Levee - 1 year

“What?” Jade asked, picking up on my excitement as we made our way up the front path toward the bungalow after two weeks away visiting her family in cold, snowy Massachusetts.

As much as we both had loved getting to experience some winter, we both sighed in relief as we stepped off the plane and felt the welcoming heat again.

“I may or may not have arranged to have a surprise for you waiting when we got back,” I told her.

“I knew you were up to something!” she said, narrowing her eyes at me. “Telling me you had to keep texting the club when they knew we were away with family.”

“Yeah, a harmless little lie. I hope,” I added as I reached for my key. “We gotta have Kylo come over and pick some of these hibiscus for the tortoise,” I said as she turned to admire the gardens she’d been tending to so lovingly.

It had been surprisingly fascinating to watch Jade settle into the house. Painting, shopping, decorating, gardening.

Nesting, the women of the club had called it. I figured that was exactly what it was for Jade, too, since she’d been very clear about wanting our lives and this house to be full of babies eventually.

I didn’t really have a single decorating bone in my body, so I’d been happy to let her have free rein with the place.

She’d filled it with color, art, plants, and love.

Which made me want to make a contribution of one design feature. Only I needed to have it done when she wasn’t around because, according to the experts I’d hired to do it, they needed a few weeks to do it properly.

“Okay. Turn me in a direction,” Jade said.

“Our bedroom,” I told her.

“Oooh, are we going to make art again?” she asked.

We’d made that a bit of a habit.

The love canvas. Erotic photography. Nude portraits. We had a lot of fun mixing her passion for the arts and our shared passion for each other.

“While I’d be down for that,” I said, especially after two weeks with her parents where having sex under their roof felt wrong as fuck, so we’d needed to sneak off to do it in the freezing car, “that’s not it.”

“Well, where…” she started as she turned into the bedroom.

I didn’t need to tell her where it was.

Because the thing took up a whole damn wall.

While we’d been away, I’d had two crews in. One to redo the primary bathroom because it was horribly dated. So I’d gotten us a bigger shower niche, a soaking tub for two, a separate water closet for the toilet, and a double vanity. The other, I’d had in to replace the wall between the bathroom and the bedroom with a massive custom-built fish tank. One big enough to expand her collection.

“Levee!” she cried, voice thick. Sure enough, when she turned, her eyes were watery. “It’s so beautiful. Oh, they look so happy!” she said, walking closer to admire her fish as they swam around, their fancy tails swishing.

When we’d moved in, there hadn’t been a good spot for the fish tank, since goldfish needed giant tanks and the living and dining rooms had awkward layouts. We’d ended up sticking the tank in one of the spare rooms. Which I knew Jade didn’t like. First, because she liked looking at them. Second, because she was already starting to paint pretty, childlike murals on the walls in those rooms.

“The tank guys said there are enough gallons now for at least six or seven more goldfish, if you want.”

“Oh, I want,” she said, reaching back to grab me, pulling me in behind her.

My arms went around her and she melted into me as we both stood there admiring the tank.

It was a good business move for her, too, to get more fish. Her goldfish prints had been selling like wildfire lately, thanks to some viral social media videos.

While she didn’t need the money now—thanks to several pricey commissions for Teddy, Zayn, and their associates—it was important to her that her art did well, that it found the people who would appreciate it.

Plus, I loved the damn fish too.

And I was kind of excited to figure out what she might name the new ones.

“I love you,” she said, turning her head so I could lean down and kiss her.

“I love you too,” I said.

And, fuck, I did.

More than I knew I was capable of.

“I have a little surprise for you too,” she said, untangling herself from my arms. “I’ve also been keeping a secret for two weeks. Well, three, I guess, now,” she said, taking my hand, and pulling me with her toward her studio that was, basically, a sun soaked closet. It was something else I wanted to fix one day. But we had time.

“In here?” I asked, looking around.

It was the usual kind of organized mess as it always was. Paints, charcoals, pastels, canvases, easels, and sketches pinned randomly to the walls.

“Yes,” she said. “I tucked it here before we left,” she told me, going to the wall with the most finished canvases leaning against it, fishing toward the back, and taking out a canvas, careful to keep the painted side turned to her. “Ready?” she asked.

“Definitely.”

She flipped the canvas, holding it against her front.

And there the two of us were.

Well, no.

Three.

Because I was standing behind her in the picture. And both our hands were on her rounded belly.

“You’re pregnant?” I asked, gaze shooting up to her face, finding her already watching me, trying to gauge my reaction.

“Yes,” she said, fucking beaming at me.

