My Brother's Best Man

EIGHT YEARS LATER

Ben

“Daddy, Mommy, look! A butterfly!”

Becca and I share a smile as Ava walks ahead of us, our seven-year-old aiming her camera proudly. She’s got her mother’s brown hair, but people say she has my eyes.

I have to admit, Ava’s eyes are serious for a seven year old. Maybe it’s all the photos she takes, skipping ahead of us as we walk around the park, the summer air bright and the birds chirping all around us.

Tyler grabs onto my free hand, the one not wrapped around Becca’s shoulders, swinging back and forth as he grins up at me. Our five year old is eager to get to the play area we passed on the way in, but he’s also a good little brother, happy to hang with Ava for a while as she takes her photos.

Becca cradles our three year old to her chest. Mia is tired from the car ride, but I just know that soon our black-haired daughter is going to spring awake, probably when we get to the play area. She looks so cute with her head resting against Becca’s shoulder.

My wife looks as beautiful as the day I met her.

No, she looks more beautiful, more womanly in her curves, more confident with her wavy hair and her sassy gaze.

She’s truly my Becca bee now, a successful portrait photographer, an amazing mother who has become the woman I always knew she would be.

As we continue walking – Ava stopping every couple of minutes to test her new birthday present out – I lean over and whisper in Becca’s ear, “Let me know if you want to stop. I know she’s heavier than she looks.”

She smiles over Mia’s head.

“Do you mind?” she asks quietly.

I chuckle as quietly as I can, shaking my head.

“No, go help our little photographer.”

Becca hands Mia over to me carefully. I take her with my free arm, cradling her to my chest, still stunned – always – that these precious beautiful children came from us.

Becca leans over, kissing my cheek softly, her voice low.

“Ben, I was going to wait until we got home, but….”

I don’t have to guess anymore.

It’s the way she looked at me in the boxing gym when we found out she was pregnant with Ava.

It was the way she looked at the restaurant when she told me about Tyler.

It’s how she looked in her studio when I learned Mia was on her way.

“Another baby,” she whispers, nodding. “Do you think you can handle it?”

“Always,” I say fiercely.

“What’s always, Daddy?” Mia says, stirring awake.

“We can always have more of you little munchkins, that’s what,” I say, giving her a playful shake. “What do you think, huh? You ready to be a big sister, Mia, like how Ava is your big sister and Tyler is your big brother?”

She leans back, smiling and alert. “I can be the big one. I can be the oldest ever.”

I chuckle. “Yeah, something like that. What do you think?”

“I think yay,” she sings, throwing her arms around me. “I love you, Daddy.”

“I love you too, sweetness. And you, little man. And Ava. And Mommy. And our lives.”

We walk on, the sun shining, the day stretching invitingly ahead of us.