Love Thy Neighbor

Chapter 59

Five months later...

"Happy anniversary," Shawn says, bringing me coffee in bed.

I laugh. "Technically, yesterday was the anniversary of when we met again."

"That doesn't count since I didn't know it was you. Plus we were already celebrating Halloween and your birthday last night. Throwing in this anniversary would have made it less important," he says as he sits down on the bed next to me.

"I don't want to work today," I whine.

"Marian is already here, but I guess you could always send her home."

"Naw. I have too much to do. I'll be fine. I'm just a little hungover."

The night before we'd had lots of fun between trick-or-treating and celebrating my birthday. David and Perri had come over, and Kendra and her family hung out with us, too.

Perri was four months pregnant, so she was the only completely sober one in the group. David and Perri had married in September, as soon as they realized she was expecting. Even though the circumstances were oddly similar to what ours had been, I knew their relationship was strong and would last.

As I climb out of bed, I remember something about the night before. I turn to Shawn who is still sitting on the bed, looking at his phone.

"I put some hilarious shit on Instagram last night," he says chuckling. "I'm deleting most of it."

"Shawn," I say.

He looks up. "What, hun?"

"Did we try to make a baby last night?"

He grins. "Oh yeah we did. You got it in your head that last night was the perfect time to start. I tried to convince you that maybe we should wait until you were sober, but you told me it was no condom or no sex, my choice."

"Perri gave me baby fever," I say, groaning.

"Was it a temporary bug? Are you now regretting it?" he asks.

"I'm not sure. I'll get back to you in a few weeks if I am pregnant."

He stands up and walks over to me, taking me in his arms. "I regret nothing," he says as he gives me a kiss.

I go down to the kitchen and say hello to Marian who is playing with Lila in the living room. I bend down and give Lila kisses all over her cheek until she says, "Stop now mama!"

We live in Shawn's house. It was the logical choice since it's considerably bigger. Coming to that conclusion was not easy for me, since I loved living in my Nana's house. We were able to find renters right away, so Elsie and I still own it. I keep telling Els she should move to Brooklyn after she graduates now that the house is pretty much hers.

Kendra and her family are a short walk away, but I miss our evenings sitting on the stairs.

I suddenly remember another thing about last night.

I take my coffee in the main floor office, which is now my workspace. I pull out my phone and text Kendra.

Me: I am apologizing now for being obnoxious last night!

She gets right back to me.

Kendra: LOL

Kendra: You were hilarious

Kendra: No apologies!

Me: I vaguely remember shouting something at you as you were leaving.

Kendra: Oh you mean when you screamed WISH ME LUCK GETTING PREGNANT WITH SHAWN MENDES'S BABY?

Me: Oh god.

Kendra: Mike almost fell down the stairs from laughing so hard

Me: I shouldn't drink tequila. Ever.

Kendra: I'm sure Shawn Mendes didn't mind. He's wanted to put a baby in you for months.

Me: This could be it. I guess I am ready.

Kendra: Yes you are. Got to get on a conference call. TTYL.

I finally get going with my stats work. I put in a solid three and a half hours before going to get a second coffee. Marian has taken Lila to the park.

Shawn is probably down in his studio. He is writing like crazy for his next album. He's already arranged to record it in New York starting in a few weeks, so he won't have to go away. He's going to tour towards the end of next year but is thinking of doing things differently. He's trying to arrange it so that for each week of touring, he gets a week off in between. It will mean a longer tour, a lot of air travel time, and many added expenses, but it will be easier on our family.

Shawn comes upstairs for lunch after I get another hour of work in. He makes us sandwiches. Marian and Lila are still gone, so they probably packed a picnic.

As we eat, he brings up last night.

"The way I see it, Jessica, is that if you got pregnant, then it was meant to be. If you didn't, we can talk more about whether we keep trying."

"So we'll keep using birth control for now?" I ask.

"Yeah. Let's see what happened last night."

And that's all we say about it until I get my period 16 days later.

I'm in the bathroom after waking up to that horrible feeling of my period starting. I take care of it, but I'm still sitting here, feeling kind of numb. It dawns on me that I wanted to be pregnant, and my awareness of this takes me by surprise.

There's a light knock on the door.

"You alright, Jess? You've been in there for ten minutes."

I stand up, flush, wash my hands, and open the door.

"I got my period," I say.

"Oh. Okay."

"I'm disappointed, Shawn."

He takes me in his strong loving arms and kisses me on the top of the head. "Want to talk about it?"

I nod. "Yes."

We get back in our bed and I put my head on his chest. He strokes my back.

"I want to have a baby," I say.

"Then there's really not much to talk about. We'll toss the condoms in the trash and start trying."

I kiss his chest. "I'm going to get huge, you know. And cranky. My feet might swell, and you will have to rub them every night."

"I can handle that."

"Will you run out and buy weird foods in the middle of the night if I have cravings?" I ask.

"Sure. Did you have cravings with Lila?"

"Dry roasted lightly salted peanuts, green olives, and grilled cheese," I answer.

"Are those normal cravings? Or are you just weird?"

"All moms crave really strange oddly specific things. You should ask your mom what she craved with you. My mom told me she craved jalapeño poppers with me. She ate them every day for three months."

"This is going to be quite an adventure, yeah? I can't wait," he says.

Author's note:

I can't believe I am close to a thousand reads. I really appreciate everyone who is reading. I know I have a core group of readers- thank you! I hope you stick with me when I start posting my next story.

Please comment if you are inclined.