33. Danica
Danica
One Year Later
The Rosa’s House Gala was in full swing, and it was everything I’d ever dreamed of.
Kids everywhere. Not behind glass, not in a parking garage, but right in the middle of things. Running between tables, laughing, dancing, being treated like the guests of honor they were. Donors mingling with families, actually talking to them, actually seeing the faces behind the statistics.
The lawn of Rosa’s House was covered in string lights. The same Victorian house we’d stood in front of a year ago, now filled with families who needed it, had become the heart of everything the foundation stood for.
Harriet was here too.
I spotted her by the cake table, wearing Chanel and a deeply uncomfortable expression. A small child had apparently wiped frosting on her sleeve, and she was staring at the stain like it might be contagious.
But she hadn’t said anything. Hadn’t snapped at anyone. Hadn’t demanded the child be removed.
Progress.
Earlier, she’d found me by the champagne.
“Danica.” Her voice was stiff. Formal. But something in her eyes was different.
“Harriet.”
A long pause. I could see her struggling with something, working up to words that didn’t come easily.
“I’m sorry.”
Two words. Two words Stefan swore she’d never said to anyone in the family’s memory.
I almost dropped my glass.
“I was…” She took a breath. “Unkind. For years. I treated you as though you weren’t enough. You were always enough.”
I didn’t know what to say. So I just nodded.
“The cake is too sweet,” she added, and walked away.
Baby steps.
Now I was scanning the crowd, looking for Stefan. He’d disappeared about twenty minutes ago, and I had something to tell him. Something I’d been waiting to say all night.
I found him by the face-painting booth.
He was sitting in a tiny plastic chair, knees up to his chest, holding perfectly still while Mateo, eight now, chair boss emeritus, concentrated very hard on his cheek.
He had a tiger on his face.
Of course he did.
“There you are, tiger,” I said.
He looked up at me, grinning under his orange and black stripes. “Couldn’t let the kids down.”
“You look ridiculous.”
“I look amazing.” He stood up carefully, thanking his small artist, who told him not to touch it for ten minutes, and walked over to me. “Is it time for speeches?”
“Not yet.”
“Then what’s up?”
I took his hand. Guided it to my stomach.
He went very still.
“Is this… are you…”
“Term Nine,” I said. “Official.”
His face went through about seventeen emotions in three seconds, his mother’s exact number. Shock. Joy. Wonder. A little bit of terror. And then pure, overwhelming happiness.
“You’re… we’re…”
“We’re having a baby, Stefan.”
He picked me up. Spun me around. Laughed like I’d never heard him laugh before, full and bright and completely unselfconscious.
“A baby!” he shouted. “We’re having a baby!”
Heads turned. People stared. I didn’t care.
Across the lawn, I saw Harriet freeze.
Her eyes went to Stefan’s hand on my stomach. To the joy on our faces. To the obvious, unmistakable meaning of everything she was seeing.
Her champagne glass slipped from her fingers and shattered on the grass.
I waved at her.
She didn’t wave back. But she didn’t look angry either. She looked… surprised. And maybe, just maybe, a little bit happy.
Stefan set me down, cupped my face in his hands. His tiger stripes were already smudging.
“I love you,” he said. “I love you so much.”
“I love you too.”
“I’m going to be a dad.”
“You’re going to be a great dad.”
“I’m going to be a present dad. A home-by-seven dad. A phones-in-a-drawer-on-Sundays dad.”
“Contract Dad.”
He laughed. “Contract Dad. I like it.”
Around us, the gala continued. Kids played. Donors donated. The sun set over Rosa’s House, painting everything gold.
My mother’s name above the door. My husband’s arms around me. My future growing inside me.
Everything I’d ever wanted. Everything I’d almost lost.
“Hey,” Stefan said. “You know what this means?”
“What?”
“We need to update the contract. Add terms for middle-of-the-night feedings.”
“I’m putting you down for all of them.”
“Fair.”
He kissed me, right there in the middle of the gala, with a tiger on his face and a baby on the way and everyone watching.
I kissed him back.
Some things never change.
THE END