Page 82 of Between Brothers

I didn’t know it was possible to feel both elated and devastated at the same time. I was torn between wanting to drop right on my ass right then and there and start rocking back and forth, and wanting to go to her and kiss her and pick her up and swing her around cheering… I held still, though, and didn’t do either of those things until I got some kind of a measure of how she felt about it.

Her eyes bored into mine, tears sliding down her face until I ached to be able to wipe them away. I took a halting step forward the urge was so strong but her next word halted me.

“I don’t know if it’s yours, or if it’s Cell’s… I just know that I can and will be a single parent if I have to.”

I shook my head vehemently, “You’re not going to be a single parent, my little one. Even if it’s Cell’s, it’s mine… even if I can’t make it up to you, you put my name on the birth certificate and I’ll pay. That’s our child,” and I could tell she knew exactly what I meant by our child.

She shook with sobs and stuffed her hand against her mouth, taking a deep breath in through her nose and trying and failing to hold it together. I knew the feeling, my own eyes hot and glassy with my own unshed tears at the enormity of what was in front of us.

“I don’t know what to do…” she moaned and it broke my heart hearing my words come from her lips, knowing the pain I’d dealt her with my absence and my actions.

“You don’t have to do anything right now, baby. I do. I need to figure out how to fix what I broke…”

“Blue,” her voice held such an infinite amount of pain it broke me to hear it.

“Just tell me what you need, baby, just tell me what you want me to do and I’ll do it.”

She looked at me plaintively and shuddering said, “Stay with me.”

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