The cap came off with a pop.
"Alright, let's have it," Harry said, sitting on the lounge chair beside mine in our backyard and cracking open a water bottle that he'd grabbed for himself.
"You share your birthday with at least 9 million other people in the world," I read, the refreshing taste of raspberry tea cool on my tongue.
"Hm," Harry said, sunlight reflecting off his sunglasses. "That's a bit mad, isn't it?"
I had to laugh. "Just a bit."
I took another sip, looking out at the view of L.A. from our perch beside the pool, wondering how the hell this was my life. How I was sitting here in this backyard with my gorgeous husband, sipping Snapple Iced Tea with a hand on the side of my round belly, where our daughter would only be growing for another month.
The next sip of iced tea went down a little harder than the last.
"That one's probably true," Harry said then.
It took me a moment to understand what he was talking about—the Snapple fact. "Probably, yeah. It would make sense."
My hand ran over my belly, my skin taut and warm beneath my touch, even through my sweatshirt. I was braless, only wearing one of my maternity sweatshirts over underwear because I'd felt too constricted in any clothes I put on this morning. And it was cool enough out that goosebumps kept appearing on the skin of my legs, but I had no desire to put on pants.
It wasn't a good day. I'd been having a lot less of those lately. The pain in my hips made it basically impossible for me to move around too much without frequent breaks for rest. So, while Harry and I had been planning to get out today—maybe do some Christmas shopping since we were a couple weeks away, maybe do some more shopping for baby clothes (Harry had suggested that we had enough, but I couldn't seem to help myself)—we'd ended up getting a slow start, taking our time with breakfast and showering, and then just staying home.
I didn't mind a lazy morning, but it would've been a nicer, more enjoyably experience if I wasn't also feeling so restless. And exhausted. Which was a combination that was only managing to make me nervous.
About everything.
"When do you think her birthday's going to be?" Harry asked me next.
My nerves spiked.
We were just about a month out. My due date was January 6, and there was no telling whether she would be early or late. And we still had to somehow get through Christmas with everyone here, and if my hips were still giving me as much trouble in a few weeks time, I had no idea how I would manage it. And I was pretty sure it was only going to get worse.
"Mads?"
"Oh, um... I don't know. Hopefully she'll come on time." I had both hands on my belly now, the book I'd been perusing before Harry had returned with our drinks open and facedown on top of it.
The idea that this baby wouldn't be inside me anymore—the idea that she would be a living, breathing, tiny little human in my arms in just a month's time, maybe less than a month...
A cold sweat broke out across my skin, even though a tiny thrill shot through my chest, setting off an incredible ache in my heart.
"Think she'll come early? A New Year's baby?"
I swallowed the sip of raspberry tea in my mouth, and tried not to focus on the nausea I was suddenly feeling. "Even if she doesn't, it'll still be close enough that she'll be a New Year's baby no matter what."
My baby. A New Year's baby. It couldn't be more appropriate, really. A new year was always a fresh start. It was fitting that the start of this new year would be the start of her life—the beginning of our lives together. I could think of nothing better to close out this year and welcome in the next, knowing that it would be bringing my life as I've known it for twenty-seven years to an end.
I was ready. But I was also absolutely terrified.
"I'm excited that our birthdays will be so close. Within a month of each other." I could feel him looking at me, and I was pretty sure he could sense there was something up. "We could have joint birthday parties."
I smiled despite all that I was feeling. "I'm not sure a month apart will work for joint birthday parties."
"Why not?"
I could only just see the outline of his eyes through his sunglasses. "You're trying to distract me."
"I feel like it's not working."
"It was worth a try."
Harry took his sunglasses off and set them aside as he swung his legs over the side of his chair so that he was sitting up, facing me. His hair was getting long, sticking out at odd angles around his head, making that concerned face look all the more endearing. He was shirtless, of course, and only wearing a pair of shorts otherwise. The muscles of his arms took firm shape as he leaned forward with his elbows on his knees, linking his hands together between them.
"What can I do?" he asked.
I reached for his hand, feeling like I could cry or scream—I wasn't sure which. "I don't know. Just be with me."
His hands covered mine, and the warmth from them bled into my skin. Where I was a bit cold a minute ago, I was now sweaty from all the emotions brewing inside me, and feeling a bit too warm, but I didn't want to move, and I didn't want to ask him to do any more for me than he already had today. But I especially didn't want him to leave—even if it was only to go into the house and come back.
"Always," Harry murmured then, running his thumb over the top of my hand. "How are your hips?"
"Okay." They were still throbbing a little, but without the pressure of my weight on them, they were definitely better than they'd been while I was walking around this morning.
