Falling for My Dirty Uncle

"You're either going to need a spanking, baby girl," he says to me as his eyes meet mine. "Or a good fucking. Either way you need to be taught a lesson."

"I'm not a good learner tonight, babe," I say, teasing him. "Maybe you you need to teach me extra hard."

We both stare at each other for a long moment.

Finally Mason cracks a smile as my eyes twinkle.

At the last minute I can't hold it in anymore. I start to chuckle.

Mason joins in.

But our chuckle becomes laughter which quickly gets louder and louder.

Oh my God, my stomach is hurting.

Which is when the baby monitor goes off.

Shit.

We've woken little Ida.

Mason looks at me with concern, but I just sit up and grab a hold of his arm as the two of us walk to the nursery.

Inside is the cutest little baby that I've ever seen.

Ida was born several months ago, but already Mason and I can tell how much our lives have been changed.

I feel so blessed to be a mother. Sometimes I don't understand how Lorna could not have wanted this feeling ever in her life.

But I'm sure she has plenty of time to think about things like this.

The case was pretty open and shut against her. I mean, when you're trying to bilk close to a billion dollars from a publicly traded corporation that manages the pension payments of millions of people, there's very little leeway that the prosecution is going to grant you. She was sentenced to life in prison at a maximum security women's prison. Her eyes boiled with hate towards Mason and me the entire time.

I just sat there next to Daniel, my father, and prayed that this would be the last time I'd ever have to see Lorna again.

It took me a long time to not instinctively call her Mom, and I think I've finally made peace with all the things she said and did to me through my life.

Oh, right. Daniel.

So Daniel had always kept tabs on me from afar, but as Mason had said, he never really bothered to reach out to me. He was under the impression that my life was proceeding along happily and that anything he would have done to get back in it would have raised retribution from Lorna towards both him and me.

I was surprised when he told me that, to say the least.

I mean, with everything Lorna had said to me, it didn't sound like she much wanted me.

"I don't think she did either," Daniel agreed with me. Even though he was biologically my father, I couldn't call him Dad. "But when the whole topic of separation came up, she made it clear that she would fight for custody. Not because she loved you, but because she would win. And she would have a trump card to play against me our entire lives."

But over the last year and half, I think that Daniel and I have gotten close. I mean, we don't see each other much - he lives in Canada somewhere in the mountains filled with snow - but we keep in touch by email and sometimes Facebook.

I think it just feels good knowing you have a family out there in this world. That you're not completely and totally alone.

And just like that, we raise the next generation of our family.

Ida is looking up at me with wide eyes, her crying over now that the big humans have come to her crib and are looking down at her making funny noises as they take her in their arms.

Mason looks at me.

"You're a great Mom," he says to me, drawing me close to him. "I have a great family."