Forced Reconciliation

71.

Andi Styles

20 WEEKS PREGNANT

"Where you goin', momma?"

As I tie the strappy heel up my ankle, my eyes flick to Ellie whos' watching my every move so closely, it almost makes me nervous. "Mommy has something she needs to do. But I won't be gone for long. Harper's going to come over and play with you for a bit while I'm gone. Is that okay?"

As expected, Ellie jumps up and down in excitement over this. She loves Harper, so all I really had to do was mention her and she couldn't care less what I'm up to.

Rome plays with my makeup brushes on the floor, watching himself in the full length mirror as he goes to put the fluffy brush in his mouth. "No, hey, let's not do that, baby." I grab the brush from his hand and replace it with one of his toys. "There we go. So much better."

"Where's daddy?"

"Daddy had some work to do this morning, but he should be back soon. Maybe even before me."

Harry's meeting with his entire publicity team today, going over the next few months and how they anticipate everything working out now that he's made a statement about his drinking problem. Apparently, they thought it was going to change the trajectory of his album sales quite a bit, so they wanted to run it by him.

I'm not so sure that's true, though. I've seen all the responses from the media and his fans, and while there are definitely some harsh critics that only have nasty words, the majority of people have shown nothing but support for Harry.

"Where's my baby beanie sister?" Ellie giggles. She's picked up on the 'baby bean' thing from Harry and has now added her own little twist to it.

"She's still in momma's tummy, El."

Ellie groans and tosses her head back dramatically. "How much longer is she gonna be in there?"

Once I have both heels laced up and secured, I crouch down next to Ellie so I'm eye level with her. "A few more months until she's here."

"How many is a few?"

Her curiosity always manages to make me smile. "Well, it's March right now, and baby sister is going to be here in July. Do you remember when I taught you the months of the year?"

Ellie smiles and nods as she starts singing the months in a sing-song tone to the rhythm that I taught her a couple of months ago. "April, May, June, July, August..." she sings through the entire year —mispronouncing almost every month— and my heart fills with pride.

"You're so smart, babe! Okay, so it's March now, so that means we have April, May, June, and July until baby sister is here." I count on my fingers and hold up the final count. "That means four more months!"

"Hey! I'm almost four!"

"You're right you are almost four." She's growing up so quickly that it's actually frightening.

Ellie opens her mouth to say something else just as the doorbell rings and the sound of the front door is being opened. Her eyes go wide at the noise and she throws a hand over her mouth in excitement. "Harpy's here!"

"Better go get her!" With that, Ellie takes off running out of the bedroom and down the stairs. Rome runs after her, but I hurry to catch him just before he makes it to the stairs. "Come with momma down the stairs, Romey. You're getting so big but you're not that big." I hold his hand with every step down the stairs, letting him do it on his own but still making sure he doesn't tumble down.

"You look very hot," Harper compliments. "Where are you going looking like that?"

I glance at myself in the reflection of the floor-to-ceiling window to see my look for the day. I needed to look the part of the kind of woman I'm trying to channel for today, so I went with something that made me feel good and confident. I'm wearing an oversized green button-up that I'm pretty sure I thrifted years ago. It fits as a dress and I've paired it with a pair of black strappy heels that tie up the back of my ankle.