Suddenly, I saw it.

The ‘glow’ people were always talking about. And I was suddenly confused how I’d missed it over the past two weeks.

“I know we meant to wait until we actually made this part official,” she said, waving her engagement ring hand at me.

“Who the fuck cares about timelines?” I said as I crossed the small space toward her, framing her face in my hands. “We’re gonna have a baby.”

“We are,” she said, a single tear slipping from the corner of her eye. “And I just know he or she is going to be as kind and generous as their daddy.”

Daddy.

Fuck.

That made my heart unexpectedly skip.

“And as loving and lively as their mom,” I said, leaning down to steal her lips.

Jade - 7 years

“Whoa, slow down there, speed racer,” I said, holding the baby I was wearing in a wrap closer as William’s motorized scooter buzzed past us on the path, nearly ramming into me in the process.

“Oh, that thing don’t go that fast,” William said from his position beside me as my five-year-old came to a stomach-dropping stop on his scooter.

“That thing is not meant to be a toy,” I said, shaking my head as my son backed it up with that obnoxiously loud beep-beep-beep that seemed more appropriate on a delivery truck than someone’s mobility scooter.

“Anything with a motor is a toy to a boy his age,” William said with a shrug as he lowered himself heavily down onto one of our multicolored wrought iron chairs.

“He could break it.” Or his head. Though, to be fair, driving a scooter that maxed out at four miles per hour was probably the least dangerous thing I’d caught that wild child of a boy doing that week.

“So Levee gets a new one for me,” William said. And it was still refreshing to me how when he spoke of Levee now, it wasn’t with the thinly veiled hatred it used to be.

A lot of that hate, it turned out, stemmed from some ridiculous idea that Levee’s dad had stolen a very valuable baseball card from William and his father. Which, to their mind, meant that their whole lives were stunted because they couldn’t sell it and move up in life.

The thing was, though, when we’d been cleaning out William’s apartment to move into the guest house on our new property, we’d found the stupid card sitting against the wall behind the console table that didn’t seem like it had been moved in fifty years.

In the end, the dog poker picture in his living room had been worth more than the baseball card. But William had surprised both me and Levee by using his windfall to work on himself. Going to orthopedic doctors, physical therapy, and back specialists. Until, eventually, he got his pain cut down to just occasional flares when he’d overdone it.

That was when he’d gone from the electric wheelchair to the motorized scooter, saying it gave him more freedom to go out and shop, thanks to the baskets on it.

It was amazing what a lack of pain, a change in environment, and some independence could do for a grumpy old man’s demeanor.

Sure, he still teased Levee. But it was in that way that older generations did. Not meant to be malicious.

And, incredibly, William had been a pretty good grand uncle to our kids. No, he was never going to be babysitting them for us. Because the stubborn old guy would still occasionally say things that I—and society at large—would find inappropriate, if not outright offensive, and it was important to me that either Levee or I were around to explain to the kids why it was wrong.

But, still, he wasn’t mean and snapping at them. If anything, he was the one reminding me to let the kids be kids, to stop being a helicopter. To let them learn for themselves that bugs taste nasty and the laws of physics did, in fact, apply to them, no matter how much they wanted to believe they could fly.

“That one is you, just shrunk,” William said, nodding his chin toward our second child. A pretty little dark-haired girl in a rainbow dress, just standing there staring at the swarm of butterflies on the milkweed I’d planted a few years before.

“Thank you,” I said, because I knew it was a compliment. And I had to admit that our little girl was an artistic, empathetic, soft soul. Though I did think that came from both Levee and I, not just me.

“That one,” he said as my son flew off of the scooter to run after a poor iguana that had just been trying to sun himself. “That one reminds me of me at his age.”

“Determined to end up in urgent care?” I asked, glad when the iguana scaled a tree before my kid could get to him.

“Eh, bumps and bruises are good for a growing kid.”

I’d always figured I would be a mom much like my own. Very hands off, laid back, easy going. It turned out that fate had different plans. And after my first baby, I’d been pretty debilitated with postpartum anxiety. I was always worried something terrible was going to happen, that I was going to screw up, that my sweet, innocent baby would pay for my mistakes.

It had taken a lot of meditation, yoga, and therapy sessions to learn to tamp down those fears.

They were still there. In the knee-jerk reaction to always step in to keep the kids from getting hurt or having their feelings hurt.

It took actual effort to hold myself back, to let them learn about the world around them—in all of its wonder, beauty, and occasional ugliness and pain—and just be there to help them through their feelings about it rather than try to protect them from it.

