STRANGER EPILOGUE
Max
“How have I had three babies before this one, and none of my maternity clothes fit?”
Sara tugged at the hem of the shirt and looked up at my face in the mirror, misery written plainly on her expression. The T-shirt fit her well enough in the sleeves, the chest, the width. But it wasn’t nearly long enough: the fabric barely reached past her enormous pregnant belly.
“Because little Graham refuses to be contained,” I told her, kissing the top of her head. “I fear for your ability to sneeze without wetting yourself.”
“That’s been true since Annabel.” She turned, leaning back against the bathroom counter. Her frown turned into a tight smile. “I love you.”
I laughed. This was her new refrain these last few weeks: each time she secretly wanted to punch me, she would tell me she loved me instead.
I didn’t have to ask her to know it was true; I had been told I love you a lot.
My giant-headed babies made her pee when she sneezed: I love you, Max.
We had to ask for a table instead of a booth at her favorite breakfast dive in Hell’s Kitchen because my giant spawn took up too much space: I love you, Max.
Our second daughter, Iris—who was barely two—had already broken her arm once trying to “play rugby” at the park: I love you, Max.
Our life was a jumble of kids and spilled juice and work calls taken in the loo and wiping jelly stains off furniture. But in reality I didn’t fear our even more chaotic future. Sara loved having babies more than she loved nearly anything, and we both seemed to be able to roll with the insanity pretty well. I told her I’d be fine with three. She wanted five. Even as pregnant as she was, she hadn’t yet changed her tune.
Though I might suggest after this boy that we stop at four: for the duration of this pregnancy, Sara had been . . . spirited.
Ezra screeched something at Iris in the other room, and the outburst was followed by a loud crash. I moved to the door, but Sara stopped me with her hand around my forearm.
“Don’t,” she said. “It’s just the Fisher-Price record player. That thing won’t break.”
“How on earth did you know what toy it was?”
She grinned up at me, giving me a flash of my easygoing Petal. “Trust me.” She tugged at the hem of my shirt. “Come here.”
“Why aren’t the kids in bed?” I asked, looking back over my shoulder.
“You can figure that out after you come here.”
I moved closer, bending down to kiss her, letting her tell me how much of a kiss she really wanted. And apparently she wanted deep and lingering, her hands sliding up my stomach beneath my shirt and over my chest.
“You feel good.”
I cupped her breasts. “You do, too.”
She moaned happily. “Oh God, you’re better than my best bra. Can you just walk behind me, holding those up all day?”
“You already assigned me to foot rubbing duty.” I kissed her once again, then hummed thoughtfully. “Though I suppose one task is for sitting, the other is while mobile.”
Sara stretched on her tiptoes, wrapping her arms around my neck. “You’re so good to me.”
I moved my hands down over her tight belly, feeling what was likely a foot pressing out beneath my palm. “Because I love you.”
Her big brown eyes met mine. “Did you ever imagine this?” she asked. “Four years ago, that we’d get pregnant only months after we had sex in a bar, and now we’re having our fourth baby and I can still kiss you and feel this way?”
“I suspect I’ll feel this way forever.”
“Do you miss it?” she asked, and I knew without having to translate what she meant.
“Sure, but we’ve got our return date settled.”
After Annabel, we’d taken a few months to return to our room at Johnny’s club. But after Iris, the room no longer felt quite right. We’d tried it a couple of times, tried to get back to that place where it was liberating and erotic and ours. But for whatever reason, making love in the room with the giant glass wall felt different. It was almost too intimate, too exposed. Simply put, it didn’t work anymore.
Instead, we had a new deal: Over our lunch hour, while Red Moon was otherwise closed, a brilliant photographer—whose name we never learned and who we’d never met—stood on the other side of the glass, taking beautiful photos while we made love. Johnny used them in tasteful decoration along the voyeurs’ hallway. Once or twice a month we would go for a session. More if we needed, less if life got in the way.
The regulars liked knowing we were still at it.
Sara liked being able to choose which images were used.
And I had the reassurance that we would always find a way to make this need of hers work: we would have this private pleasure between us as long as we lived.
“You’re happy?” she asked, dipping her hands beneath my shirt to press her palms to my navel.
“Fucking blissful.”
She stretched, kissing me again. “I think we should stop at four.”
I laughed into her mouth. “I think you’re right.”
“I like having a nanny. I don’t want him to quit.”
This made me laugh harder. “I think George is pretty thrilled you have a nanny, too.”
In the pocket of my trousers, my phone vibrated, and I pulled it out, reading.
My heart stilled.
“Should we get a house in Connecticut?” she asked, musing, as she kissed my collarbone. “Manhattan isn’t going to work much longer.”
I stared unblinking at my screen.
“Maybe we can drive up tomorrow, since your schedule is pretty light . . .”
I read the text again, and again.
Well, here we go. I let out a laugh. That poor bastard had no idea what was about to hit him.
“Max?”
Startling, I blinked over at her. “Yeah?”
“Maybe we could drive up to Connecticut tomorrow afternoon?”
With a grin, I turned my phone so she could read it. “Not quite yet, Petal. We’ve got a more important trip to make right now.”