your life with me. Because you can’t imagine a future that doesn’t include both of us, together, annoying each other until we’re old and gray and still arguing about who ate the last slice of pizza. ”
“You ate it,” I reminded him.
“It was communal pizza.”
“That’s not how pizza works.”
“See?” His grin was blinding. “We’re already great at this.”
I laughed, the sound watery but genuine.
Owen stepped back, and before I could process what was happening, he dropped to one knee on the bathroom tile. The small space forced him to angle himself awkwardly, his knee bumping against the cabinet, but he didn’t seem to care.
“What are you doing?”
“What does it look like I’m doing?” He looked up at me, blue eyes shining. “Harlow Cruz. Will you fly to Vegas this weekend and marry me?”
“Owen...”
“Don’t take the test now,” he said quickly. “We’ll fly out Friday night. Spend the weekend in Vegas. Get married and then fly to Tennessee to see Jax and Kaia.”
“Are we going to tell them we’re dating, pregnant, and married all at the same time?” The words came out slightly hysterical. “That’s a lot of bombs to drop in one conversation.”
He laughed. “No. God, no. Jax would have an actual aneurysm. His head might literally explode.”
“So what’s the plan?”
“We’ll figure it out later.” He shrugged, still on one knee, still looking at me like I was everything. “We won’t know if you’re pregnant until we get back from Tennessee. We can take the test then. Together and whatever it says, we’ll handle it. Together.”
“So it would just be us,” I said slowly, processing. “In Vegas. No family. No friends. Just...”
“Just us.” He nodded. “We can have a big party later. A reception, a celebration, whatever you want. But the moment itself? The vows? That’s ours. Just ours.”
I stared at him.
This ridiculously infuriating and wonderful man had somehow become the center of my entire universe.
He was kneeling on my bathroom floor, proposing to me without a ring, asking me to run away to Vegas and marry him while a pregnancy test sat unopened on the counter behind us.
It was insane.
It was perfect.
It was so utterly, completely us.
A smile spread across my face. I bit down on my bottom lip, feeling the grin trying to split my face in half.
“Let’s do it.”
Owen’s face lit up like sunrise. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.” I was laughing now, tears streaming down my face. “Let’s fly to Vegas and get married like two crazy people who have completely lost their minds.”
He surged to his feet, sweeping me into his arms and spinning me around. The small bathroom made it awkward; my foot knocked against the toilet, his elbow hit the towel rack, but neither of us cared.
“I love you,” he said against my hair.
“I love you too. Even when you eat all the pizza.”
“It was one time.”
“It was three times.”
“Your memory is suspiciously accurate.”
“I have receipts.”
He pulled back just enough to look at me, his smile so wide it looked like it might hurt. “We’re really doing this.”
“We’re really doing this,” I confirmed.
“Vegas.”
“Vegas.”
“This weekend.”
“This weekend.”
He kissed me then, deep and thorough and full of promise. When we finally broke apart, both of us breathless, I glanced at the pregnancy test still sitting on the counter.
“Should we...?”
“Later.” Owen followed my gaze, then looked back at me. “Right now, I just want to enjoy this. You said yes.”
He kissed me again, laughing against my mouth, and for a moment, everything else faded away. The test. The uncertainty. The conversation we still had to have with Jax, Kaia, and everyone else.
All that mattered was this. Owen’s arms around me, and the promise of forever stretching out ahead of us.
Whatever came next, we’d face it together.
And really, that was all I’d ever wanted.