Page 97 of How to Say I Do
“Well.” I tore another grass strip in two.
“You want kids.”
I pushed out a breath and nodded. “I do.”
His eyes closed, and I imagined him imagining it. Us with kids, maybe even us here at the fence with a boy and a girl running around with Peanut. Teaching them how to ride and how to fish and how to count shooting stars, and also how to strut their stuff on a runway we built in the living room. How to sass, and how to grill, and how to make toast. The two of us with little versions of ourselves.
“I wouldn’t want to do it part time.” His voice was fragile, almost stolen by the wind. “I wouldn’t want to miss anything. I’d want tobethere.”
We’d come from such different worlds, and such different families. My dad had never missed a good night kiss or a Little League game. Noël’s father had sent him someone else’s birthday flowers on the wrong day. Of course he’d want to rectify that and be a part of his own kids’ lives. But where? Did he imagine frisbee in Central Park and brunch on Fifth Avenue? Or did he imagine teaching them the taste of grapes and fitting them for little cowboy boots and hats?
I didn’t know how to ask. Or, rather, I was too scared that if I did ask, the answer would be something I wasn’t ready to hear. I couldn’t leave Liam, or Savannah, or Jason, or my home, so how could I ask Noël to consider the same?
I had to steer the conversation away from these well-trod worries of what-if and what would happen. I cleared my throat. “I was thinking—”
“Uh oh.” Noël grinned.
“All right, enough hanging out with Liam for you.” I flicked the tail of my long grass at his hip. “I was thinking about Tessa. She needs a bridal suite for her wedding, yeah? Somewhere for her and her bridesmaids before the ceremony.” Deep breath in. “I was thinking we could clear out the sunroom and spruce it up. You could help me turn it into a beautiful space.”
“It’s already a beautiful space.” Noël frowned. “Wyatt, we haven’t stepped foot in there since that night, and I understand—”
“It’s time to move on.” Before yesterday, I wouldn’t have been ready to fling open the doors and drag out those memories, but now I had my dad’s voice inside of me again. I’d felt him, the best and most beautiful parts of him, come back to me. I didn’t need to cling to his ghost or build time capsules inside my home when he’d come back and I’d felt him again.You will never be alone, Wyatt.
“I’m not saying it will be easy. I need you to help me. But, with you, I can get it done. And after the wedding, I was hoping you could help me design a tasting room there. Something small, where I could host little weekend get-togethers.”
Noël held out his hand. I took it and laced our fingers together. “I’d be honored,” he whispered. “Honored, Wyatt.”
I scooted down the railing and leaned in for a kiss. It’s a difficult thing to do to kiss someone who’s also wearing a cowboy hat. There are two brims involved, and the angles are tricky, and, more often than not, noses are a problem. I’d just gotten it right, and our kiss was on the way to a something lot more interesting, with Noël sliding his hand up the inside of my thigh and me cupping my purple fingers around the back of his neck—
When Jason hollered from the back porch, his telescope up to his eyeball. “I can see you guys kissing, Uncle Wyatt!”
That night, Liam grilled burgers while Savannah and I taught Jason how to use his telescope. He was hopeless at first—unsteady, zooming in and out too quickly, and frustrated the stars weren’t great big scribbles in the sky, or the planets weren’t stickers he could point to and see like cartoons. But he got there, eventually, zooming in on the rising harvest moon enough to pick out impact craters and the Sea of Tranquility.
Noël sat beside Jason as Jason happily babbled away, downloading every astronomical fact that he’d ever learned from his science books and the back of cereal boxes. “Did you know the moon isn’t made of cheese? It’s made of rock and metal. Jupiter is the biggest planet in the solar system. Did you know that nothing can escape from black holes, not even light?”
Liam shook his head at me over the sizzling burgers.
The telescope wasn’t exactly NASA grade, but it was enough to excite Jason into the wiggles. Noël was beautiful with him, just beautiful. He patiently passed the telescope back and forth with Jason, exclaiming over this moon crater, or that dark spot, or that brighter, shinier spot over there.
We ate with our plates on our laps, sitting on the porch steps as fireflies flickered around us. Jason wrangled an exchange out of his parents—one bite of hamburger for a ten-second look through the telescope—and then Noël sweetened the deal, challenging Jason to a hamburger-eating and star-finding contest. Whoever could eat a quarter of their burger and then find Polaris, or Vega, or Jupiter the fastest, won.
“Do you even know where Jupiter is tonight?” I murmured into Noël’s ear.
“Thepointis that Jason is eating,” Noël said. “Him winning doesn’t irreparably damage my ego. And Jupiter is that way.” He flicked his wrist toward the west, where Jupiter definitelywasn’t. I kissed his cheek and laughed.
After we finished, Liam and Savannah cuddled up on the porch swing, him drawing lazy spirals on the inside of her folded knee beneath the long hem of her sundress. Noël and I sat on the top step, his head against my shoulder. Jason zoomed through every star in the sky, grading each blob of light on twinkle factor and coolness. He plodded across the yard with the telescope up to his eye like he was a pirate, chasing those specks of light.
“I could see having kids with you,” Noël breathed. “I couldn’t see them with Jenna or with anyone else. But I could see having kids with you.”
It felt like all of the wonders of the universe were here. Him in my arms, my family beside me. Every moment of this night—every breath we inhaled, every giggle from Jason, every snort of laughter from Liam, every tickle of Noël’s hair against my skin, every time I felt his heart beat and his hand squeeze mine, all of it—seemed to be telling me to rake this all in, to drag every ounce of delight out of this evening. These were the moments that were real, beautiful and tangible, and I had to grab them, hold on to them, and cherish them for all time.
A shooting star streaked out to the far horizon. Jason whipped around, his telescope hanging at his side as he followed the streak with his finger. “Did you guys see that?”
“Sure did. Make a wish, kiddo,” I said.
“And tell us what you’re wishing for,” Liam added.
“I can’ttellyou! It won’t come true!”