"Maybe we should get in the pool?" he suggested.
It wasn't exactly warm enough to go for a swim, but I knew being in the water for even a few minutes would be a really great way to relieve even more of the pressure. Still, I just didn't want to move yet. "Maybe in a little while."
His lips shut—pressed together. His fingers didn't stop moving over the top of my hand, and when they closed around my wrist in a desperate way, I knew I was upsetting him, which was the last thing I wanted to do. "Are you sure there's nothing—"
"It's just a weird day," I said, wanting to reassure him. "And I think—I think it's really starting to set in that we're maybe a month away from her being here, and there's so much left to do, and we don't even have a name picked out, and I just... I just don't know if I'm ready."
Harry only stared at me for a couple moments, but it was long enough that I felt the need to go on.
"Great time to start having doubts right?" My other hand was still on my stomach, the book still open on top of it, and I stared at it, tried to laugh. "I probably should've started wondering if I could really do this eight months ago."
"Of course you can do this."
I looked at him, letting him read the disbelief on my face, and for some reason it was amusing to him.
He chuckled. "Don't look at me like that."
"Like what?"
"Like you're determined to not believe a word I'm going to say."
"I'm just scared."
"So am I," he said, still smiling. And I shut up. "I'm terrified."
Of course I knew I wasn't alone in my fears. We were in this together, going headfirst into the unknown. I'd been confident in us all this time—sure that we could do it. I'd basically had no doubts that we could do it. But now that we were getting so close, now that she was almost here, I—
I just couldn't seem to shake the fears, and it helped to know that he was scared, too.
I squeezed his hand. "What are you scared of?"
He breathed a laugh. "What aren't I scared of? That would probably be a shorter list."
"Tell me," I said, eager to feel close to him in this way. This way that meant opening up and sharing intimate secrets—things we wouldn't tell anyone else.
After a few more seconds of him simply staring at me, maybe gauging how badly I wanted to hear what he had to say, maybe even a little hesitant to reveal just how much he was afraid of...
Harry shrugged a little. "I mean, where do I start? I'm scared that I won't have a clue what to do when she gets here. I'm scared I won't know how to take care of her. I'm scared I won't... connect with her the way I'm supposed to as her father. I'm scared I'm going to mess things up somehow."
He went quiet for a little while. But I waited, sensing more.
And he was a little more hesitant when he went on, like he wasn't sure it was something he should be saying. "I—I'm scared of the way things are going to change. Between us and just—our lives now that we'll have a child to worry about and take care of. I'm scared knowing that we're leaving behind the days of just you and me, even though I'm excited and in love with our little girl already. Even though I'm excited for the way things will change."
He shrugged again. "It's all scary, isn't it?"
"It is," I said, feeling just a bit calmer now to know that a lot of his fears were my own, too. "And I have to give birth to her."
I'd been thinking about it more and more. My physical discomfort and the constant needing to pee weren't the only things keeping me up at night anymore. I'd lay awake thinking about what it was going to feel like, how much it was going to hurt, what would happen if something went wrong.
I had a plan. As much as I loved the idea of a natural birth, and even though I'd grown more confident in my Lamaze classes, I just wasn't brave enough to face it, so my new doctor here in L.A. agreed with me that painkillers would be on hand. She'd reassured me that given the way things were looking with the baby as of now, I should be able to deliver her vaginally just fine. But she'd also warned me that I was still a month out, and there was still time for things to change. We couldn't completely plan for what might happen once I was in labor. No one could. We had to roll with the punches. And if something happened that meant I would need a C-section, that's what we would do.
And I didn't know what I was more afraid of—pushing her out of my body myself, or getting cut open to get her out. I didn't particularly relish the thought of either option, but there was no help for it now.
The anxiety over what the pain would feel like, how unbearable it might be—the unknown variables—was weighing me down more and more. Because what if I couldn't do it? What if it was too much for me? I'd never had a particularly high tolerance for pain. I mean, I'd been shit-scared of getting blood taken up until a couple years ago. How the hell was I going to give birth to a baby?
But there was no use voicing any of that to anyone. My doctor knew my concerns on a rational level. She knew that I wanted drugs. She'd reassured me that every new mother is afraid—that it's totally normal to feel this way. But she didn't know that it kept me awake. She didn't know that the fear sometimes brought me to tears.
The fact was, I was eight months pregnant, and no matter how scared I was, this baby was coming out one way or another. And I had to remind myself that all the pain would be worth it when she was in my arms.
Which was when all the other fears kicked in.
"That is true." Harry laughed then, in an easy way that made me all the more jealous of men and the fact that I was the one who had to push her out of my body. "I'm scared of that for different reasons, I think."
