The Knocked Up Plan

The third trimester, though?

It’s rough going.

I’m bigger, more tired, and a little grumpier.

But I’m also less cranky, since I have help. He helps me walk my dog. When I feel like I can barely bend to feed Ruby anymore, he takes over and gives her kibble. He cooks for me, and he makes sure I don’t just eat jars of artichoke hearts.

Oh, and he handles the entire move to our new apartment.

I don’t need to redo the closet since my mom finds us a new place, suitable for a new family and two medium dogs. Ryder insists I spend the entire moving day at the spa, getting pampered with my best friends.

If this isn’t love, I don’t know what is.



I wear a white dress that billows over the pumpkin inside me one month before I’m due to pop. As Pachelbel’s Canon in D plays, I walk down the aisle at a small church in Manhattan. I’m barefoot and loving it.

Ryder wears a charcoal-gray suit, a pressed white shirt, and a sky-blue tie that I gave him. On the tie is a silver pin in the shape of a papaya. I gave him that, too.

I hold a bouquet of yellow daffodils, and when I reach the groom I’m struck once more by the realization of how lucky I am. This wonderful, witty, handsome man is mine.

We say our vows, and before God, my mom, my brother, Delaney and Tyler, Penny and Gabriel, Ryder’s parents, his sister Claire, his brother Devon and his husband Paul, their daughter Simone, and Ryder’s friend Flynn, I promise to love him for the rest of my life.

He pledges to do the same.

When he slides a platinum band on my finger, the baby kicks.

When I give him his ring, the baby does a little jig, and then I kiss my husband. Later, I throw the bouquet, and Simone catches it.

Her dads look terrified.

“Someday,” I say with a wild grin.



“You’re almost there, Nicole. You can do it.”

Dr. Robinson shouts her encouragement, and I’m sweating, panting, and swearing.

Nineteen hours of labor sucks. She was right. Morning sickness is nothing compared to pushing a watermelon out of your body.

“I can see the head. One more push,” she says, her cheerleader voice ringing in my ears.

Ryder squeezes my hand. “You’re almost there.”

I’m exhausted, and everything hurts, but I want this baby out of me so badly. Machines beep, and nurses encourage me, and Ryder tells me I can do it. I stare at my monster belly, and I imagine that finally, after nine hard, wonderful, amazing months, I will at last get to meet my child.

I bear down and push and push and push until . . .

I hear a wail.

A loud, gorgeous, beautiful cry that fills my heart with joy.

“You did it!”

Tears spill down my cheeks as the doctor announces, “You have a son. And he’s perfect.”

I’m bawling, too, just like my baby boy and my husband. As the doctor hands me my son, I cradle him in my arms for the first time. It is magic and moonlight and all the stars in the sky, and I am flooded with a love that I know is infinite. Tears streak down my husband’s gorgeous face as he plants a sweet daddy kiss on our little boy’s head. “Hi, Papaya.”

I cry and I smile at the same time. “He’s not Papaya anymore.”

“He has a new name.” Ryder’s deep, sexy voice is thick with emotion. We already picked one. He meets my eyes, and then gazes at our baby. “Hey there, Robert Powers Lockhart.”

My father’s and both of ours.





Another Epilogue





Ryder

“Do you want to grab the sage?”

Robert takes a wobbly step across the concrete. He doesn’t actually know what sage is. At least, I don’t think so. But he follows my pointing finger and swipes at the herb with his chubby hand. He misses.

I help my one-year-old son and grab some from the plant.

“Now, what about some thyme? Mommy likes that in her pasta, doesn’t she?”

“Doggie.”

That’s Robert’s answer for nearly everything these days. He can say mommy, daddy, and doggie. Oh, he can say Ruby, too. But Romeo? No way. That name vexes him.

“Where’s the doggie?” I ask.

My blond-haired, blue-eyed son points to my white and brown collie mix. Romeo lounges in the August sun that shines brightly here in the communal rooftop gardens of our apartment building.

“Yes, that’s right. That’s our doggie. Can you say Romeo?”

“Doggie.”

I laugh, then snip some thyme from a miniature potted wheelbarrow where we grow herbs. The mini wheelbarrow was a gift from my wife for my last birthday. We’d tried the Wheelbarrow, and I’m loathe to admit this, but she was right. It didn’t work for far too many reasons. Mostly because she hated being upside down in what she called a ridiculously awkward and uncomfortable position. She rode me like a Crouching Cowgirl instead, and that was fine with me.

The next day, she gave me this ceramic mini wheelbarrow, and we planted some herbs in it.

Win some, lose some.

But honestly, I’m winning at pretty much everything.

I’m still working at Hanky Panky Love with my wife, but I’m there as a freelancer now, and so is she. She cut back her hours and started working from home more, and somehow we make it all fit, taking turns caring for our son. We still do our shows, and she writes her columns, too. I’ve cut back on those since my consulting business picked up. After Aaron, I nabbed a few more guys, and word spread. Now the Consummate Wingman has found a specialty niche in helping divorced guys get back out there.

It makes me feel damn good to give these men strategies that help them build confidence to put their hearts on the line again, especially since I can walk the walk and talk the talk. I’m writing a book on the topic. I don’t have a title yet, but my publisher wants to call it Got Your Back Again. Maybe it’ll stick. The bio, though, was easy to write.

Ryder Lockhart and his lovely wife Nicole have a son, two dogs, and a very happy ever after.

It’s the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

I also have a date with my wife tonight, so after the little man and I head inside and I mix up a pasta dish for my wife, I answer the door. Her friends are here, since both Penny and Delaney said they’d babysit tonight.

Penny scoops my son into her arms and coos at him. She loves kids and Delaney does, too. Nicole and I have a running bet on who will be the first among her friends to follow in her footsteps. I say Penny, but Nicole says Delaney.

“You are the cutest little guy in the entire universe,” Penny says, then plants a huge kiss on his forehead.

Robert squeals with laughter. “Doggie!”

Penny cracks up. Ruby races over to greet Penny, and my son mixes in another word. “Ruby!”

Delaney leans in to kiss him, too. “Are you ready to go shopping with your aunts?”

I groan. “You’re taking him shopping?”

“We need to train him early to be a good boy when the ladies shop,” Penny says. “Besides, Delaney needs shoes.”