My Life as a Holiday Album (My Life as an Album #5) - L.J. Evans Page 0,11
don’t even have a purse with me. Just my phone and my license and an ATM card. You have a bag full of motherly goodness.”
Edie laughed. “I grew up with Wynn as a mom. I’m perpetually prepared. That has nothing to do with whether I’m prepared to actually be a mother.”
“You’ve already been a mom. To all of us. You helped take care of us all the time.”
“Being stuck babysitting, again, doesn’t make me mom material.”
“Are you nervous?” I asked her.
She looked out the window and nodded. “I’m nervous about a lot of the same things you’re nervous about. Unsure if I’m going to be able to do this.”
“You didn’t want kids, right?”
Edie shook her head. “Neither Garrett nor I did. We were happy with it being the two of us.”
“Doesn’t Garrett want to keep the distillery in the family?” I asked.
“There are some cousins who work for the family business who would be more than happy to inherit it. His only concern is passing it down to someone who will love it as much as he does. Having a child doesn’t necessarily mean that child will love it the same way.”
That was true, because neither Mayson nor I wanted to be an entertainment lawyer or run the horse ranch that was in our families. And my cousins Ty and Eliza didn’t want anything to do with the family car dealership, even if their sister, Ginny, had always shown an interest in it.
“Stephen’s mad because you’re thinking about aborting it,” Edie said.
Aborting sounded so much nicer than killing. Stephen had said killing it. Killing the baby. I wasn’t sure I could live with myself if I did do it. Which was why I’d wanted it to be a choice we made together, so we could help each other out whenever the guilt was too much for one of us to bear. I certainly hadn’t wanted it to be the choice that tore us apart.
I nodded at her.
“Seeing me all bloated and huge isn’t helping either,” Edie said.
“It’s not that. You’re beautiful. You look like a glitter cloud. Like you could be your own constellation.”
Edie laughed so hard I thought she’d fall off her chair. “I’m glad you think that. It certainly isn’t how I feel. I feel tired and exhausted. My boobs hurt constantly, and the baby is, right this minute, pushing a foot up inside my ribcage in a way that makes me want to hurl the cookie I just ate.”
I started crying again. More stupid tears.
Edie moved into the chair next to mine, wrapping me in her arms like Stephen usually did, which only made me cry a little harder. I wanted him to be there, making this decision with me.
“’Ley. You need to make the choice that is right for you, and your life, and your future. If you want Stephen to be a part of that future, you probably need to include him. But…” Edie drew a shaky breath. “Even coming to an answer together doesn’t mean one or both of you might not regret it later. All you can do is make the one that seems the best, for both of you, right now.”
“I just. I just want to have the future we saw. Traveling to see the stars. Staying out late to watch them. I won’t be able to do any of that with a baby.”
“Who says?”
I looked up at her. “Oh, come on, take a baby with us to Bali?”
“Why not?” When I rolled my eyes at her, she shrugged. “Okay, maybe when it’s a tiny baby you might not want to expose it to all that travel, but you know either of our moms would be thrilled to watch it while you two took a trip.”
“What? Just leave my baby for weeks at a time?” And as I said it, with indignation in my voice, I realized just what it meant. If the thought of leaving my baby for a few weeks with my mama was enough to get my feathers ruffled, how could I really think about ending its life before it even began?
Edie smiled at my indignation, and my thoughts must have reflected in my face because she asked, “Do you want to hear some of the good things?”
“Good?” The doubt was clear in my voice.
“You get to feel flutters, like butterfly wings inside you. And your heart expands a gazillion times because of the little critter growing inside you. Seeing the expression on Stephen’s face when he feels