"I don't want to be scared. I know women have been giving birth since the dawn of time, but I can't help it."
"I would be a little concerned if you weren't," Harry said then, unaware of the tight squeeze in my chest that I couldn't seem to shake. His eyes went down to my stomach, where the book was still perched. "She's pretty big, and you have to push her out of a pretty small hole."
"Thanks for that clarification."
"I just mean that it makes sense being afraid. I'm scared for you."
"That's... really not making me feel any better," I said, feeling slightly nauseous again.
He laughed and scooched forward until I was moving over, giving him room on my narrow lounge chair until my head was on his chest, and his arm was around my shoulders. It was probably a comical sight—the two of us smushed together on that chair. Just looking at my stomach protruding in the air above us, the side of it nestling against his leg, I had to laugh.
"This probably isn't a good idea."
"What d'you mean?" He was still shifting around, trying to get comfortable. "Cuddling is always a good idea."
I laughed a little more. "I'm not suggesting anything as crazy as we stop."
"Good." He stilled beside me, beneath my head, and I took a deep breath.
"I'm sorry, my girl," he said then, and I knew he was referring back to what we'd just been talking about—giving birth. His lips moved against my hair, his breath warming the skin. "I know this probably doesn't help, but I have no doubt that you can do it. Still, I—I completely understand why you're fearful. It's scary for me, and that's only because I don't want to see you in pain and because I want everything to go smoothly."
"Yeah, it, uh—" I pressed my nose into his skin, breathing him in a bit. "It's giving me more anxiety than I'd like, that's for sure."
His hand curled around my shoulder a little tighter. "I know you can do it, and I'll be with you the whole way. I'm sure everything'll be fine. Your doctor seems to think so, too."
"I know. But I really don't want things to go wrong. And even if they don't, I still hate not knowing what to expect."
We fell quiet then. And I didn't know if it was because Harry didn't know what to say, or whether he was tired of trying to comfort me. From the way his fingers circled my shoulder, the way he pressed his lips to my hair and lingered there, I had a feeling it was the former.
Not wanting to give him any more reason to feel afraid for me, I stared out at the city. I hadn't expected to bring my first baby into the world in Los Angeles. In every dream I'd ever had about it, I was always at home in New York. Always near my family.
They would be here, I reminded myself. Well... Mom would. Will, Jenny, and the girls and Mark and Emily would be here for Christmas, but they would all have to go back home after New Year's. Everyone had to get back to work and the girls would have to get back to school.
Anne and Robin would be here for the holidays, too, and Gemma was coming with her boyfriend. Whether they'd all be here for the birth of the baby, I still didn't know. But I was sure Anne would.
I couldn't have had more support. I couldn't have had more love around me. I knew very well how lucky I was to be in this situation. Having my first child with the man I loved, surrounded by the love of our families. I knew without any doubts because I hadn't been so lucky in the past. And I knew because plenty of women brought children into the world under much worse circumstances.
I hugged Harry a little tighter just as movement in my belly demanded my attention and shifted the folds of my sweatshirt.
Harry's hand went right to that movement.
Baby girl shifted again beneath his touch.
"That's always going to be incredible," he murmured, pressing his hand onto my side, where what felt like her little foot was kicking.
I could feel her fists on the other side, pushing against the layers of muscle and skin less noticeably, and I realized that I was going to miss this. This indescribable feeling of having my baby inside me, feeling her move, knowing that she was safe and well—knowing that she could hear the beat of my heart, and hoping, on some level, that she knew how much it loved her.
"Imagine how incredible it's going to be when we can hold her." I put my hand over his, holding it there.
His nose came to my temple, pressing there gently, and we fell quiet again, listening to our own thoughts as we felt her move beneath our hands.
Despite all my fears, I was so ready to hold her. She may have felt big in my stomach, but I knew she was going to be tiny. Delicate. And I knew I was never going to want to put her down. Still, though, there was plenty to worry about in that respect, too. I'd held babies before. My nieces, friends' babies... but I'd never held my baby. What if I didn't do it right? What if she wasn't comfortable in my arms? What if she never stopped crying in my arms?
What if neither of us could get her to stop crying?
I squeezed my eyes shut, snuggled further into Harry, breathing him in.
If I couldn't, he could. I didn't have a doubt in my mind that he would be able to. There was nothing like his touch to calm me, nothing like his steady, deep voice to soothe me, and nothing like his embrace, his smile, to make me feel precious and loved.
He would do that for her, too. Of that, I was absolutely sure.
"I can't wait to see you with her," I murmured, imagining the sight for the umpteenth time.
