Page 122 of All I Need

Two years later

JOSTLING ELLIE, I TELL HER, “It’s time.”

Her eyes flutter open, a frightened look on her face that I try to wipe away with a brush of my lips to her forehead. “I’m… I don’t think I’m ready.”

“We are, though.”

A single tear leaks from her eye and she grips my arms braced beside her. “Together?”

I nod, elbows bending as I swoop down to kiss her lips. “Forever.”

I slowly wake from the dream I’ve been having for months now. It started just a few times a week but the closer and closer we get, the more frequent the dreams come. Every time the phone rings, I jump, wondering if this is the moment that Lily Cole, our social worker, is calling to tell us that we have a child waiting for us.

Making the decision to foster a baby was a risky one. We knew there would be a chance that the baby wouldn’t stay in our home if the birth parents decided they wanted to keep him or her. But that’s what was laid on our hearts and there was no denying that we felt strongly we were being led in this direction.

And then one day the phone call we’d been waiting for all that time was not what we expected.

When Lily first told us about Amber, a nineteen-year-old mom who’d gotten pregnant with twins but was unsure of her next steps, we weren’t sure it was meant to be. Fostering had been the only thing on our minds since we first started talking about expanding our family of fourteen.

Six goats.

Two dogs.

Three cows.

One cat.

But Lily was insistent that we needed to talk to Amber.

So we did.

We walked out of Dreamin’ Beans, tears in both our eyes, hope blooming in our chests. That hope was squashed, though. Amber went back and forth for the next few months, not knowing if she was ready to give up her babies. The baby’s father wasn’t in the picture, said he was too young and wasn’t ready to be a father so he signed away his rights. It was an emotional time. The not knowing was the worst but we both felt sure that those babies were meant to be ours so we rallied, supported Amber how we could and demonstrated patience neither of us knew we had.

We understood that. Offered an open adoption. A way for her to stay involved in the twins’ lives. We let her know that we were still considering fostering for the future. It would never be off the table. There were too many children who needed love.

She was good with that. I think it’s what helped her make her final decision, actually. She grew up in the system and knows how hard it is on a child.

The phone rings, waking me up from my restless sleep.

“Hello?”

“It’s time,” Lily’s voice is urgent through the phone line.

“We’re on our way,” I tell her, quickly hitting the red button on the phone and tossing it back on the nightstand.

“It’s time?” Ellie asks, and I’m so damn grateful that her face is full of excitement rather than the trepidation I had been dreaming of.

“It is.”

“Holy crap, Walker. We’re gonna be parents!”

“We are. Together.”

“Forever.”

“God I love you so fucking much,” I say, kissing her square on the mouth.

“I’ll remind you of that when I’m covered in spit up and poo, hair greasy from never showering and I have bags under my eyes because we’re way too old for this shit,” she teases.

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