Levee, on the other hand, had taken to fatherhood with an ease that was unsurprising to me, but also a giant relief. Because when I was panicking, frantically trying to navigate the rough waves that was parenthood at times, he would just effortlessly take the oars and steer us toward calmer waters.

“That doesn’t bother you?” William asked when the baby I was still wearing started to fuss.

“They’re kind of easy at this stage,” I said, tapping a hand up the baby’s back. “If they’re fussing, they want to eat, be changed, to be burped, or be soothed to sleep.”

I thanked the universe every day that I’d been lucky enough to have relatively ‘easy’ babies.

“It’s when they are old enough to get tired but want to fight it so they can play that they get really difficult. But also more fun.”

“You really like the mom thing.”

It wasn’t a question, but I felt like I needed to answer anyway. “I had three things I really wanted in life. To get people to appreciate my art, to find the love of my life, and to be a mom. I am the luckiest woman in the world to get all three.”

“Never wanted kids myself. Didn’t have the patience.”

“I don’t know. You’ve been pretty patient when you’re teaching the kids about tools and stuff like that.”

“Want ‘em to grow up knowing the difference between a socket wrench and a ratchet.”

“Daddy!” my little girl cheered when she heard the rumble of Levee’s motorcycle coming up the street.

“Stay in the yard,” I called as the kids rushed to go meet their father.

I heard Levee slow as he got close to the driveway, used to this routine with the kids, and mindful not to be going too fast in case one of them ran into the driveway as he pulled in.

“Welp, I gotta go get myself ready,” William said, using the table to help him stand. Sure, his pain was much better, but he was never going to be as strong and stable as he’d been before he’d hurt his back.

“Ready for what?” I asked.

He wasn’t as much of a shut-in as he used to be. He even found a couple of buddies that he hung out with at the local diner here and there.

“I have myself a date,” he declared, puffing his chest a bit.

“Oh, yeah? Good for you. Do you need a ride?”

“She’s gonna pick me up. In her convertible,” he said, looking dangerously close to smiling.

“Well, have a great time!” I said as he started away just as Levee came around the side of the house holding our daughter’s hand and holding our son upside down with one arm anchored around his midsection.

It didn’t matter how many times I’d seen Levee with the kids, it always gave me that little heart squeeze.

“Heya, doll,” Levee said after turning our son over his forearm to land on his feet, then leaning over to press a kiss to my lips, then the top of the baby’s head. “How was today?”

“Narrowly avoided a scooter accident and an iguana was quick enough to save himself some annoyance. Oh, and your uncle has a date.”

“A date? With a woman?”

“Well, you know, I didn’t ask. But I’m assuming.”

“Wow. I mean, he has become… wholly tolerable, but I did not see that coming. Okay, give me the baby. You go get some much deserved time in your studio.”

I was not going to argue with that.

I unwrapped the baby, gave him to Levee, then leaned up for another, longer, kiss.

“Eddie is gonna drop over some dinner later,” he told me as I started to retreat.

All day with my kids. Some time alone to paint in peace. Dinner provided by Eddie. And a night, later, curled up in Levee’s arms?

I couldn’t think of anything more perfect.

Jade - 10 years

“Lily!” I called, rushing forward toward where she was standing beside Curtis on the sidewalk in front of the art gallery. “You look gorgeous,” I said as I wrapped my arms around her.

She did, too.

Moving up in life had genuinely agreed with her. Gone were the bags under her eyes and the twitchy way her eyes would always scan around back when we lived in the same building, always on the lookout for someone who might put her kids in danger.

Instead, there was an ease about her that came from moving to the suburbs in a lovely duplex with another couple next door who they quickly turned into their own extended family.

I didn’t get to see Lily and Curtis as much these days, given we’d both moved in opposite directions. And the kids were all old enough to not really want to spend any time with their “Aunt” Jade.

But just this once, we’d decided we all needed to reunite.

Not for my gallery showcase.

Oh, no.

This was for Terrance.

The kid who’d once drawn giant boobs on my whiteboard and protected me with a switchblade had been carefully working on his craft over the years, honing it, making it something truly remarkable.

Better, I thought, than me.

It had been years before that I’d decided I had to stop giving him lessons because he’d learned everything I could possibly teach him.

We’d stayed in touch, though.

And now, now it was time to celebrate his amazing hard work.

I’d pulled out all the stops, calling not only Lily and Curtis but Mrs. Jackson, her husband, their girls, Teddy, Zayn, the club, friends and work associates I’d gotten close with over the years. I wanted Terrance’s showcase to be successful beyond his wildest dreams. He certainly had the talent.

