Kate’s eyelids were falling closed, and she let her head sink into her pillow.
“Can we have happy face pancakes for breakfast?” Melody asked.
“Hmm?” Kate said. “Mmm-hmm, sure.”
“Can I go ice skating with you tomorrow?” Melody asked, turning to me.
“Yeah, sure.”
“Will you take me in the Jeep, with the top off?”
I smiled, remembering how much she liked the wind blowing her hair all over the place. “Yep. And we can have lunch with Luke if you want to.”
“Lukey? Yeah!”
Melody had wrapped Luke around her little finger the first time they’d met. She had that effect on everyone.
“I think Kate’s asleep,” Melody whispered.
“She was pretty tired,” I whispered back. “You should go to sleep, too.”
“Will you rub my back?”
“Yep.”
She turned around and I rubbed my palm in circles on her back. A couple times I’d sat next to her bed and did this to help her fall back asleep after bad dreams.
“How long until the baby’s coming?” she asked. It was a question she asked almost every day.
“Three more months. 13 weeks.”
After a few seconds of silence, she spoke again. “Are you guys gonna get rid of me when you have your own kid?”
My hand stopped mid-circle. “What? Mel, look at me.”
She turned onto her back and gazed at me, her hazel eyes big and sad.
“We’re never getting rid of you. Remember the day the adoption was finalized and we told you you’re our daughter now?”
“Yeah. But I thought you might change your minds when you have your own baby.”
A wave of protectiveness surged through me. “We’ll never change our minds. We love you. You’re not any different than the baby to us.”
“I wish you were my real dad.” She whispered it so softly I barely heard the words.
“You’re my little girl now,” I said. “That’s real.”
Her tiny head nodded in the darkness.
“I want to tell you something,” I said, sitting up so I could look down at her.
“A story?”
“No, not a story. This is something real. Before I met Kate, I had another wife. Her name was Maggie. And like your first mom and dad, she died. I was sad for a long time, but then I met Kate and fell in love with her. She’s my wife now, and just because I was married before, that doesn’t mean Kate’s not my real wife. It’s like that with us. Families are made in lots of different ways. But that’s what we are, Melody. Me and you and Kate and the baby are a family, and that lasts forever. Okay?”
“And Stanley,” she added.
I grinned. “And Stanley. How could I forget him?”
Her lips curved up into a smile and she nodded again. I sighed, relieved. Kate was much better at all this than I was. It would’ve broken her heart to hear Melody ask if we were getting rid of her.
“What if I wanted to call you daddy? And Kate mommy?”
My throat tightened. Hearing this would’ve made Kate giddy. She’d told me about her hope that Melody would one day want to call her mommy, but she didn’t want to say anything to her that would make her feel pressured.
“That would be …” I cleared my throat. “We would both love that.”
“I want to sometimes. But then it makes me think of … you know.”
I nodded, again wishing Kate was awake to help me with this conversation. “You can call us whatever you want. When bad stuff happens to us, it takes a long time to … get better, you know? It never really goes away, but it doesn’t feel as bad as time goes on.”
“Yeah.” She yawned deeply. “That’s what Kate said. She said sometimes your heart can have bruises, and it takes a while for them to feel better.”
“She’s pretty smart, isn’t she?”
Melody smiled and her eyes slid shut. “And nice. And beautiful.”
She’d be out in a second. I’d managed to calm my scared kid back to sleep. Kate would’ve laughed at my satisfied sense of accomplishment.
Chapter 15
There were only a few seconds left in the hockey game I was watching Ryke and his team play on TV. And since they were down 4-2, there was no hope for a win. I turned the sound down and curled up on the couch on my side, laying a palm over my belly.
I was 38 weeks pregnant. 13 days from my due date. My appointment earlier today was still fresh in my mind, Dr. Polanski’s words ringing in my ears.
“Everything looks good, Kate. Anytime you go into labor, the baby will be okay.”
As long as there were no complications during the delivery. But still, his words had brought me some relief. The baby was okay. I came home and ordered the crib Melody and I picked out a couple weeks ago, and also a car seat and other essentials.