Page 71 of It Must Be Fate

“Then we’re going tocompromiseon this baby being the last one,” Nera answers.

“I can be okay with that.” I pull her close once more. “Are you still happy about it?”

She softens, letting me hug her against me. “Always.”

I smile. “Me too.”

There’s a small part of me that experiences something akin to grief that this part of our life is over.

I’m not ashamed to admit that part of the reason I keep getting Nera pregnant is that I know the more babies we have, the harder it would be for her to ever leave me should she one day feel the ill-advised and futile urge to try.

The fact that I constantly search for new ways to tie her to me is because of how often she tried to run away from me—fromus—when we first started dating. Call it protective instincts or preventative measures, I don’t care. The reality is there’s nothing I won’t do to make sure she stays where she belongs; by my side for the rest of my life.

It would also be much easier to stop at five children if they weren’t all so fuckingcute. Even now, as I look down at Cato, Kiza and Suki who are pulling a slinky toy between the three of them, and at Juno who’s asleep in his carrier, the animal part of my brain is screaming “more!”.

“Mummy’s having another baby?” Kiza asks, wise beyond her years.

I crouch and grab my daughter, beaming up at Nera. “Yes, she is, darling.”

“Where?” Suki asks, inquisitive as always.

“Where what?”

“Where’s baby?”

Nera gets down on her knees next to me. She places her hand on her bare stomach.

“In Mummy’s tummy.”

Suki’s eyes widen even though she’s too young to understand any of this. “Woah.”

All three of the children minus a sleeping Juno crowd around their mother. I wrap the four of them in a big hug, making the kids squeal delightedly.

“‘Woah’ indeed,” I say, as happy as I’ve ever been.

***

Kiza and Hayes walk hand in hand just ahead of us as we approach the park where we’re meeting the rest of our friends.

“Stop at the crosswalk,” Nera calls out to them.

They listen, stopping well short of the road. Their heads come together and they start to whisper gossip back and forth as they wait for us. They started kindergarten this year and every time I come home and ask Kiza how her day was, she mentions someone new. It’s getting hard to keep track of all her friends, but I’m pleased to report she hasn’t mentioned any boys’ names more than once yet.

As we come up to them, Cato is holding his mum’s hand, Suki is in Thayer’s arms, and I’m pushing Juno’s stroller. We cross the road and enter the park, walking towards the main field where we said we’d meet the others.

“There they are,” Thayer says. She looks down at Suki and points at something in the distance. “Do you see your Uncle Rhys?”

Suki’s face lights up excitedly as they approach. “Ivy! Astra!” she screams, spotting her best friends.

“What am I, chopped liver?” Rhys answers with an offended pout.

Thayer sets Suki down and then she’s running as fast as her short little legs can take her towards her friends.

“You’re a lower priority to them,” Thayer says, walking up to her husband. She places a hand on his chest and gets up on her tiptoes to kiss him. “But not to me.”

A purr rumbles in his chest like a big cat’s. “I better not be, love.”

“Tristan!”

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