Harry, shirtless, just like he was now, with our little girl safe in his arms, tucked right against his warm skin so that she could feel and hear his heartbeat. He would stare at her like he might never look away, his green eyes gentle and loving on her little face. He would tap one of her little fists with his finger—so much larger than hers—and she would unfurl it, then grasp the pad of his finger, and he would smile that dazzling smile that made me weak at the knees. He would lean down to kiss her then, touching his soft lips to her soft head, holding them there and breathing her in—letting her know just how much he loved her, reassuring her without words that he would always be there to take care of her.
The thought was enough to have my heart swelling already, and I snuggled impossibly closer to him, smiling when I felt him pull me closer, too.
It occurred to me then that we only had maybe a month left of this type of cuddling—with my belly between us, baby girl shifting around in there, making us both smile. Who was to say that after she was born, we'd have much time for this kind of lazy snuggling anymore? We'd probably be pretty preoccupied with her, and when she was sleeping, we'd probably want to sleep, too. Everyone had already warned us multiple times that lots of things were going to change—friends, family—and we'd been nodding patiently, half-believing them, half-sure that things wouldn't change that drastically.
But it was possible that they would. Possible that we wouldn't be able to just be with each other like this for some time once baby girl arrived.
Harry had said it only a few minutes ago, which made me feel less guilty admitting it, too—to him and to myself.
"I'm scared of the way things are going to change, too," I said, and it came out as a whisper. I'd been thinking it for a while now, but it felt so selfish, so ungrateful, that I'd never said it out loud.
With his warm body pressed up against me, mine had thoroughly relaxed, which made it all the more noticeable to me when my muscles tensed again, waiting for his reply.
"Yeah?"
I angled my head to look at him, still nervous, but already feeling better for having admitted it.
"Yeah." I studied his face. The stubble around his pink lips, the small mole situated beside them, just above his jaw, his perfect nose, cheekbones, eyebrows, eyes... He smiled, his thumb finding my brow then and caressing gently. "I'll miss it being just you and me."
His head came forward then, giving me what felt like the softest kiss we'd ever shared.
I smiled at him, reaching up to tamp down his hair. It didn't work. "What if we start to grow apart?"
He took my hand and brought it to his lips. Kissed it. "That won't happen."
"It might." He kept my hand in his. "It happens to lots of new parents."
He stayed quiet for a few beats, and I knew he was thinking about that very seriously. And from the way his bottom lip jutted out, just a bit, I could tell he didn't like the thought at all.
"Well, even if it does," he said, a new determination in his eyes, "we'll find our way back to each other. We always do."
I had to smile. He said it like that was that. He said it like it would be the easiest thing in the world. He said it like it was already fact. Like there'd be no question that even if we did drift apart, we'd come back together. Because we always had.
And I loved him for that reminder. I loved him for that certainty—that faith in us. I had it, too. But it was the most reassuring thing in the world to hear it from him. To look into his eyes and know that he wanted the same things I did.
"Now..." He lifted the book still propped open on my stomach. "Enough of that kind of talk. Shall we continue?"
I sighed, staring at the open pages of the book as he peered at it beside me. "We probably should."
"Mm," he said, "How about Gertrude?"
I wrinkled my nose, barking a laugh. "Uh... pass."
He flipped through the pages, landing on a seemingly random one. "Henrietta?"
"Er, no."
He flipped through a few more. "Ethel."
"Am I giving birth to a baby or an elderly woman?"
"Fine, fine." He flipped through a few more. "I know. Babette."
I laughed a little more. "You're ridiculous."
"It got you to laugh, though."
"Give me that." I took the book from him. "Where's that pen I had?"
Harry shifted around, turning to look at the ground beside us, and it made the chair squeak enough that I stopped him. "Don't worry about it. I'll just dog-ear the pages."
He gasped. "You? Dog-ear pages?"
He knew very well how I felt about keeping my books in pristine condition. I gave his chest a light smack, smiling. "Just this once."
With some more careful angling, he managed to find the pen for me anyway, kissing my cheek as he handed it to me. I didn't let him get far before kissing his lips, loving him for the way he knew me, and the way he took care of me even in the smallest of ways.
We'd been at this for a few days. Leafing through this book my mother had sent us last week, marking names that we liked. Scratching ones that we didn't. Putting combinations of names together to try and figure out what sounded good to us.
And we'd gotten basically nowhere with it. But for me, it was easier to do it this way than it was to look online. At least in a book, there were a limited amount of names, even if it was still hundreds of pages full of them. When I'd looked online only a handful of times over the last few months, I got too overwhelmed and had to stop.
