“So much better,” she said, beaming at us. She’d brushed her hair, applied a little bit of makeup and had on fresh clothes. She looked like her regular non-stressed-mom-self.
“Wow, she’s still asleep?” I nodded. “Well, that’s not going to last once we get her in the car seat.” She seemed a bit more upbeat after only a few minutes for herself.
“Are you sure you want to go out?” Lucah said, his hand on my shoulder. Lola made a little grumbling sound and frowned in her sleep, but didn’t wake.
“Yes, I need to leave this house. If only for an hour. I’m going to go crazy.” April did look a little manic. Her eyes were wide and she blinked a lot.
“Okay, we’ll hold the down fort here,” he said, giving her a kiss on the cheek. I had the distinct feeling that when we came back the house was going to look quite different. I gave Lucah a kiss as April started packing up a diaper bag with everything that little Lola could need. Babies came with a lot of accessories that was for sure.
Carefully, I walked out to the car with Lola. April was right that the second I placed her in the car seat, she woke up.
“Hey, baby girl, it’s okay.” She made the cutest grumpy face and started flailing her hands, but didn’t cry. April and I waited as she closed her eyes again and seemed to fall back asleep.
“Do you want to ride in the back with her?” I asked and April nodded.
“Yeah, just in case she gets fussy. It’s easier to comfort her if she can see me and I can at least touch her.” I got in the front seat of her BMW and adjusted the seat and the mirrors.
“And we’re off!” I said and April did a little victory punch in the air.
~*~*~
Twenty minutes later I was pulling through the drive through at McDonald’s. April had practically cried when she’d seen the golden arches.
“I want fries so, so bad.” I wasn’t a huge fan of their food, but since she was getting something, I got a burger and fries as well and I thought about getting a latte, but since April couldn’t have caffeine, I didn’t want to rub it in her face.
After I paid and set the bags on the passenger seat, I parked and April came and sat in the front seat with me to eat.
“I know this isn’t fancy, but this is so, so good,” she said, nearly moaning as she shoved about ten fries in her mouth. “I know this is bad for me, but I can’t be bothered to care.”
The food wasn’t bad, and they’d given me extra ketchup when I asked, so they had that in their favor.
“So how’s it been? Other than the no sleep and everything?” I asked. I was probably opening a can of worms, but she’d said she wanted adult conversation.
“I love my kids so much, but sometimes I just want them to go away. I hope that doesn’t make me a terrible mother, but sometimes I just want a break. I want to sleep and have sex with my husband without someone crying or interrupting.” She leaned her head back and closed her eyes for a moment.
“I miss sex,” she moaned. “I miss orgasms and kissing and feeling like an adult.”
I wasn’t sure what comfort I could offer her, so I just dumped some of my fries into her now-empty container.
“Here, have fries. Carbs make everything better.” If I was Sloane, I’d bake her some sort of elaborate cake to make her feel better. But since I wasn’t, I didn’t want to subject her to my sporadic baking skills.
“Bless you,” she said, reaching out and patting my shoulder.
We ate some more in silence until April sighed.
“Okay, tell me what’s going on with you. I want to hear all your wedding plans. Spare no detail, no matter how mundane.” Her eager face made me think of her daughters when they asked if they could prance around their room in my heels.
I laughed and started telling her about my dress (I wasn’t telling anyone about the second dress. I wanted them all to be surprised). She oohed and ahhed and acted as if this was the most exciting thing she’d ever heard. Lola woke up in the middle of my stitch-by-stitch recounting of my last fitting, but April just yanked up her shirt, let Lola latch on and kept listening.
I thought that I would bore her, but she hung on every word as Lola sucked away. Afterward, she grabbed a cloth and burped her and then held her on her shoulder.
“I remember my wedding,” she said as if it was something that had happened a million years ago, instead of just six.
“I wasn’t a huge fan of marriage either,” she said, stroking Lola’s head absentmindedly. “I thought I was going to be a hardass career woman, but things change, you know?” I did.
“I mean, I was never averse to marriage. I just wasn’t sure if it was something I wanted. And then, of course, I met Tate and I knew from our first date that I was going to marry him.” I thought my story with Lucah was pretty damn romantic, but April and Tate also had a lovely story.
They’d both been in college doing their undergrad degrees and she’d been dating someone else at the time. They’d had a fight and April ended up bursting into tears just outside her dorm and sitting on a bench. Tate just happened to be walking by and sat next to her.