Page 78 of Pieces

My dad doesn’t reply, but I can see that he’s viewed the message, and within a few seconds, he thumbs up the picture. I stare at it for a beat longer than I should, the hollow feeling echoing in my chest. I guess that’s all I’m gonna get right now. Locking my phone, I leave it in my lap, telling myself it’s fine, but it’s not. It stings.

Hudson hasn’t said much since we left the office, just tapping on the steering wheel, lost in his head. That’s rare for him. Normally, he can’t go five minutes without cracking a joke or saying something totally ridiculous. It’s one of those things about him that’s equal parts charming and silly. But right now? The silence feels heavy, like he’s trying to work through something big and doesn’t know how to put it into words. And that feeling only increases when I watch his hands gripping the wheel tight.

“You okay?” I ask.

His grip on the wheel loosens, and he lets out a shaky laugh. “Yeah. I mean, no. I mean…” He glances at me. “Does it ever hit you that we’re gonna be responsible for a whole human being? Like,weare their blueprint.”

“Every second,” I admit. “It’s terrifying.”

He nods, his shoulders dropping just a fraction. “But it’s kind of amazing too, right? Like, we made that.” The awe in his voice is impossible to miss as he points at the sonogram. “They’re part you, part me. That’s wild.”

Itiswild. I look down at the sonogram again, tracing the edges of the tiny, blurry shape with my thumb. For all my doubts, all my fears, there’s this one, unshakable truth sitting in my chest. This baby is already everything to me. And I can’t quite understand why my dad is acting the way he is. I’ve always had a great relationship with him, but then, I’ve always acted like the perfect daughter. It’s something that I’ve always clung to through my parents’ opinions and authority figures.Daphne, what a great example you’re setting for your classmates. Daphne’s doing so well, and she’s such a good girl in class. Of course, we can have Daphne over for a sleepover, she’s so good.And I think at some point, that language has been damaging for me. It made me believe that anything I did outside of the ‘good, perfect, great’ scope was wrong.

The fact that one night I let it all go, I let my inhibitions disappear, and I did the most non-good girl thing and got pregnant... Maybe my dad is having a hard time adjusting to that reality that I’m human, and I make mistakes. I’m adjusting too, and I’d really like it if he saw that.

“I hope they get your brains. God help us if they end up with mine.” Hudson laughs, bringing me back to the moment.

“Hey, your brain’s not so bad,” I tease and nudge his arm. “I mean, today’s not the best example of that.”

“Yeah, I kinda freaked in there,” he says, the corner of his mouth lifting.

“I kinda noticed.”

“I just kept thinking how something so tiny can be so huge for us and then the things I kept in my head were not the words spilling out.” He runs a hand down his face, groaning. “I called our baby a booger, Daph. In front of a healthcare professional.”

I bark a laugh, louder than I intended, quickly covering my mouth. “I think it was cute. It did sort of look like a booger.”

“You’re just saying that to make me feel better.”

“I’m not, I swear.” I make a cross over my heart as he glances at me before pulling into the school gates. “I love our little booger.”

The car comes to a stop, and he looks over at me with that handsome face of his, hazel eyes captivating me. “I love them too.”

Reality swims around us as we sit quietly in the car together. We’re not just two college kids anymore. We’re something bigger now, tied together by that little heartbeat we saw on the screen.

“I was thinking,” he says after a beat, glancing at me out of the corner of his eye. “We should go to the library tomorrow.”

That’s not what I expected. “The library?” I echo with a tilt of my head. “Why?”

“For baby books,” he clarifies. “I mean, I know some stuff from when my sister was little. But she’s six years younger, so it’s not like I was there for the hard parts, you know? My mom didn’t exactly give me a play-by-play.”

I blink at him, trying to process what he’s saying. “You helped your mom with Rory?”

“Yeah, sometimes.” He shrugs like it’s no big deal, and that just makes me want to cry even more for whatever reason. It is a big deal. I know his mom was a single mom, but I just never thought about how that impacted him until right now. “I mean, I was just a kid, so it wasn’t a lot. But I’d hold her when she cried, and I remember feeding her when she started baby food. I’d make goofy faces to make her laugh.” He hesitates, rubbing the back of his neck. “But this is different. This isours. I want to do it right, and I don’t want to just wing it. So, I figure books are a good place to start.”

Yep. Here come the water works.

I blink rapidly, trying to hold it together, but the tears are already welling up.

Shaking my head, the tears slip free because, of course, they do. “Hudson, most guys wouldn’t even think to pick up a book, let alone admit they don’t know something. And here you are, planning a whole study session.”

“Shit.” He rubs the back of his neck again, looking a little embarrassed. “But…you’re crying. Why are you crying? Did I say something wrong?”

“No,” I say quickly, swiping at my cheeks. “No, it’s just… I’m emotional, okay? This whole thing is emotional.”

He looks unconvinced but doesn’t push it. Instead, he leans back in his seat and gives me a lopsided grin. “So, you’re saying I get bonus points for admitting I’m clueless?”

Rolling my eyes, I let out a watery laugh. “Yes, Hudson, you get all the points.”

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