Chapter Twenty-Six
Rose
The waiting room might as well be our own personal lounge with how many people we have crammed in here.
It’s both hilarious and beautiful.
We’ve taken over most of the chairs, there are jackets and bags everywhere, and someone keeps moving the balloons because they’re blocking the television.
Nobody is watching the television, but that has somehow failed to resolve the balloon issue.
Every fifteen minutes somebody relocates them, somebody else complains, and the balloons begin another leg of their journey around the room.
For Michael and me to go from having mostly just each other to... this? All these fucking people? I don’t think I’ll ever get used to it.
We’re all orphans in one way or another.
Some of us literally. Some with parents who were technically alive but had no business being called parents.
Some lost people too young, and some simply never had the kind of family they needed until they stumbled into one somewhere else.
None of us came together the normal way, whatever the hell the normal way even is, but somehow we did.
And now we’re all sitting in a hospital waiting room at an ungodly hour because two of our babies decided to come at the same damn time.
Our babies.
I know they aren't actually our babies, and if I say that around Michael right now he'll probably make me fill out visitation paperwork, but that's what they feel like. This entire room has been waiting for them.
Samson and Lauren are here with the kids and have naturally taken over the parental side of the operation.
They’re making sure everyone has eaten, forcing bottles of water into people's hands and periodically asking when someone last slept, which feels a little ambitious considering none of us have any intention of sleeping until Blaire delivers.
Lauren handed me a bottle of water earlier, watched me take one sip, then stood directly in front of me until I drank half of it.
I didn’t even argue.
That’s how you know tonight has gotten weird.
Samson has been doing what Samson does, checking on people without making it obvious he's checking on them. He’s talked to Joe’s family, checked on James about six times without ever actually asking if he’s okay, and keeps finding reasons to wander near whichever person looks like they might be winding themselves up.
Meanwhile, he's just as anxious as the rest of us. He’s simply better at hiding it.
They're just being them.
Jade and Macy claim a corner of the waiting room and make their rounds every little while, usually because they’re bored or because they’ve decided somebody somewhere knows something they haven't been told yet.
Jade has already attempted to charm information out of two nurses. Macy apologized to both of them.
A few members of Jenn and Joe’s family are here too, and somewhere over the last few hours we've somehow knighted them into our inner circle of chaos.
They're sharing snacks and phone chargers now.
One of Joe's cousins brought coffee for everybody.
His mother and Lauren have exchanged baked-good recipes.
It's over for them.
They're family now.
Jenn’s baby arrived a little over an hour ago.
We haven’t been able to go back and see either of them yet because she started shaking pretty badly after the delivery.
The nurses told us it can happen after an epidural, especially with the hormones and adrenaline crashing all at once, so they’ve got her in recovery until it passes and she’s feeling more like herself.
I know she's okay.
They've told us she's okay.
Joe came out and personally told us she's okay.
I would still very much like to lay eyes on her myself.
He only stayed in the waiting room for a few minutes before going back to her. Long enough to tell everyone that both mom and baby are healthy, his son is beautiful and, according to Joe, looks exactly like his dad.
The baby is approximately an hour old.
He looks like a potato.
I didn't tell Joe that because the man was already a complete fucking mess. Hair everywhere, eyes swollen, hospital gown half untied, crying so hard he had to stop twice while telling us how perfect his son is.
Rightfully so. I don’t think he made it through three consecutive words without crying, laughing or stopping to wipe his face. He kept saying, “I have a son,” like he needed to hear himself say it before he could believe it.
I can’t wait to meet the little guy, but there’s no rush. Jenn just pushed an entire human out of her body. She can take all the damn time she needs before the rest of us descend on her like a very emotional parade.
James has been on his Switch with his brother and sister most of the night. He’s trying to act like this is all perfectly normal, but every time one of those doors opens, his head shoots up.
Actually, all of our heads do. Then we pretend they didn’t.
My parents should be here. That part hurts today especially.
My mom should be sitting beside me asking every five minutes if we’ve heard anything.
My dad would’ve found some random man in the waiting room to talk to and known his entire life story by now.
They should’ve met Jackson. They should’ve seen Michael become a father. They should’ve been part of this.
