Chapter 20
Eyes were windows into the soul, I had once read, so did that mean a window was an eye into the soul?
No, I couldn’t open with that. She would think I was high.
I stood at the foot of the stairs in the Kaye house, staring up at that purple and green stained glass window that Olivia loved. My internal poet scribbled down and then struck out line after line as the din of conversation from the twin’s baby shower rumbled on.
When I was too afraid of what to say, I said it in French. During intimacy after the April Showers gala, my chest had ached with so much sticky and messy emotion that I only let it escape in a language I knew Olivia couldn’t understand.
I had told her that she looked beautiful in her pink dress—that she was the star of the gala, my rose in the rain, and everything I had ever wanted.
I told her I loved her, over and over, and I begged her to stay with me.
But I wasn’t brave enough to say it in English.
I kept staring at that window above the landing as I failed to form a solid plan for my next move. The landing where the stairs split off in opposite directions was large enough for two people to stand, making for picture-perfect framing.
Of course, there would be no pictures. I wouldn’t take Olivia up to the landing until the baby shower was over and everyone left the house.
I’d hold her soft hand as I led her up the stairs and then ask her why she loved that window so much.
Then, I’d listen to her talk for as long as she wanted about the history of the house, of the craftsmanship of Art Deco design, or whatever research rabbit hole she had fallen down that led her to adore that window in particular.
Once she was done, I’d just have one other question to ask her.
I held my breath as I reached into the internal pocket of my blazer, ensuring the small leather box was still there.
I’d tell her that she was worth ten years of waiting.
A familiar groan from behind made me turn around. Olivia stood in front of a bronze plaque on the opposite wall with both hands splayed across her belly.
I yanked my hand out of my jacket pocket and ran over to her. “Are you all right?”
She let out a breath. “Just another Braxton Hicks contraction…I think I’m getting them more lately.”
“Maybe you should get off your feet, then,” I said. “Shouldn’t you be seated on your throne or whatever Ashley made for you?”
Olivia rolled her eyes. She wore a beautiful flowing white dress and had aptly-themed sprigs of baby’s breath worked into her hair. She was thirty-four weeks pregnant and glowing, looking effortlessly bridal.
The small box in my pocket felt heavier and heavier with each passing second.
“Let me read the rest of the names and then I’ll sit,” she bargained.
Ashley and Tyson had solicited donations for the Kaye house renovation from people all over the world, but they had given a special spotlight to donors that honored female-owned businesses in Elren in the form of a tasteful plaque.
The bronze plaque read: “To all the Elren businesswomen who made it.”
Nicole Liu’s name was on the plaque, and so was Marisol Martinez and her mother, Lupita, who had been cutting my hair since I was a toddler. John Whitecloud donated on behalf of his mother, Charity, who owned the coffee shop downtown.
It was a lovely detail of the house. If Mom had been a businesswoman, I would have put her name on the list too.
But if Olivia had truly read the list of names of all the Elren women who followed in Miss Kaye’s footsteps, she didn’t pay much attention to them. Instead, her fingertip traced the raised bronze letters of the woman she donated on behalf of—her mother, Annie Brady.
“She’d be so proud of you, you know,” I said softly.
Olivia finished tracing the “y” at the end of her mother’s name and slowly pulled her hand away from the plaque. “Damnit, Beau, I already almost lost it when I put her ashes on the mantle in the other room. Don’t you make me cry in front of all these people.”
I reached down and held her hand. “Come on, maybe opening some presents will help.”
We walked into the big white room that was filled floor-to-ceiling with pink and blue balloons and twisting crepe streamers.
Even though the twins’ nursery was going to be purple and green—or lavender and sage, as Olivia put it—, Ashley chose classic boy-girl colors for the baby shower.
Olivia and I even parked the pink Bel-Air and the blue Mustang on the front lawn to go along with the color scheme.
Olivia pressed into my body as we weaved through the tight crowd toward Olivia’s chair.
Though the baby shower was technically for the twins, it was also an open invitation for the community to debut the house renovation.
I hated the idea of that many people squeezing into our family moment, but Olivia wanted it and who was I to tell her no?
Although I wondered if even she expected half the town to show up.
