29. Freya
— ? —
Freya
I couldn’t sleep, so I went to sit in the nursery, and Rex followed me like he always did now.
So I gave up trying to sleep and waddled down the hall to the room we’d spent months preparing.
The nursery was perfect. Soft yellow walls, white curtains billowing gently in the breeze from the cracked window, the rocking chair Rex had ordered from some fancy furniture maker after I complained about the one from the store being too hard.
The bookshelf was full of stories I couldn’t wait to read aloud, classics I remembered from my childhood and new ones I’d discovered during late-night browsing.
And in the center of it all, the crib Rex had built with his own two hands.
It was still crooked. Despite multiple attempts to fix it, the thing listed slightly to the left, and one of the rails had a visible dent from where he’d hit it too hard with the hammer.
The changing table wobbled if you breathed on it wrong, and the rocking horse in the corner had its mane on backward.
It was the most beautiful room I’d ever seen.
I lowered myself into the rocking chair, a production that involved multiple attempts and a fair amount of ungraceful maneuvering, and sat in the darkness, one hand on my belly.
“Hi, Alma,” I whispered. “Can’t sleep either, huh?”
A kick in response. This kid was going to be a night owl, I could already tell.
The door creaked open, and Rex appeared in the doorway, hair mussed from sleep, wearing nothing but pajama pants that hung low on his hips.
“You okay?” he asked, his voice rough.
“Couldn’t sleep. I didn’t mean to wake you.”
“You didn’t. I just… I can always tell when you’re not there.” He crossed the room and crouched beside the rocking chair, his hand joining mine on my belly. “She keeping you up?”
“She’s practicing for the Olympics, I think. Either that or she’s already taking after her father and refusing to sleep at reasonable hours.”
“I sleep at reasonable hours.”
“You were up until 2 a.m. last night answering emails.”
“Those were important emails.”
“They were emails about quarterly projections. That could have waited until morning.”
He had the grace to look sheepish. “Okay, fair point.”
We sat together in the quiet nursery, the moonlight painting silver stripes across the floor. Outside, the ranch was silent, the kind of deep Texas darkness that had felt oppressive when I first came here but now felt like home.
“I’ve been thinking about the vows,” Rex said eventually.
“What vows?”
“For the wedding. The real wedding.” He stood and moved to lean against the crooked crib. “I know we haven’t set a date yet, but I’ve been writing mine. In my head, mostly. Sometimes on paper.”
“You have?”
“I want to get them right this time. Not generic promises about love and honor. Real things. Specific things.” He looked at me, his expression open and vulnerable in a way I was still getting used to.
“I want to promise to always ask about your day instead of assuming I know. To never call your feelings silly, even when I don’t understand them.
To choose you over comfort, every single time. ”
My throat tightened. “Rex…”
“I want to promise to build more crooked cribs. To make you hot cocoa during thunderstorms. To learn the names of all your students and remember what they’re working on.
” He laughed softly. “I want to promise to watch all eleven hours of Lord of the Rings with you, even the parts with the trees that talk.”
“The Ents are important to the plot.”
“I’m sure they are.” He pushed off the crib and crossed to kneel beside me again. “I want to promise to be the husband you deserve. Not perfect, I’m never going to be perfect. But present. Attentive. Yours.”
I reached out and cupped his face in my hands. “I love you.”
“I love you too.”
I kissed him. Softly at first, then deeper, my fingers sliding into his hair. He made a sound low in his throat and pulled me closer, as close as my enormous belly would allow, anyway.
“We should go back to bed,” he murmured against my lips.
“Bed is too far.”
“Freya-”
“I’m serious. I’m huge and uncomfortable and if we try to walk all the way down the hall, the mood will be completely ruined.”
He pulled back to look at me, his eyes dark with desire and something that might have been amusement. “Are you suggesting what I think you’re suggesting?”
“There’s a perfectly good rug right there.”
“You’re eight and a half months pregnant.”
“I’m aware.”
“That can’t be comfortable.”
“Nothing is comfortable anymore. At least this would be fun.” I raised an eyebrow. “Unless you don’t want to?”
His answer was to kiss me again, harder this time, his hands finding the hem of my nightgown.
We ended up on the nursery rug, soft and plush, something we’d picked out specifically because it would be comfortable for tummy time, with Rex hovering over me, being impossibly careful despite the urgency I could feel in every line of his body.
“This is ridiculous,” I said, laughing as he tried to figure out the logistics.
“Completely ridiculous.”
“We’re going to traumatize the baby.”
“She’s not even born yet. She’ll be fine.” He found a position that worked, and suddenly I stopped laughing.
It was awkward and wonderful and nothing like the movies. We had to stop twice so I could adjust my position, and at one point Rex accidentally elbowed the rocking horse and it made an alarming creaking sound that sent us both into giggles.
We lay tangled together on the rug, breathing hard, staring at the ceiling.
“That was-” Rex started.
“Don’t say romantic.”
“I was going to say athletic.”
I laughed so hard the baby kicked in protest.
“We should probably get up,” I said eventually. “This floor is getting uncomfortable.”
“In a minute.”
“Rex-”
“Just let me have this. One more minute of lying here with you in our daughter’s room, pretending I’m not terrified about being a father.”
I turned my head to look at him. “You’re terrified?”
“Obviously. I have no idea what I’m doing. What if I mess her up? What if I turn out like my mother, putting conditions on my love?”
“You won’t.”
“How do you know?”
“Because you care enough to worry about it.” I reached over and took his hand. “You’re going to be an amazing father, Rex. I know it like I know my own name.”
He squeezed my fingers, and we lay there for another moment in comfortable silence.
Then I felt it.
A rush of warmth between my legs. A sensation unlike anything I’d experienced before.
I sat up suddenly, my hand flying to my belly.
“Rex.” My voice came out strange. Calm on the surface, but with something urgent underneath. “Rex, my water just broke.”
He went absolutely still. “Your- what?”
“My water. It broke.” I looked down at the rug we’d just been lying on. “On the nursery floor.”
“But you’re not due for two or three weeks.”
“Babies don’t follow schedules.”
He scrambled to his feet, his eyes wild, all the calm confidence of the man who ran a billion-dollar empire completely gone. “Okay. Okay, we need… hospital. We need to go to the hospital. Where’s your bag? I packed a bag, where did I put-”
“By the front door.”
“Right. Right, okay.” He helped me to my feet, his hands shaking. “Can you walk? Should I carry you? I can carry you.”
“I can walk. But maybe we should put some pants on first.”
He looked down at himself. Shirtless, pajama pants twisted around his hips, and then at me in my nightgown.
“Pants,” he agreed. “Pants first. Then hospital.”
A contraction hit, and I grabbed his arm, breathing through it the way we’d learned in the classes I’d dragged him to.
“This is really happening,” Rex said.
“This is really happening.”
He kissed me quickly, fiercely, and then we were moving, shuffling down the hall to get dressed, grabbing the bag, climbing into the car. The whole time, Rex kept one hand on me like he was afraid I’d disappear if he let go.
“I love you,” he said as he started the engine.
“I love you too.” Another contraction, stronger this time. “Now drive.”