46. Ivy
Ivy
August
Time had flown by, and the past months were a blur. I swore to myself that I would never get pregnant again, at least not during the summer. Sweat clung to my skin and never seemed to evaporate. My feet and ankles were swollen. Sleep was miserable. My back hurt. None of my clothes fit.
Basically, I was stuck in hell.
The only thing that kept me going was the fact that any day, I would go into labor. Part of me was scared of what that would be like, but I was happy that Phoenix would join us in the world. And that laying on my side would no longer make my hips feel like they were being crushed.
Instead of complaining, I sat in the middle of Rayne’s living room, sipping green punch while people milled about, talking with one another. She’d decided to throw me a last minute baby shower.
It wasn’t that I needed one. Trey, Caleb, and Niko ensured I had everything I needed. The nursery was complete, and stuffed animals and toys were carefully placed on the shelf, waiting for Phoenix. The walls were painted, bedding had been washed, and onesies lined a dresser drawer. They’d even bought boxes of diapers.
I think Rayne had decided I needed a baby shower, because that was what you did for friends and family. It was nice to feel cared for, even if the invited people were interesting . Joey approached me with a tiny baby blue bag in his hand. He sat down on the edge of the table and adjusted his tie.
“You really didn’t have to,” I said. If anything, Joey’s real gift to me had been keeping me safe.
He shrugged. “My mother raised me better. If she found out I showed up to a shower empty handed, she’d beat me with her cane.”
His statement made me laugh as I pulled out a tiny baby blanket that felt like clouds. On the edge, a teddy bear had been embroidered. “It’s beautiful,” I said.
The pain in my back worsened as my stomach cramped. It had been doing that all morning. I tried to ignore it, knowing it was probably nothing. The feeling passed quickly, and it didn’t happen very often.
That was until I felt something wet trickle down my legs. My heart stopped, and I looked up at Joey. “Don’t make it a big deal, but I think that I need you to go get Niko.” He’d decided to stand on the roof with Ethan for a while to escape the crowd inside.
“Why?” His eyebrows furrowed in concern.
I grimaced at him. “I think that my water just broke.” It wasn’t like anything in the movies, nothing quite as dramatic as that. In cinema, a gigantic gush hit the floor, and everyone knew exactly what was happening… The wetness and faint trickle were nothing like that. The back pains and mild cramps I had were easy to dismiss. But together, it signaled that it was time. It seemed cliche that it had happened at my baby shower, of all things.
Rather than calmly getting Niko, Joey stood up and clapped his hands together, a grin spreading across his typically solemn features. I scowled at him. “Just go get Niko, and he’ll handle the rest.” He already knew where the bag I’d packed was and could tell Caleb and Trey for me.
Everything happened in a whirlwind. I was whisked away to an SUV where the guys clambered in next to me. In just a few short hours, I’d be a mother. The thought was as terrifying as it was exciting.
Twelve hours later, I was holding a tiny human in my arms. In the heat of the moment, I’d swore that I would never have sex again. It was a lie; the guys let me say it without correcting me. Phoenix Camden Spencer was born at 11:43 pm, weighing eight pounds and nine ounces. As I fed him, Niko, Trey, and Caleb looked on adoringly, watching his tiny face.
Even if I hadn’t decided to have a paternity test done, I would have known exactly who the father was. He looked just like him. It was how he pursed his lips while he dozed, sated off milk.
I smiled down at him, tracing his cheek. If I could change the past, I would, but I couldn’t. None of us could. Instead, we could only look forward to the future.
Niko held out his arms, beckoning me to hand him the baby. Begrudgingly, I passed Phoenix to him. He whispered something in his ear that I couldn’t hear. I wondered how, despite everything, I had gotten so lucky. Even with everything that had happened during my pregnancy and the copious amount of caffeine I had drank, Phoenix was healthy. Caleb looked down at the baby, enamored.
Trey sat on the edge of my bed, intertwining our fingers together. “He’s perfect. Just like you.” He kissed my knuckles, and I sighed at him, content. “I love you.”
“I love you too.”
And I did. I loved each of them. They were all different, even in their trauma. We were all healing, separately and together. My relationship with the guys was stronger than ever, and somehow, along the way, we had created a family that I didn’t know I needed. I couldn’t wait to see what the future looked like.