Chapter 31
Callie
Landon’s asleep on my chest, his weight warm and familiar, a few drops of drool dampening my shirt.
One tiny hand is fisted in the fabric like he’s afraid I’ll disappear if he lets go.
Mitch sits beside me, his arm hooked loosely around my shoulders, the TV murmuring in the background—a rerun of Home Improvement neither of us is actually watching.
His parents left ten minutes ago.
And yet, the house still feels tight. Hollow. Like the tension hasn’t fully lifted—like it’s clinging to the walls, waiting to settle.
“I still don’t think your mom likes me,” I say quietly.
Mitch glances over from the armchair. “She likes you. Why wouldn’t she?”
“She had something to counter everything I said.”
“She wasn’t mean, though. It’s not like you guys were arguing.”
“I didn’t say we were arguing. I’m just saying she didn’t agree with anything I said. She had a comment to, like, one-up me every time.”
Mitch shakes his head. “Okay, well, I don’t know. It’s just how she is, I guess?” he says, trying to brush it off.
My jaw tightens. “That’s not comforting.”
He shifts in his seat. “Babe, I think you’re reading into it.”
I look at him then. Really look. “I don’t think I am. You say it all the time, how she can be fake, come off super nice. I think this is that.”
He just stares at me, the words sitting between us, heavy and unfamiliar. Because it’s not just tonight.
It’s in the way she asks how Mitch is and forgets to ask how I am.
The way she holds Landon like he’s just Mitch’s kid.
She doesn’t ask how I’m sleeping, or healing, or coping.
Not to mention, she still never apologized for how she acted when Mitch told her about the baby.
And considering she holds Landon as if he’s the greatest gift on earth, it’s hard to understand why she doesn’t look back and see how she overreacted.
Especially now that he’s here and everything’s going okay.
The first time I saw her after the news broke was…
awkward. Not for her, though; just me. Only because I knew how she reacted to Mitch and then I came in and had to pretend I didn’t.
She was kinda laughing about it at that point.
Not in a “this is great news” kind of way, or like it was funny, but in a “this oughta be interesting for you two” kind of way.
I can’t explain it. She did ask how I felt, if I was sick at all.
I said I was, and all I remember was her saying how morning sickness is worse with twins, so I should be thankful it’s not that.
At the time it didn’t faze me, but now, when I look back and I sorta tally all these things up…
it’s a pattern. It’s always something with Danielle.
“Mitch,” I say softly, careful not to wake Landon, “every time we’re around them, I feel like I’m being evaluated. Like I’m on some kind of probation.”
“They’re just…different,” he says.
“I don’t care,” I reply sharply, shaking my head.
He doesn’t answer right away.
“They helped,” he says finally. “They bought stuff for Landon.”
I swallow. “Yeah. Past tense.”
He winces. “What?”
“They helped and then they stopped,” I say. “I didn’t need people to cuddle my baby or buy him toys at two weeks old. I still don’t need someone to take care of him. I need help taking care of me.”
He shrugs, like he feels bad but knows there’s nothing he can do about it now. “I don’t know, Callie. We can’t force it.”
I stare down at Landon’s tiny fingers, tracing the knuckles with my thumb.
“I don’t know what changed,” I say quietly. “Maybe because he’s not a newborn anymore. Maybe because the excitement phase passed. Or—” I hesitate, then say it anyway. “Maybe because my parents helped us a lot with the house and all.”
He stills, then sighs. “Maybe. I don’t know.”
“They don’t like that we’re doing good, and not struggling,” I say quietly.
He shakes his head like he wishes I wasn’t right.
He looks at me then, eyes desperate, tired of it too. “What exactly do you want me to do about that?”
My chest aches at the question.
“I want you to stand up for us,” I say.
“I do, baby; you know I do.”
“No.” I shake my head. “You smooth it over. You tell me to let it go.”
“They’re my parents.”
“And I’m the mother of your child,” I say, my voice cracking despite my effort to keep it steady. “I want to be first. Not second.”
The words land sharper than I intend. Too honest to take back.
“You are first,” he says—but it sounds thinner now, like he’s trying to convince both of us.
“I don’t feel it,” I whisper, and before he can reply, I carefully stand and lay Landon down in the swing, watching him settle and stay asleep when I drape the blanket over his legs. Then I turn back to Mitch, whose hands are together, rubbing slowly, looking down like he’s thinking.
“I think part of you still wants their approval,” I say quietly.
“And I get it, they’re your parents. You want them to be proud and love and support you.
But we both know they think we should’ve done things differently.
And sometimes it feels like that judgment is always there—just unspoken and hidden in being passive-aggressive. ”
“You could say that about anyone,” he says. “Everyone has opinions. What matters is what works for us.”
“But I’m tired of trying to look better than I am,” I admit, tears burning now.
“I already walked around pregnant with no ring. Everyone thinking we’re reckless teenagers.
And now, people probably still think we’re stupid for co-owning with Macy, being that we’re still not married.
” I let out a shaky breath. “And then there are the people who still think we’re doing something wrong just because we share a wall.
I just—” My voice breaks. “I feel like I can’t win, Mitch.
Like no matter what we choose, someone thinks it’s wrong. ”
“Callie,” he says, standing in front of me. He hugs me, and I let myself lean into him.
He takes a breath first, like he’s choosing his words carefully.
“You know what Pastor Miller said on Sunday?” he asks quietly.
I sniff once. “No.”
“He said that sometimes doing the right thing doesn’t bring peace right away, it brings resistance. From other people. From expectations. From pride.” He lets out a slow breath. “That stuck with me.”
I tilt my head, listening.
