I asked Sophia to stay home with me, not realizing it was one of her off days, anyway. The third trimester belly really rattled me last night, and I needed her. My head reeled with panicked thoughts. I focused so much energy on hiding from the world and being paranoid about our safety that I never considered what happens at and after the birth. How bad will it hurt? I’m having c-section, but what about labor? Will my son be easier to explain after he’s born? Is the world open enough to accept someone as different as him? Can our lives ever be normal again? We lingered in bed for a while and talked about these things. Though we didn’t arrive at any conclusions, it was nice to discuss them with her.
A knock at the front door interrupted us. I almost forgot about the contractors and got up to get dressed, but Sophia told me she would handle them. Bless her. I took a nice long shower as I considered some of my earlier questions. Even though we didn’t have the answers, one thing was for certain. It was past time for me to stop wallowing in fear and shame. I needed to man up and deal with it.
When I got downstairs, Sophia said she instructed the contractors to only modify half of the room. With only one other room available, that room would have to be his even beyond the baby stage. We could keep the single bed and dresser for when he’s older and then just change out the crib for a toddler bed when he’s ready. I didn’t think of any of that. She’s so much smarter than me.
A stack of boxes in the dining room caught my eye. Sophia collected the ones from yesterday and the ones that arrived this morning so I could open them while she was gone. But since she was here, we opened the presents together and set everything up after breakfast. I really do have the best friends in the entire world. Maira sent diapers and toys for when he’s a little older. Justin sent a portable crib. Chi Chi sent a bottle warmer and formula. And of course Dub had to top them all with a very expensive looking baby monitoring system with a 4K screen, a camera with night vision, and automatic daily backups to the cloud. He was the most generous sim I knew. Unboxing everything with Sophia was fun. It temporarily took my mind off what happened to me and what’s going to happen to me. For just a few moments, I was excited about having a new child enter our lives, not some alien that haunts me every day.
By the time we were done, the contractors were leaving. We had a nursery. I loved what they did, but to be honest it was kinda cringe—at least to me. The room was already green, so they kept the same colors and did a forest theme. That made complete sense. Why would do they do anything different? But what if the baby is green? Would it offend him and his kin? Is it ignorant of me to even assume aliens are green?? I only know what I see on TV. Apart from the color, I love what they did. He should be very comfortable in there.
Thick weeks around the money tree threatened to choke it out, so I tackled them as best I could, knowing getting on my knees would probably be a mistake. No sooner than I got down there, I heard a not-so-subtle throat clearing behind me.
“What are you doing?” Sophia asked.
My beautiful warden caught me. I explained I was tired of being inside, and I saw the weeds and figured I’d take care of them. She said she would have done it, and I knew she would, but she missed the point. I’m no good at sitting around and doing nothing. I gotta keep myself busy or I’ll go nuts. She said she wouldn’t throw me in jail if I paid the price of one kiss on the cheek.
That was a price I could definitely afford without consulting my lawyer, heh. I got up—with her help, of course—and leaned in for the kiss. But just as I reached her cheek, she turned her head, and my lips collided with hers.
“If you wanted a real kiss, you could have just led with that,” I said.
I yanked her as close to me as I could get her and kissed her as passionately as I could.
She pulled away.
“Stop before you get ME pregnant!”
“That’s not funny,” I said.
Knowing I couldn’t actually get her pregnant hurt a little, but I loved her ability to maintain her sense of humor despite everything life threw at us. She was always the one to keep us afloat when life tried to tank us.
“I really love you,” I said.
“I know that.”
“I know you know, but I feel like I haven’t said it in a while.”
“You’re saying it now.”
“I am. I love you, Sophia. I couldn’t have gotten through any of this without you.”