I sat Olivia down in the large wicker chair that Ashley had decorated with vines of fake blue and pink flowers. Olivia started opening her gifts while I stood to the side and hoped no one would notice me.
Unfortunately, our audience was less interested in the purple and green baby outfits that Tyson’s older sister had made and was more focused on darting their eyes toward me and whispering to the person next to them.
I bit my tongue to keep my face from going sour.
I would have thought the shock of a Fontaine pregnancy out of wedlock would have worn off by now, but everyone in Elren had to ruminate on their gossip like cows chewing cud until something new came along.
They were probably calculating the twins’ conception date back to the class reunion.
Or wondering why my parents weren’t at the shower.
Or taking bets on which twin would get sacrificed to the magical catfish in our cow pond that allegedly maintained my family’s wealth.
Nothing I wouldn’t expect from Elren’s mouth-breathing finest.
Still, all the eyes on me made my skin crawl.
“Oh, this is so cute!” Olivia gasped as she pulled a green blanket out of a large silver bag. “Beau, look at how cute this is! Destinee’s wife knitted this!”
“So cute,” I parrotted back. I swallowed a lump in my throat. “Let me get you a snack so you can keep your energy up.”
Olivia gave me a thumbs-up and I held back a relieved sigh at the dismissal. I crossed through the foyer and walked past the tables full of food in the dining room to hide in the kitchen.
I leaned against the quartz countertop by the sink and took a deep breath.
I might have been alone, but the ring lights and cameras scattered around the kitchen made me feel so exposed.
Ashley and Tyson had filmed all their precious content before the shower started, but couldn’t they have found anywhere else to stash their fucking equipment?
I raked my hair back as cold sweat began to form on my temples. I needed to calm down.
Quietly, I pawed around the plastic catering containers scattered all over the counters until I found an open bottle of champagne from the pre-shower mimosas Ashley had made.
I held the neck of the bottle like a damn freshman and took a sip. The champagne had gone flat, but I needed something to cure the tight dryness in my throat.
I gripped the champagne bottle in one hand and pulled out the leather ring box with the other. The box weighed in my palm, grounding me to the earth. No matter what anyone at the shower said about me, or my family, or my babies…none of it mattered because I was about to finally win Olivia.
She might have never said she loved me, or even that she wanted to make whatever we were permanent, but Olivia changed after the April Showers gala.
First, she started grabbing my hands and pressing them against her belly any time one of the twins moved.
Then, I caught her reaching over the pregnancy pillow and gripping my bicep in her sleep.
When she held my hand during her last ultrasound, I knew I had her.
I sucked down a deep breath and put the ring back into my blazer pocket. No more running, no more hiding. I had to go back out there.
As stealthily as I could manage, I slipped out of the kitchen. Relief flooded through me when I noticed fewer voices echoing through the house. The stragglers remaining were probably only people Olivia liked.
I grabbed a plate at the end of the food table and started gathering a snack for my future wife.
I piled chicken nuggets onto her plate—not the most dignified food, but she couldn’t have the deli meats on the charcuterie board and she was craving protein lately.
She probably needed a little sugar boost at the end of a long party, so I reached for a brownie—no, those were topped with walnuts and Olivia didn’t care for nuts and chocolate mixed together.
I spotted a vanilla cupcake with a swirl of pink icing on top, so I grabbed it and set it on the plate next to the nuggets.
“Are you feeding a five-year-old?”
I turned. Mom stood in the entryway between the dining room and the foyer. She wore thick black sunglasses and her fingers twitched at her side, as if she were about to quick-draw a cigarette. Aunt Liz stood next to Mom, holding a large pink-and-blue gift bag in her hands.
“I-I’m surprised to see you here,” I said.
“We’ve actually been here for over an hour,” Aunt Liz said. “We sat in Cheryl’s car and waited for the crowd to thin before—”
“So, how bad was the riff raff?” Mom interrupted. “Did anyone ask Olivia if we’ve inducted her into our cult yet? Or audibly debated if the twins were actually human?”
I raised an eyebrow. “You think I wouldn’t have laid someone out if they spoke that way to my…”
I stopped myself right before saying wife.
Aunt Liz cut Mom a sly look. Mom lowered her glasses to look me in the eyes.
“Your what, Beau?” Mom said with a smirk.