And I knew too well that sometimes, success was more about who you knew than anything else. Through Levee, I knew a lot of life-changing people. And now, I was happy to pass those connections on.

“And look at you. You’re ready to pop!” Lily said, reaching out to touch my belly.

I was.

My belly was so round that it felt comical. I was two days past my due date. But I’d made a deal with this baby that if it could just hold out until after the showcase, I would spend each day feeding him all of the ice cream he wanted.

“Hopefully, just a few more days,” I said.

“Well, now, you know you need to let me come over and get some baby snuggles on. We’re well beyond the baby thing now.”

“Anytime you want,” I agreed, thinking of how full circle this particular night felt. “So, you ready to go buy some lovely art?” I asked as Curtis reached for the door.

“Wait up!” Levee called, rushing toward us with Zayn just a step behind.

“Does Terrance do commissions?” Zayn asked. “Daniyal has a birthday coming up…”

Levee - 19 years

“I have a feeling this means I am maybe one year away from him declaring he is going to prospect the club,” Jade said, leaning her head against my shoulder as we watched our oldest back out of the driveway on the brand-new motorcycle he’d just bought himself.

“Nah,” I said, rubbing her hip. “We have at least five more years before that. No one prospects this young. Gotta get some life experience first. Besides, you love the club,” I reminded her.

“I do,” she agreed. “But I’ve also seen all the danger that has gone around for the past twenty years.”

That was fair. But we always came out on top.

“That one isn’t far behind,” she said as our second son came flying down the driveway on his skateboard.

He’d given into Jade’s demand that he wear a helmet, but refused to use any of the knee or elbow pads she’d bought for him. If a week went by when he wasn’t scratched up, bruised, or bleeding, it was a miracle. But he’d been that way since the day he started walking. A daredevil. Rough-around-the-edges, but with a good heart.

The third son, that was the one I felt was a bit more like me. Laid-back, allergic to hard work, but kind. Oh, and the damn kid also inherited my youthful aversion to cleaning his room. And it usually took me or Jade bitching at him to clean up the shit that started to get furry on the plates in his room to get them in the dishwasher.

Our only girl, though, she was all her mother. Soft, sweet, kind, artistic. Too good for this world.

“I’m just getting my suit, then I’m going to the club,” our son said, carrying his board under his arm as he went into the house.

“The other two are with friends,” Jade told me as, no more than two minutes later, our kid was back outside and tearing down the street on the skateboard at a speed that even made me anxious.

“Really?” I asked, glancing back toward the house. “It’s empty?”

“I think this might be the first time ever,” Jade said, turning to give me a soft smile. “I don’t know if I’m finding it sad or exciting.”

I understood what she was saying.

We’d spent the last nineteen years eating, sleeping, and breathing parenting. And now, well, we were only a couple more years away from all those kids being out on their own.

It was a bittersweet thing, having your kids grow up. Bitter, because not having them around was going to hurt like hell. Sweet, though, because we knew we’d done a good job with them, that they had everything they needed to live successful lives outside of our home.

“Well, seeing as they will all be home before bed, I think we can go ahead and be excited,” I said, letting my hand drift down to grab her ass.

“I like the way you think,” she said, turning in my arms to wrap her arms around my neck, then leaning up for a long, lingering kiss that quickly went from sweet to heated.

Reaching down, I gathered up her skirt to just below her ass, then lifted her up.

Her legs went around my waist as I turned and walked us into the house.

The same house that I’d once wanted to work out the kinks of. But now, I couldn’t imagine it without its sweet little imperfections.

The gouge in the living room molding from our eldest riding his little motorized car into it early one Christmas morning.

The lines on the doorway into the kitchen, marking all four of the kids’ growth.

The window in the bathroom that once creaked and let us know one of the kids had decided to sneak out then climb back in through it.

The hall closet door that featured a mural done by our five-year-old daughter while Jade and I had accidentally slept in one Sunday morning.

And, yeah, that screen door that still cracked against the jamb as I carried Jade inside.

That sound now made me think of little kids running in and out all day long, letting bugs and lizards in that we would spend the night chasing and relocating.

I couldn’t imagine a home without every single one of those features. That evidence of all of the years of love and happiness that had existed inside. The generational cycles that had been broken.

All of it, every last bit, thanks to the amazing woman with her kind soul and giant heart.

And her incredibly convenient love of all things easy-access skirts, I thought as I carried her into the bedroom and kicked the door closed behind us.

XX