I wish I didn’t have to lose them to have the life I have now. I wish both things could’ve existed at the same time.
But I wouldn’t change this life or these people.
There was probably a time when admitting that would’ve made me feel guilty, like loving what came after somehow meant I loved what came before less.
It doesn’t anymore.
I feel Jackson’s palm cup my jaw and blink, realizing I must’ve spaced out again. I lean into his hand and look up at him.
“Hi, baby.”
“Hi,” I say through a mountain of tears I haven’t even bothered trying to hide.
Look at me crying in public without pretending I have something in my eye. Take that, personal growth.
His thumb swipes beneath one of my eyes. “A little emotional?”
I nod.
He studies me for a second, then lifts the blanket covering his legs. “Come here.”
I don’t need to be asked twice. He pulls me onto his lap and wraps the blanket around both of us before settling his arms around my waist. I tuck my face into the crook of his neck and let myself relax against him.
“You okay?” he asks quietly.
“Yeah.”
“You sure?”
I nod against his neck. “Just looking at everybody.”
He glances around the waiting room. “There’s a fucking lot of us.”
I laugh and wipe my cheek against his shirt. “That’s what I was thinking.”
“Pretty sure we violated the fire code an hour ago.”
“Probably.”
His hand moves slowly along my back for a while before he asks, “Tell me what’s really got you emotional.”
Damn him.
I stay tucked against him because saying it feels easier when I don’t have to look at his face.
“I was thinking about how it used to just be me and Michael, and now look at us. My parents would’ve loved this.
” I swallow around the knot forming in my throat.
“I’ve been thinking about them a lot lately, and today it’s hitting harder than usual. I just wish they were here for this.”
“I know, baby.”
I close my eyes and settle my head against him again.
“They would’ve loved you,” I tell him after a minute.
He kisses the top of my head.
“Obviously.”
I snort and pull back enough to look at him. “They would’ve thought you were an asshole.”
“They could’ve loved me and had good judgment.”
The laugh comes out hard enough that a couple people look over at us. Jackson just smiles and pulls the blanket higher around my shoulders like getting me to laugh was the entire point.
Asshole.
I settle back against him, still smiling.
Yeah.
They would’ve loved him.
“Rose.”
Michael’s voice cuts through the haze of the moment, and I lift my head from Jackson’s shoulder.
“Rosalie.”
He sobs my name as he rounds the corner, and the second I see his face, I’m moving. I’m off Jackson’s lap and running toward my brother before I even register standing up.
Michael meets me halfway and lifts me straight off the floor, wrapping both arms around me so tightly I can barely breathe. His face disappears into my hair, his entire body shaking against mine while I hold on just as hard.
“I have a daughter,” he gets out through wracking sobs. “She’s here, Rose. I’m a dad.”
And there goes whatever composure I had left.
My brother is a dad.
I bury my face against his shoulder as my own tears come harder, because suddenly I’m seeing every version of Michael at once.
My little brother holding my hand when we buried our parents even though he was hurting just as badly as I was.
The kid I spent years protecting, worrying over, threatening to murder at least twice a week.
The one constant I had when our entire lives changed and neither of us knew what the fuck we were supposed to do next.
For so long, when Michael and I said family, we mostly meant each other.
Now he has a daughter.
“Oh my God.” A laugh breaks through my tears as I pull back enough to look at him. “Mikey, you have a daughter.”
“I have a fucking daughter.”
The wonder in his voice nearly takes me out all over again. His cheeks are soaked, his eyes are bloodshot, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen my brother look this happy.
“Is she okay?”
He nods, wiping uselessly at his face. “She’s perfect. She’s so fucking tiny, Rose. I don’t even know how she’s that small.”
I laugh because I’m not entirely sure what size he expected a newborn to be. “And Blaire?”
His face changes immediately. Somehow the smile gets even bigger while fresh tears fill his eyes.
“She’s good. She did so fucking good.” He shakes his head and looks down for a second, searching for words that evidently don’t exist. “Fuck, Rose, you should’ve seen her. I don’t know how she did that. I don’t know how she fucking did that.”
The awe in his voice makes me smile through my tears.
“I’m so proud of you.”
He gives me a wet laugh. “I didn’t do shit.”
“You know what I mean.”