Page 78 of Evading Fate

Our joy was overshadowed by sadness once again when Mama passed away about a month after we learned we were pregnant. I was a mess and if it wasn’t for Trey, I don’t know what I would have done. After a few months, I started to feel better, it wasn’t quite so hard to get through each day but there are days when it blindsides me. The pain comes crashing down on me out of nowhere and it’s just as raw, just as powerful as the day she died. I’ll pick up the phone and be dialing before remembering that she’s gone or I’ll find myself driving over to the nursing home before it hits me that she’s not there anymore. There’s so much I want to ask her about being a mom, and now I’ll never get the chance but she taught me so much just by her example, and I know that she’ll be with me as I raise my daughter.

“You ready for company?” Trey asks, sticking his head in the door, and I grin up at him, nodding. He steps inside and people start filing in behind him, and I start laughing when I realize that he brought everyone.

“How are my girls?” he asks, his gaze flicking between my face and our daughter resting in my arms.

“Perfect.”

He smiles and nods. “Yes, you are.”

Charlotte and Michael approach my bed first, both with tears in their eyes as they look down at their newest granddaughter.

“She’s gorgeous,” Charlotte whispers, and I can’t wipe the smile off my face.

“You did good, kid,” Michael says, slapping Trey on the back, and Trey grins at me.

“Naw, it’s all Addy.”

Emma and Nix file into the room last with their brood in tow. Emma struggles to carry a wiggling Harper around her pregnant belly, and I laugh. She shoots me a mock glare.

“You just wait until you have a couple more of these little monsters,” she says, and I laugh again, hoping that one day we will.

“I can’t believe you’d call my children monsters,” Nix teases her, and she sighs.

“Well, they get it from you.”

A round of chuckles flows through the room as Trey winks at me. “Should we tell ‘em?”

I nod, smiling as we look out at our family. We’ve been keeping the name a secret, and I’m excited to tell them.

“Okay, we’d like to introduce you all to Elizabeth Grace,” I say, turning Lizzie so they can see her, and Charlotte lets out a soft gasp.

“Oh my,” she says, tears in her eyes, and I’m relieved that she seems happy to share a middle name with her granddaughter.

“We wanted to name her after our mothers,” I whisper to her, and a tear falls down her cheek. She looks up at Trey and smiles at him, her love for her son apparent.

“Thank you. I’m truly honored. Can I hold her?”

Nodding, I pass Lizzie to her arms and watch as she whispers something to her that I can’t hear. Looking around the room at our family, I feel so blessed. Emma beams at me as I meet her eye. It feels weird to be this happy but it’s a good weird. At a time when I was certain that I was completely alone in the world, the people in this room stepped up and brought me into their family. I know that I wouldn’t have made it through the last six years without them, and I’m lucky to have them. Not everyone in this family is related by blood but this family, stronger than a lot of other families, was built with love just the same.

The End