Page 13 of Tulips and Lost Time

But I don’t want to put her down yet. And she doesn’t seem all that rushed to leave my arms either.

Just like I had an ache brewing in the base of my spine, pushing my sisters along a boiling, almost melting road in the height of that summer, I feel a similar ache in my arm now, holding a baby for hours without moving. Maintaining this exact position even though my bladder reminds me it’s almost time to get up.

“Luc?”

“I’m upstairs.”

I keep my voice low-ish. Just loud enough for my sister to hear but not so startling that the baby will wake. Then I turn my head on the cushion and study the doorway in silence. Counting down Jess’ approach as the fourth stair creaks, then the third one from the top.

I’ll fix them someday.

Maybe.

Eventually.

I told Kari I would. But like the floor she ended up doing on her own, this may just be another job I never find at the top of my priority list. Because there’s always something more pressing calling upon my time.

I rock in the chair, gentle, slow swoops of the glider that seem to bring the baby comfort. Then I look my sister up and down when she stops in the doorway, her arms so often laden with her own twin girls, now occupied by a foil-covered plate.

She’s still as beautiful as ever. As youthful.

Maybe her experience as a twin has prepared her for a life of being a mother to two. Because I’ll be damned if she looks any older than she did back when we saw her off to college for the degree that would eventually have her sitting the bar exam.

She’s got it all; the career, the kids, the husband.

She knows how to make things happen in her life, and even when the world gets a little cruel, she holds on and ensures everything rights itself in the end.

Just another skill I never quite mastered, it seems.

“I brought you dinner,” she murmurs. Though she doesn’t infringe on Billy’s room. She doesn’t cross the threshold and invite herself in. “We had baked chicken with all the trimmings.”

“Potatoes?”

She grins, her sky-blue eyes twinkling in the overhead light now that the sun has gone down. “Parmesan smashed potatoes. Your favorite. Glazed carrots. And green beans, too.” She slides her tongue forward and wets her dry bottom lip. “I ate with Kane and the girls because I knew you wanted to be alone for a while.”

“But you couldn’t go to bed without feeding me first?”

Her eyes well up, swelling because Kari is her best friend, too. Hurting, because all her life she’s idolized the ground I walked upon. And now I’m in pain. “I’m never going to bed and leaving you out in the cold, Luc.” She swallows, the bob of her throat visible as she looks down at Billy. “Can I hold her? You could eat,” she explains, “and I could have a few minutes with my favorite niece.”

“Your favorite?” I force a chuckle through my chest. The sound is tinny and not all that genuine. But it’s better than breaking down and giving up on this fucked up world. “You have, like, five nieces, Jess. It’s not nice to play favorites.”

“We just won’t tell the others,” she teases. Finally breaking away from her spot by the door, she meanders into the room and carefully sets my dinner on the changing table. “It’s still brand new,” she snickers. “Still clean enough to eat off of it.”

“Not true. Bill shat all over the place an hour ago.” My stomach growls anyway. My last meal… I don’t even know. Breakfast, maybe. While I sat by Kari’s bed and choked down enough sustenance to get me through the day I never wanted to come.

Carefully pushing my legs down, I force the footrest back into its cavity beneath the chair and take extra care not to jostle the baby awake. I hold her with just one arm, numb as it may be, and use the other to push myself up until finally, my feet touch the floor, and pins and needles roll up through my legs to remind me I haven’t moved in a while.

“I guess I’m kinda hungry,” I admit, rocking Billy out of a habit I never possessed a mere ten days ago. Leaning in and pressing a kiss to her button nose, I wander toward my little sister to hand her off.

But I don’t.

I don’t offer the baby, and I don’t know that I can breathe if she’s not in my arms.

“I’ll stay right here where you can see me.” Jess scoops her hand into the crook of my arm. Her moves, smooth and practiced after a couple of years with her own. Then she backs up toward the recliner. Turning and watching where she’s going would be easier. Smarter. But she keeps her word and allows my eyes to stay with my baby. “Eat something, Luc. You have to eat, or you’ll make yourself sick.”

“I wasn’t ready to put her down.” I move to the changing table and poke at the foil covering my still-hot meal. “We tried so hard for her, Jess. We put everything we had into this pregnancy. And now it’s all just…” I shake my head and peel the foil open to reveal a chicken leg and more potatoes than any man should eat. But it’s what Jess does. She feeds me. She takes care of me. “It all fell apart in a way I never could have predicted.”

“Because you couldn’t have.” She settles into the chair and crosses her legs, drawing Billy up to sniff that sweet, new baby smell. “You can’t predict an accident, Luc. And you sure as hell can’t predict someone else’s behavior when they’re not following the law or doing the right thing.”

---