We're skipping ahead here...
Jade and Sean were thrilled to find out that they were having a boy.
Because Sean was still in recovery, spending the first few months in rehab, then being busy with physical therapy and his psychiatrist, I accompanied Jade to most of her doctor appointments.
We all went to the gender reveal one though. Dante pushed Sean through the halls on the wheelchair that he would soon be out of and I tried to catch up with Jade who was surprisingly fast for a pregnant woman.
"Look at his thing! Is that his thing?" Jade asked, pointing to the monitor that had images of her baby on it.
"Yes, it is." The doctor laughed. "It's a boy!"
The room fell silent then. The four of us had our eyes glued to the little person on the tv in front of us. "There's a person in you." I said, stating the obvious. But in my defense, that was the first time that it actually hit me. Knowing it's gender and being able to distinguish its arms and legs made it so much more real in my mind.
"Whoa... I'm having a son." Sean said, glassy-eyed.
I looked over at Dante who had the strangest look on his face.
"Don't get any ideas." I gently nudged his side.
"Hmm... it might be too late, Skyla."
Although Sean wanted to be kept up to date with everything baby related, his relationship with Jade still wasn't... solid. They had never established themselves as anything other than soon to be parents. They acted like nothing more than friends but calling them friends was off the table. They didn't like to be called the f-words, but they also didn't want anyone to say that they were in an official relationship...
But I guess that was understandable considering the fact that they were never anything and Sean's accident delayed them in becoming anything.
They did live together which just made the whole situation even more confusing. Susan and Anthony allowed Sean and Jade to move into their furnished garage which had everything in it that a regular house would. Kitchen, bathroom, living room, bedrooms. It was huge.
I was positive that it was Susan's doing though. She hired nurses and was also available around the clock for her recovering son. She seemed to be the most enthusiastic about the baby. I guess she didn't think Sean would ever give her grandkids, or have children that he knew about...
So having her son and grandson living in the house right beside her mansion was a dream come true in her eyes. Her husband, on the other hand, wasn't too thrilled. He saw Jade as some random girl that his son knocked up and would spend the next eighteen years paying child support to.
The baby ended up being born near the end of that summer. I was actually with her the moment she went into labor.
Dante had taken Sean to his weekly physical therapy appointment so Jade and I decided to do some necessary shopping. And I say necessary because if it wasn't, the moody pregnant woman would not leave the house.
She needed to decide on a crib once and for all. I guess shopping with a billionaire's card made the possibilities endless. Money was not an issue when it came to the baby so Jade was torn between two very expensive cribs.
"Skyla, why the f*ck are you walking so slow? Hurry up I want to get out of here already." My pregnant friend snapped. She was quicker now than she had been before getting pregnant.
"Okay, okay. Sorry, but these shoes–"
"F*ck!" She yelled. I thought it was directed at me so I jumped behind a clothes rack and hid.
"I think I f*cking peed on myself." She announced to everyone who was in a ten-foot radius of us.
"What?" I ran out of my hiding place. "You peed on yourself?"
"I don't know but something just came out of my vagina."
I looked down to see a puddle on the floor beneath us. After the second trimester, it didn't matter the weather, Jade wore nothing but dresses. And when it was one of those maxi dresses that went down to her ankles, you could probably guess that she was going commando and be right.
Today was a maxi dress kind of day.
"Um... I don't think that's pee." By that point, the entire store was staring at us. "I think you're water just broke." The baby was due next week, but he was not going to wait.
"What? No, no, no. I can't do this today. I need to get the crib and Sean — ow!"
"Well, it's happening today whether you're ready or not." I tried not to yell out in pain from her death grip as she squeezed my wrist. "I'll call your driver, where's your phone?"
"But Sean's at his appointment and how am I going to have a baby but no crib or bassinet? Where am I supposed to put him, he's going to have nowhere to sleep, Skyla I'm not ready. Things were supposed to be – f*ck – perfect but their not. Ow!"
"I'll have Sean and Dante meet us there. Besides I know what crib you want, I'll make sure to have it set up by the time you guys come home."
"Okay." She finally agreed.
We arrived at the hospital first, then Susan came with no Anthony, and about fifteen minutes after that Dante and Sean arrived.
"You're coming in with me, right?" She asked after the doctor left.
"Um..." No.
"Skyla, you have to come in with me. I can't do this by myself." She pleaded.
"You won't be alone. Sean will be there and so will Susan." Jade and Susan seemed to have formed a mother-daughter relationship.
"Skyla you are coming in that f*cking delivery room with me. You're my best friend, you're like my sister. I need you to come in with me."
I rolled my eyes at her guilt trip but agreed to go. "Fine."
The 'miracle' of childbirth was absolutely horrifying. The screams, the blood, the parts of the body that shouldn't be stretched out the way they were. At one point things just escalated a little too far and I had to stand behind Jade and let her crush my hand. I would take a broken hand over witnessing that any day.
Dante was lucky that he wasn't invited in.
"Oh f*ck Jade, how are you doing this?" Sean asked, just as horrified as I was. "Look at his head! Oh my God!"
"You're not f*cking helping!" She screeched at the final push.
All this potty language being used around their new baby, I thought to myself.
I had to admit, aside from the fluids, screams, and stretching, at the end of it all, I was kind of glad that she forced me to go in with her. The baby was absolutely beautiful. He had soft blonde hair and the greenest eyes I had ever seen.
Everyone else had tears running down their cheeks as they huddled around him, but I stood there in shock at what I just witnessed.
It made me want to have one of my own.
(Quick confession: I suck, I can't remember if I named Jades baby so I'm going to do it now if I already did, let me know so I can change it 😂)
Julian, as cute as he was, was a handful.
He was the cutest and sweetest little person I had ever seen... while being carried that is because the second you put him down that was it. He would scream bloody murder until someone picked him up again.
At first, they'd call Dante and I every single night at all different hours, practically in tears, begging us for help.
"I don't know what to do!" She cried. "He won't be quiet, and the nanny went home."
"Jade! He peed on me get me a diaper!" Sean called from the other room.
That was usually the end of our conversations because she would then hang up and run to help him.
Anthony warmed up to the idea of Jade and Julian becoming part of the family. Actually, he loved his grandson more than he seemed to love his actual son.
He would go out and buy him grandfather themed clothes and matching hats. It was pretty sweet.
Eventually, they became experts at parenting and I knew exactly who to call once my baby started acting up.