Harry hadn't been much help in that sense. He, too, felt a little frazzled about having to choose a name.
"How are we supposed to name someone we don't even know yet?" he'd asked earlier, when we'd started this out here.
"We're just picking out names that we like, Harry. We don't have to pick the name right now." I'd said it as much for myself as I had for him.
Because it was weird. We weren't naming a puppy, we were naming a human being. Our human being. And she'd be saddled with the name we chose for the rest of her life. It had to be something we loved, and something we could hear ourselves saying. But it also had to be something that would suit her, and we wouldn't know what would suit her until we actually met her.
"We'll put together a few different options and then settle on her name when she's born," I'd said, proud of myself for at least getting that far in the decision-making process.
Harry, of course, had thrown another wrench in the works. "And what if she doesn't look like any of those names?"
I'd only sighed, fearful for yet another reason. "Then back to the drawing board, I guess."
For some reason, I hated the idea of not being able to name her as soon as she was born. She was already the most important part of our lives, we already loved her so much, I didn't want her to go nameless for any more than a few hours after she entered the world. The most important part of our lives, the little human we loved more than we loved ourselves, deserved that much.
"What if we just went all out," Harry said now, watching me flip aimlessly through the book, "and pulled a real celebrity move and named her 'Kiwi'?"
"No."
"C'mon."
"No."
"You're not giving it a proper chance."
"No."
"The fans would lose their shit."
I had to laugh. "We're not naming our daughter 'Kiwi'."
Harry breathed out an exaggerated sigh. "Fine."
I giggled a little more. "I think even the fans would be disappointed in you if we did that to a poor, helpless little girl."
"Maybe some. But most would love it."
"Still no."
Harry chuckled then, bringing his thumb to my jaw from around my shoulders as I flipped through the G names, running it back and forth there affectionately. "Whatever you say, my girl."
"Are you sure there's no one in your family you want to name her after?" I asked, thinking that "Giselle" sounded like too grown up a name for a baby.
"I mean..." he started to say, sounding serious again. "I don't think so. We already sort of agreed that we wanted her to have her own name, didn't we?"
"We did, but I'm just thinking this would be a lot easier if we could name her after someone."
"That's a cop-out, Mads."
"Well, you're certainly no help. Can you blame me for wanting a loophole?"
"You're just not interested in my suggestions," he said through laughter.
I turned my face toward his, staring at him with a smile. "You suggested Gertrude."
"Gertie is a classic name, I'll have you know."
I groaned. "What about Grace?"
"Eh. Kind of unoriginal."
I flipped through the book some more, landing on a page at random. "Sadie?"
"My friend from primary school had a dog named Sadie."
I groaned again. "Do you think there's a right way to do this that we haven't caught on to yet? Something better than flipping to a random page and picking a name?" I asked, even as I flipped to a random page and scanned the names.
Harry took the book from me, eyes moving over the page full of names that started with M. "I like doing it this way. Makes it more fun."
"For you. Every name is starting to feel unoriginal to me now."
We'd agreed that we didn't want too common a name, but we didn't want to pick something too strange either. But flipping through the book like this, all of them were starting to blur together in my mind, to the point that none of them seemed special to me anymore.
"What about Madeline?" Harry said then.
I looked at him in disbelief. "Madeline?"
"What? It's not Madelyn. Though I still wouldn't mind naming her after you."
"I would." I took the book back from him, began flipping again. "That feels way too self-indulgent."
"Men do it all the time."
"Case in point."
He laughed.
I sighed, eyes moving over all the names that began with P. "We're never gonna figure this out, are we?"
"'Course we will," Harry said, dropping a kiss to the side of my head. "We've still got a whole month left."
I nodded, about to suggest "Paisley" before thinking better of it.
"Don't worry, my girl. It'll come to us. And if not," Harry went on, pressing his nose to the side of my head so that his breath of laughter sent shivers down my spine, "We can always keep 'Kiwi' as a fallback."
___
Author's Note:
A nice cozy chapter for you babes, snuggled up against a shirtless Haz :) Honestly, what could be better??
Nothing, that's what.
It also sort of feels like the calm before the storm though lmao. One last quiet moment for them before not only the baby, but their FAMILIES lol. Should be lots of fun!!
So, I hope you like this one, and I'm SO SORRY I've been majorly slacking on comments. I'm genuinely not sure at this rate I'll ever catch up. Maybe once the story's over (ugh) which sucks, because it means THE WORLD TO ME that you take the time to comment, so please know that I've read them, and I appreciate every single one, and when I can reply, I absolutely will. Love you all so much, thank you for everything!!!!!
Until next time, babes. Have the BEST two weeks! xx