Page 17 of Future Like This

Rae throws her thumb up in Katie’s direction. “Have you met her? You don’t cross Katie Hyun-Hansen.”

“Damn straight,” Katie says with a wink.

Rae sits down next to me and Kara slides her a cup of cocoa. “How are you, baby?”

“I’m good. Just finished outreach for the day. Aaron wanted me to have lunch with him later, so I thought I’d hang out here for a bit and work on some of my master’s stuff rather than drive back up to the farmhouse.” She takes a long sip of her hot chocolate. “Mm. Chocolate is so much better than my master’s. I know it’s a means to an end, but I just want to be out there helping people.”

“You’ll get there,” Katie says. “And there’s no reason you can’t start building a business plan now.”

“The hardest part is going to be finding someone to be the clinical supervisor. It’ll take time for Chelsea and I to become LCSWs, which we’ll need to be.” She sighs. “Which means finding someone who is as passionate as us who doesn’t care how low their pay will be.”

“I’ll be on the lookout for you. You never know who might be excited to work on something like this with you.”

“I know. I’m a doer. I want to get things done. I hate waiting.”

I laugh out loud. “Same. Totally same.”

“Why can’t we just snap our fingers and fix things?” she says with a laugh.

“Hey, how’s your sister?” Kara asks Rae. “I can barely get her on the phone right now.”

“She’s crazy busy with her program, but it’s good busy. I saw her last night. Well, I see her pretty much every day. Perks of living on the same property. She’s in her element right now. It’s busy in a way that fulfills her and brings her joy. She’s crazy happy. Joel’s been busy, so I think all their spare time has been spent together. Texting her is the most effective method of communication right now.”

“Not surprising,” Kara says. “Your dad has texted with her plenty.”

“Yeah, they have meme wars,” Rae says with a laugh. Then she looks at me. “See, I’m co-opting your time with them.” She grabs my hand. “Oh, how was your baby appointment today?”

“Great. I’m healthy. She’s growing like a weed. I’m worried she might break me on the way out, but I’m trying not to think about that.” I bite my lip, then smile, trying to decide how mean I want to be, but… I need some amusement. “We picked a name.”

Everyone turns to me, waiting for me to elaborate, but I don’t.

“Are you going to tell us?” Katie demands.

I nod. “When she’s born.”

Rae laughs into her hot chocolate as Katie pins me with an intense glare, that up till now I’ve only seen used on Addie and Jameson.

“You really are becoming one of my daughters.” She points at her head. “Giving me gray hairs.”

Kara snorts. “Please. You have like six gray hairs. I have more, and I’m younger than you.”

Katie sticks her tongue out at Kara.

Rae and I both laugh at that. Their friendship is adorable.

“We want to surprise everyone when she gets here, but given how long we put it off, it felt like a milestone that we finally picked a name.”

Katie’s still glaring at me. She sighs dramatically. “Fine. But if someone else finds out before me—”

“You’ll cut them?” Rae asks in amusement, then we both laugh.

Katie points a finger at us. “Exactly.”

I’m smiling so big it hurts, but I love it. Though there’s a touch of sadness because I know my mom would be laughing just as hard at this conversation, I’m filled with joy, and thankful that I have two incredible women in my life who are happy to step in and give me all the mom love and laughter when I need it.

Miles

“When was the last time we did this?” Joel asks, sitting down in an oversized chair in Mackenzie’s apartment. He had some free time this morning, and since I’m not going into work for another hour, the three of us decided to have coffee together while my mom and Kara stole Amelia for the morning.

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