Steel Hearts

- 33 -

The next few weeks were beautiful. We spent our honeymoon in Europe. Exploring Vienna and Barcelona. Places neither of us had ever been but wanted to visit without the worry of a fight following. We went to wine tastings and museums while also eating as much food as we could because American food just didn't cut it. It was a much-needed miracle; a break that had been a long time coming.

When he had returned home, we found ourselves sitting outside in the grass for no reason other than it was nice outside. I took the time to teach him Spanish after we had talked about wanting to visit other countries in Spain. There were countless nights that we spent going back through his list he had compiled to catch up, dancing around the living room to soundtracks, and laughing at comedy movies.

We had decided to pull the plug and adopt a six-month-old black and white border collie. She listened to nothing but Chewie. Fitting, as we had watched 'Star Wars' a few weeks before bringing her home. There wasn't much of anything for us to do. We had gotten so used to jumping from fight to fight, it felt strange for us to do nothing. A time of peace had overcome the world, albeit grief slapped it just as hard.

Steve would 'accidentally' drop food from the table for her. It sometimes felt like he loved the dog more than me. Not that I minded, it was sweet and I loved Chewie just as much. Every single night, she slept on the foot of our bed. Neither of us had the heart to kick her off. Sometimes she took up the majority of the bed and left us no room, resulting in fits of giggles from the two of us.

Then it happened.

I sat on the edge of the tub in our bathroom, "Hey, Steve."

He was folding laundry and poked his head around the corner of the doorframe, Chewie following closely behind, "Is everything okay?"

I'd never forgotten the look on his face when he saw the three positive pregnancy tests sitting on the counter. He truly was a liar when he told Tony he didn't want the stability of a family. We both knew that.

His eyes started to well with tears when he knelt down in front of me, his features still set in disbelief, "Really?"

Wordlessly, I nodded quickly and threw myself into his arms. It wasn't anything either of us expected, but we would've been lying to ourselves and each other if we said we didn't want a family together. I'd also be lying to myself if I said that I didn't feel guilty getting our happy ending at the expense of half the universe. Several days later, we had gone to the doctor for confirmation and sure enough; I was definitely pregnant, seven weeks along with twins.

Shocked, we fell right into making one of the two spare bedrooms into a nursery for them. The two cribs were positioned on opposite walls from each other. Steve took the doors off of the closet and managed to fit a large dresser snuggly in the bottom, giving us more floor space to work with while also keeping storage a priority. Once we had finished off the room, it was plainly black and white with a small pop of light red and brown.

One day, several weeks before my due date there was a knock at the door. Chewie hopped right up to bark at the front door. Her nose pressed to the crack between the door and the floor. Reluctantly, I shimmied my way off of the couch and let Steve know that I would answer the door.

When the door swung open toward me, my brother Andrew stood in front of me.

"Uh- hi," he says, shoving his hands into his pockets. Awkwardly, he rocked back and forth between his feet.

"Hi. Is everything okay?" I ask, mildly confused and concerned as to why he showed up out of nowhere.

Chewie was circling and sniffing his feet as he said, "Yeah, I just wanted to talk. Well, apologize really."