In The After

3.2 CADE

I'm going to be a father.

This glorious mantra plays on a loop in my head, and has been for three months now. I am giddy with it. It distracts me, like a little tap on my shoulder when I'm knee deep in work. No matter how busy I get, it floats to the surface of my consciousness and makes me smile. Makes me text Adelaide for the tenth time in a day just to ask how she's feeling and remind her how I love her.

I was starting to get sincerely worried about her in New York. That whole first week I could see she felt like hell. At first I chalked it up to the flight messing with her inner ear, making her dizzy and nauseated. But when it persisted, I was getting close to cutting our trip short.

Then, the truth- the amazing, wonderful, fabulous gift she's given me. She still doesn't feel great, I know. But knowing why seemed to put it all in perspective for her. Morning sickness is a beast as far as I'm concerned- I feel pretty helpless. But just in the last few days I've noticed a little improvement. She hasn't been quite so green around the gills, doesn't seem so worn out. Tomorrow she will be 12 weeks along. Officially done with the first trimester. Which means we can start telling people after her doctor visit Friday. Thank God. I had no idea what a challenge keeping a secret was until I had to keep something between Adelaide and I.

The mother of my child.

It's breathtaking, really, the meaning of those words. I will never be able to give her anything in our lives as big as the gift she's giving me. I hope I'm showing her that. I hope I'm expressing it by watching over her, trying to anticipate her every whim, keeping Tristen occupied when she's exhausted. Since she's felt so awful, it was easy for me to talk her out of working. But she's a little stir crazy now and I'm pretty sure she's going to want to go back soon. With Tristen in school all day she'll push for the lunch shift. And it may be weird and archaic and presumptuous but I would really feel better if she'd stay out from behind the bar. It can get rowdy sometimes. I happen to know that, before she got pregnant, she jumped over the bar with the baseball bat we stash behind it and forcibly broke up a fight between two drunks before Samuel could get to her with the bouncers.

It could have ended badly but apparently the sight of a 5'3" woman in pigtails swinging a Louisville Slugger was enough to distract.

I can't have her in that kind of atmosphere again. So even now, while I'm serving and chatting with customers, many who have visited enough to be considered our regulars, I'm working through what it will take to keep her home. Maybe asking her to do the office stuff...

"I was starting to forget what you look like, asshole," a familiar voice says to my right over the chatter and reggae.

Oliver leans over the bar wearing a Marlins cap and a Tommy Bahama shirt. I haven't seen him in a month- between both of our jobs and life in general, we hadn't been able to catch up. He invited me down for a weekend in the middle of July and Adelaide encouraged me to go. But I didn't feel comfortable leaving her when she felt so sick.

"Hey!"

"If Mohamed REFUSES to come to the mountain..." he says as we embrace over the counter.

"I am a suck friend. I know."

"You ARE a suck friend. So I figure you owe me many free beers. And shots. Shots especially."

It's a Wednesday so I feel comfortable leaving Tori in charge. I grab two bottles of beer and we settle into a table near the water. Our conversation is easy, like it always is. The thing about my friendship with Ollie is that it's completely stress free. The closest we've ever gotten to a fight was that day in my apartment when he threw up his hands and slammed out after shoving me. We are grown men with busy lives. But no matter how much time passes between visits, we can pick up right where we left off.