Treasure Hunt (boyxboy)

Treasure Hunt | Chapter Thirty-Two

Loran and Logan were playing with Zach and Treasure out in the backyard, Logan pushing Treasure on the swings as Loran threw a football for Zach to catch and then throw back. I stared out the kitchen window, a coffee mug filled to the brim with tea in my hands. Next to me, Ariel watched with me. It'd been nearly a week since we found out that I was pregnant, but last night after the kids went to bed, Loran and I had decided it best then to tell Ariel and Logan. They were ecstatic, Ariel soon revealing that her and Logan had decided they wanted to try for a baby, too. They hadn't had much luck yet, but that wasn't gonna stop them.

"Logan's gonna make such a good dad," She mused, staring dreamily at him.

I couldn't argue with her. He was extremely good with Treasure when she was a baby all the way up to now, I can only imagine he'd have been the same way with Zach. "He is," I responded, taking a drink and licking the added coffee creamer off my lips.

"He loves kids, and he's so good with yours." She smiled at me. "I'm sorry, I just can't help but be a little jealous."

"Jealous? Of what?" I laughed.

"You know," She shrugged and folded her arms over her chest. "You just seem to be able to conceive so...easily. It just seems so natural for you, I guess."

I felt the blush creep on my face and I set one hand on my still extremely flat stomach. I couldn't be that far along, definitely not more than a few weeks, three or four at the most, so it would still be way long before I started to show. "They way you're talking seems like you've been trying a lot longer than just recently. How long have you been trying to get pregnant, exactly?"

She shrugged again and stared at Logan again. "A year, give or take. We try for a couple of months and when it doesn't come back positive, we take a break for another couple months and then try again. We just aren't having any luck."

She looked extremely sad as she said that. And she had a good reason to be. I could tell she wanted children. She and Logan were finally at that point in their lives - and relationship - were they felt they were ready, and it just wasn't happening.

"Have you thought about fertility treatments?" I bit my lip.

"We decided that if we don't get pregnant within this year that we're gonna try in vitro. But I didn't want it that way, you know, I wanted it to just happen the way it's supposed to."

"Just because the baby isn't conceived naturally doesn't mean your pregnancy or motherhood has any less value or worth." She smiled and hugged me, tightly, kissing me on the cheek, small tears in the corners of her eyes. "If you want my honest opinion, do what you need to to get healthy. Loran, too. Start taking vitamins, eating healthy, working out. And stop actually trying to get pregnant. When you stop trying is when it usually happens."

"How is it you almost always know what to say to make a person feel better?"

I shrugged and laughed. "I guess it happens you have children." We were quiet for a few minutes then, still watching as they guys played with the children. "All this talk of babies, though," I cleared my throat. "I need you to do me a huge favor."

"What is it?"

"If...If this baby's delivery looks like it's going to end up how Treasure's ended up and if there ends up being a choice between saving the baby or saving me...make sure Loran chooses the baby."

"Dalton," She hugged me tight, "Of course."

"Thank you." I hugged her back, burying my face in her bright red hair and feeling comfortable. "It just makes me feel better."

We didn't know when we were planning on telling the kids, yet. Probably after we made an appointment and I didn't know when we were gonna make that for, either. There was just a lot happening at once and I didn't know if I could wrap my mind around it all at one time.

Loran laid in between my legs, the side of his head resting on my bare stomach as his fingers drew lazily across my skin. We'd laid down over an hour ago, both claiming how exhausted we were yet here we continued to lie awake, neither of us able to sleep. "You know the fight we had," This was the first word either of us had spoken since we got comfortable. "I'm sorry about how it sounded." I didn't respond so he kept talking. "I just...I don't want to think about the possibility of losing you. Watching you go through all that, I honestly didn't know if you were going to come out of it...and to think that you're pregnant again. I'm so happy that you're having my baby...believe me. I can't even fathom how happy I am. But I'm scared that you're going to go through that again and that this time you really won't come back out."

I ran my fingers through his hair, biting my bottom lip and thinking of what to say but I couldn't find anything.

"But I want you to know that I'd give my own life for this baby, already. Just like I would for Zachary, or Treasure, or hell, even you. I want you to know that I'll fight as hard as I can to make sure that if something goes wrong, that they'll save the baby first. Okay? God, I'm so scared to even have to think this."

"Let's get married."

It was a thought that bubbled up out of my throat, tumbling off of my tongue and startling me before I even realized I'd let it slip.

"What?" Loran sat up, looking at me as if I'd just grown a second, and possibly third head.

"Before the baby is born." I set my hands on my abdomen. "Unless you don't want to."

"No, no, it's not that. I want to marry you - eh, yes, I'll marry you. It's just...I envisioned this moment a little different. Like, say, I imagined it being over dinner, and, you know, me asking you."

I pulled him over me, his hands next to my head and my fingers clasping around the back of his neck. "I don't have a ring," I admitted, looking into his Lavender Grey eyes.

"That's okay," He leaned down and kissed my hard on the lips; leaving my body craving for more once he'd pulled away. "Because I do."