Captured Moments

CHAPTER NINE: A WINTER BLESSING

Marie hummed "Silent Night" softly in French as she stirred the gravy, watching the thick sauce swirl into perfect ribbons against the worn wooden spoon her grand-mère had passed down to her. The kitchen was alive with the aromas of her maman's pot roast recipe – carrots and onions melting into tender beef, fresh rosemary from the windowsill herb garden she'd stubbornly maintained even through the winter months, and the buttery scent of rolls rising in the oven. Steam rose from the pot, fogging the window where delicate snowflakes danced in the December twilight, coating their little Cape Cod in a pristine white blanket that glowed pink and gold in the setting sun.

Her free hand drifted to her swollen belly, feeling the gentle movements of the baby who had been their constant companion for the past nine months. The tiny foot or elbow – she could never quite tell which – pressed against her palm in what felt like a greeting. These quiet moments in the kitchen had become her sanctuary, a place to dream about the future while nurturing the present, blending her French heritage with her new American life.

The wedding ring on her finger caught the glow of the overhead light, sending tiny rainbows dancing across the fresh yellow paint they'd chosen for the walls just last month. Landon had insisted on repainting the entire kitchen himself, wanting everything to be perfect before the baby arrived. She smiled, remembering how he'd ended up with more paint in his dark hair than on some of the walls, his infectious laughter filling their home as she'd tried to help him clean up, teasing him in her French-accented English about his painting technique.

Everything had changed so quickly in the past few months. The day Landon had burst through the front door, his tie askew and eyes bright with excitement, clutching the offer letter from Morton, Bradley, and Associates, felt like yesterday and a lifetime ago all at once. He'd swept her off her feet – as much as he could with her growing belly – and spun her around their tiny living room. They'd celebrated that night with sparkling cider instead of champagne, sharing dreams of nursery colors and baby names over her mother's lasagna recipe, which she'd finally mastered after three attempts and several long-distance calls to Paris. The timing of the job couldn't have been more perfect, a blessing they'd both needed after months of worried conversations about their financial future.

She reached for the pepper shaker – the one shaped like a little rooster that they'd found at that charming antique store in Vermont during their honeymoon, which had reminded her so much of the one in her mother's kitchen back in France – and froze. Something felt different. The baby, who had been doing her usual evening acrobatics, suddenly seemed to shift lower. Then she felt it – the telltale trickle down her leg, warming her hand-knitted wool sock (a early Christmas gift from her sister Claire, who'd been determined that Marie's feet wouldn't get cold during the December chill).

Her heart began to race, butterflies erupting in her stomach as she quickly turned off the stove burners, her hands trembling slightly as she moved the pots aside. The oven timer dinged, but the rolls would have to wait. Their daughter, it seemed, had her own schedule in mind.

"Okay, reste calme," she whispered to herself in French, the familiar words of her childhood providing comfort as she pressed one hand against her lower back. Even after years in America, these private moments still brought out her mother tongue. She waddled to the hallway where the beige rotary phone hung on the wall, past the cookbook her maman had pressed into her hands before she'd left France – its pages now splattered with evidence of Marie's attempts to recreate the tastes of home.

The wallpaper beside the phone still bore the pencil marks where they'd measured their heights last summer, a tradition started on their first night in the house. The highest mark was Landon's, of course, towering over her own measurement. Below them, they'd already drawn a tiny line labeled "Baby Pearce - Coming Soon!" Her trembling fingers found the familiar number sequence for Landon's office, the plastic dial clicking rhythmically with each turn.