Southern Gentleman (Charleston Heat 3)

Yes, this isn’t how I imagined my experience of motherhood would play out. Namely, I thought I’d be doing this baby thing with a great, sexy, preferably bookish guy who adored me as much as I adored him, and who was committed to being an equal partner in all things. Parenthood included.

And yes, there’s a chance Greyson will want to be involved. But even if he is, can I count on him to be that equal partner? How would we co-parent when we can hardly look at each other without engaging in verbal fisticuffs (shout out to historical romance for making that word a regular part of my vocabulary)?

Bottom line: am I ready to take on single parenting? Yes, I have a village that is ready and willing to help out. But at the end of the day, it will just be me and this baby against the world. I won’t have a partner to take over diaper duty in the middle of the night after I’m exhausted from a feeding. I don’t have a parent to offer advice or just be there when I’ve had it or my nipples are bleeding or I’m out of coffee.

Doing this alone is going to be fucking hard.

The hardest thing I’ve ever done.

I’m scared.

But I’ve done enough scary things in my life to know that sometimes being frightened is a good thing. It means you’re taking a chance. Doing something that’s risky and big. You’re diving into life headfirst. Diving into experience.

As a woman of appetite—for food and liquor and the occasional cigarette, yes, but also for knowledge, for late nights and literature and feeling and family—I am all for experience.

Blinking, I look up at my parents’ house. I’m flooded by all the memories this place holds. The big stuff—graduations, birthdays, holidays—and the little ones, too. How Mom would make blueberry muffins from a box on Saturday mornings, making the whole house smell like sugar and butter. Her sitting at the counter with me, hiding her wine in a Solo cup while walking me through my long division homework. Dad playing music in the living room, the three of us dancing to Sir Elton, Springsteen, Melissa Etheridge (he went through a Lilith Fair phase in the late-nineties.)

I miss that.

The sense of belonging.

It hits me that maybe this baby is my chance at building a new family. At recreating that belonging, just with someone new.

Someone I created.

It’s what Lady Charlotte was implying when she asked Callum why he wanted an heir so badly—that he’d lost his family and wanted to create a new one. That he was lonely, and searching for a sense of belonging.

Taking a deep breath, I turn and start walking again. I walk and I think. I am in a place where I can raise this baby how I want to. I could give her a good life in a loving, secure, stable home.

I also have the means, the resources, and the support to (hopefully) enjoy motherhood myself. Again, things that are important to my decision making process. I have great insurance and really good doctors. Solid maternity leave at my job. A job that pays me enough to cover quality child care when I go back to work. I’ve already achieved a lot of what I set out to do in my career. I’ve traveled, I’ve had a great time. I’ve gotten to meet incredible people.

I am one lucky bitch with a lot to share. And share it I do, with my students, the charities and causes I support, and my community.

If I chose to, I could share it with a baby, too.

I have no sentimental notions about motherhood. But the more I think about where I’m at and who I’ve become, the more I’m starting to believe this baby thing could actually be fun. Hard, yes. Exhausting, totally. But how cool would it be to teach her how to read? To love her and learn who she is, what she’s passionate about, her likes and dislikes? Travel with her, even?

How cool would it be to take the idea of motherhood and make it my own? Do it my own way, because I can?

I’d be giving up a lot to have this kid.

But the flip side of that equation is that I’d be gaining a lot, too.

A family. The privilege of experiencing the world through a new set of eyes.

Yeah, having a kid without a dedicated partner is not what I thought I’d be doing at this point in my life. It’s going to be a struggle to let go of what I’d hoped my path would look like and embrace how things will actually shake out.

There’s no telling if this path is any better or worse than others I could have taken.

But that doesn’t mean it’s not the right path.