“Okay, Mom and Dad. What are we putting on the birth certificate for this little guy’s middle name?” the nurse interrupted.
Drew and I looked at each other. Why the hell didn’t we talk about any of this before now? We couldn’t give him Drew’s name yet. Dawson would never let him have Drew’s last name.
“We’re waiting on a paternity test for that,” I was the one to say. There was no easier way to say it. I was glad that she didn’t ask any more questions.
“I’m going to take him to the nursery for his newborn screening, and then I will bring him back. Do you want to carry him to the nursery?” she asked Drew, no longer calling him dad.
“Yes, absolutely.”
“Drew,” I called.
He turned and smiled a warm, scared, smile. “I’ll send him in,” he said, knowing what I wanted.
Dawson walked in without Lauren. I was glad. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to see her. He was wearing the same sacred smile. I wondered if he was now hoping that the baby wasn’t his.
“Hi,” I said.
“Hi,” he said, kissing my cheek. “I think this has been the longest day of my life. How are you?”
I snickered a little. “I’m good. Happy. Scared.”
“I bet. You look good,” he smiled.
“Thank you. How are you?” I wanted to know if he was happy. It meant a lot to me that he was.
“I have been good, nervously waiting for you to have this baby.”
He didn’t call him my baby. That was the first time I had ever heard him not say his baby.
“Did you see him?”
“No, but Star said he looks just like me.”
I looked down. I didn’t want him to look like Dawson. I wanted him to look like Drew. I wasn’t sure what to say. “Drew put a rush on the test. We’ll know before the night’s out.”
He nodded. He already knew that.
We shared an awkward silence. Neither of us knew what to say.
“Lauren wants to see you,” he said, kind of in a question.
I smiled and nodded. He left. I never thought that I would see the day when Dawson and I couldn’t talk. It was sad.
Lauren on the other hand acted like we were still best friends. She hugged me with a big smile.
“Congratulations,” she said. “I just saw him through the window. He is beautiful, Ry.”
“Thanks, how are you?”
She held up her left hand.
“Engaged!?” I said, shocked. Wow. That didn’t take long. “Are you pregnant, Lauren?” I just spit it out.
Why else would he be jumping into that again already?
“Dawson proposed on Christmas Eve, and yes, Ry.
I’m pregnant.”
“Oh, my God.” I squealed, grabbing her and hugging her. I was ecstatic for her. It was weird. I felt no bitterness toward her whatsoever. “I’m so happy for you, and I’m sorry I am making things so difficult for you guys.”
“You stop that. This is a happy day for you. It will all work out, besides if the baby is Dawson’s, we’ll have to stay friends forever,” she stated.
I smiled. I really was happy that she was there. I could see me back in my little house in Maine while my son was next door with her and Dawson. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. It would take Drew some time, but I knew he would love him like he was his own. Maybe I was just trying to place a little sunshine on a bad situation, but in the meantime, it seemed to be working.
Drew came in carrying our baby with a happier smile than he had left with.
“Do you want to hold him?” I asked Lauren.
“Yes, of course.”
She held him, playing with his little fingers. “Ry, he is beautiful.”
I was trying to read her face. Was she seeing Dawson in him too? If she was, she hid it well.
She talked about the shop, the radio station, Star dating John, my beach friend. I was glad she was talking like nothing had ever happened between. I laughed when she said she had to take up cooking and how the first time she tried to make Dawson a nice meal, it all had turned out to be a nightmare. They ended up going to Millie’s for supper.
She handed me my baby when he started to fuss.
The nurse came in with a bottle and Lauren hugged me.
“I’ll see you later,” she said.
“Geesh, I didn’t think she was ever going to leave,” Drew stated, kissing me.
“I’m glad she came,” I said, watching my little man take his bottle.
“Yeah, but I have been dying to tell you something, and she wouldn’t shut up,” he exclaimed.
I laughed. “What?”
“Let me see my baby,” he said, taking him and laying him over my legs.
“What are you doing?” I asked. Nicholas was mad.
He was enjoying that bottle, and he didn’t want to be unwrapped.
“Drew?” I asked again as he took the tiny diaper off.
He smiled and held him up, showing me the exact same strawberry birth mark that Drew had on the same left butt cheek. “My mom told me that my dad also had it.”