Page 36 of A Wedding in the Bay

“Yup, looking great,” she said, checking her photographs. He turned back to her, and she grinned at him. “Our baby is lucky to have such an awesome daddy.”

He smiled at her, and then sighed. “Someday we’re going to have to call him something other than just ‘our baby.’”

She sighed too. “You’re right. There’s got to be a name out there we both like.”

“How about Reginald?”

She snorted and picked up her paintbrush again. She crouched down and began to paint small blue flowers at the base of the little mushroom house they’d painted.

“You didn’t answer me. What’s wrong with Reginald?”

A laugh burst out of her, and she shook her head once. “Veto on Reginald, sorry. Maybe it’ll come back in style in another twenty years or so, but that hasn’t happened yet.”

“Okay, how about Coriolanus?”

“Like the angry Shakespeare character? Veto.” She laughed again as she concentrated on creating delicate, smooth strokes for the flower petals.

“Okay, how about Liverwurst?”

She groaned.

“What? I like it.”

“Hmm, let me think about that one, okay?” She was laughing almost uncontrollably now—so hard that she had to take a break from painting because she was worried about her hand shaking too much.

They continued to discuss baby names as they painted. Dane kept coming up with silly ones, but as their painting progressed, they both shared a few more names they genuinely liked. Unfortunately, they still couldn’t agree on one.

Stroke by stroke, the mural became more and more elaborate.

“It’s beautiful,” she said, stepping back to gaze at it in delight. “I mean, you can tell we’re not really artists by trade, but watching those instructional videos really helped. I’m proud of us, Dane.”

“I am too.” He also took a step back and sighed in satisfaction as he looked at their work. “I hope what’s-his-name likes it too.”

“Are you referring to our son as what’s-his-name?” she squeaked, and he laughed.

“Well, we don’t know his name, do we?”

She sighed, shaking her head, and he continued to grin as they resumed their painting.

After another half an hour or so, they declared themselves to be finished.

“That looks amazing,” she said, stepping back to get a good look at their finished project. “Let’s get a photo of just the mural, and then a self-timer photo with both of us in it.”

“Sounds great to me.”

She took a picture of the mural, and then set up her phone on a tripod so they could take a photograph together. They stood in front of their painting with their arms around each other, smiling at the camera.

Once they’d checked both photographs and agreed they looked great, they stepped back to look at their mural again.

“I’m proud of us,” she said. “We tackled something new and we stuck with it.”

“I’m proud of us too. Not just for this. We’re doing a great job of preparing. We’re just about ready for the baby to arrive.”

“Yes—we’ve got just about everything ready except the name.”

They both sighed and wrapped their arms around each other. They stood side by side, looking at the mural and thinking about what to name their baby.

“I just can’t seem to think of anything we haven’t already discussed,” she said finally, leaning her head against his shoulder. “It’s like my wellsprings of baby name inspiration have run dry.”

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