“And then today,” he continues, “I had a podcast on while I was mowing. Talking about how we confuse God’s approval with people’s approval.
How we think if everyone around us is comfortable, then we must be doing it right.
” He shakes his head. “But that’s not how it works.
If it was, Jesus wouldn’t have made anybody mad. ”
A weak laugh slips out of me.
“I kept thinking about us,” he admits. “About how no matter what we do, someone’s going to think it’s wrong. Too slow. Too fast. Too unconventional. Not enough. Always not enough.”
My chest tightens again, but this time it’s different.
“And I realized,” he says, voice steady now, “that the only question I actually need to answer is whether we’re trying to honor God with what we’re doing. Not whether my parents are comfortable. Not whether the town approves. Not whether it looks neat and tied up with a bow.”
I just look at him.
“God’s not up there tallying whether we made everyone happy,” he says. “He knows our hearts. He knows we’re doing our best and keeping him at the center of our choices.”
His hand presses gently over mine. “He knows we didn’t plan Landon. But He blessed us with him anyway. We didn’t rush into marriage; that’s not what He wanted. I think He wanted to test our faith, to make us slow down and do this with intention.”
My eyes burn. Neither of us speaks for a few seconds. But everything he’s saying makes me feel good and safe and happy with him.
“And I need you to understand something,” he adds, softer. “If I ever hesitate with my parents, it’s not because I’m unsure about you. It’s because I’m still unlearning how to stop being their kid and start being the head of my own family.”
That lands deeper than anything else he’s said.
“I’m working on it,” he says. “I promise I am.”
I nod, pressing my forehead into his shoulder. “That’s all I needed,” I whisper. “To know you see it.”
“I see it,” he murmurs. “And I see you.”
The baby swing ticks softly in the corner of the room. The TV flickers. The house exhales around us.
And for the first time in a while, my faith doesn’t feel fragile. It doesn’t feel like something I’m constantly questioning or failing at. It feels steady. Grounded. Like something Mitch and I are walking through together instead of separately.
He holds me like that for a long moment, quiet expanding between us, and when he finally kisses me, it feels like a promise more than anything else.
“I love you,” he says as he pulls back, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear.
I lean into him again, the kiss deeper this time. His fingers brush along my back and stay there, familiar and warm, and for a second everything blurs in that dangerous, easy way.
I press my hand to his chest before it goes any further. Because last time we blurred lines like this, we made a baby.
“I gotta go,” Mitch says softly, reading me before I have to say it.
I nod, smiling. “Yeah.”
His eyes flick to Landon, still asleep in the swing, then to the time on his phone. We both stand.
“I’ll take him,” I say.
I carefully lift Landon from the swing and carry him upstairs, every step slow and practiced. The room is dim, the sound machine humming low. I lower him into the crib as gently as I can.
His face crumples instantly.
A sharp, offended cry slices through the quiet.
I wait a beat, hoping he’ll settle. He doesn’t.
I scoop him back up, pressing him to my chest, rocking side to side. I try the binky. I try nursing. I check his diaper. Nothing works. His cries grow louder, more frantic, and the dread settles in—heavy and familiar.
The night stretches out in front of me, unknown and sleepless, and I feel the sting behind my eyes.
Crying won’t help. So I breathe. I whisper a prayer. And I try again.
I’m settling into the rocking chair, struggling to get him to latch, when I see Mitch in the doorway.
“Gosh, you scared me,” I say, standing.
I lift Landon to my shoulder. Mitch steps closer, flips his baseball cap backwards, and holds out his hands.
“Let me try.”
I don’t hesitate. I pass him over immediately, my ears ringing from the crying.
Mitch holds him the way he always does—Landon’s belly stretched along his forearm like a football, one hand steady at his chest, the other patting his back as he walks slow circles around the room. His voice is calm, low, constant.
After a minute, he stills.
“He feels warm,” he says.
My chest tightens. “What? What do you mean?”
He turns Landon toward me. “Feel him.”
I press my palm to his forehead. Hot. The back of my hand confirms it.
“Well, maybe it’s because he’s screaming?”
“He’s never gotten that hot from crying before.”
My stomach drops.
I grab the thermometer from the changing table drawer, hands shaking just enough to annoy me. We check together.
101.3.
The screen glows red.
“Oh my gosh,” I whisper. “What do we do?”
Mitch’s eyes widen, panic flashing across his face. “I-I don’t know. You’re the girl.”
“That doesn’t mean I magically know everything,” I snap, heart racing.
I find the infant Tylenol—still sealed, untouched—and read the label twice while Mitch talks softly to Landon, pacing, keeping him calm. I draw the dosage carefully, then sit beside them.
He settles Landon upright and I give the medicine slowly, a little at a time.
The crying stops.
“He likes it,” Mitch says, half smiling.
“Yeah,” I murmur. “It’s basically candy.”
Landon swallows it all, then immediately spits his binky back out.
“Maybe he’s hungry now,” Mitch says.
“Or—” I freeze. “Oh my gosh. What if he’s getting a tooth?”
The realization hits all at once. The fussiness. The heat. The pediatrician’s voice in my head.
I nurse him again, this time easily. His body relaxes. Mine does too.
I sink back in the chair, exhausted, my back aching. Mitch stays nearby, quiet, watching us.
After a while, I whisper, “I’m gonna take him to bed and just lay with him for a bit.”
He nods. “You sure?”
“Yeah,” I say. “I’m good.”
He leans down, presses a kiss to my forehead, then Landon’s head. “Call me if you need anything.”
“I will.”
I don’t see him leave.
I just feel the house settle again—quiet, breathing, holding us.
And realize he never actually went home at all.