“Thanks for your support, Mom,” Phil said.
“You always have it, Sweetie. I’m happy for both of you.” She was beaming big now and I was glad that at least one of them was on our side. “But we will have to discuss how to… explain this to people. I don’t want them to get the wrong impression.”
“Well, the truth seems to work,” Phil replied. “It worked with you guys. Kind of, anyway.”
“Yes, I suppose that’s true,” she agreed. “Although maybe there’s a way to ease people into it before we tell them you’re expecting and getting married.”
“I don’t think it will be that complicated,” Phil argued. “It’s not like Tracianne and I grew up together as brother and sister.”
“And when you think about it that way, like you said, it makes sense,” I noted. “You were attracted to Richard for his qualities, and Phil is attracted to my qualities for similar reasons.”
“I know, hon,” Daphne said. “We’ll just have to explain it to everyone else like that, too.”
I couldn’t claim to be excited to tell people our situation, but I knew it was just part and parcel of falling in love with my stepbrother.
It would be worth it for a lifetime of happiness and the closeness I felt when I was with him, even if outsiders didn’t understand.EpiloguePhil
Six Months LaterI was in the clinic, standing behind the glass window, looking at the baby. We had thought of so many different names, but it was time to pick one. It was going to be tough.
We hadn’t been able to choose one from a lost list of possibilities, because nothing seemed right just yet. So, we decided to wait until the baby arrived to see what the little tyke looked like.
A noise behind me caused me to turn around, and I saw that it was Richard walking into the hall. After he had walked out of the living room that day, he didn’t really talk to us much. He and Tracianne had a few more blowups.
He had a lot of trouble accepting us as a couple. But he seemed to be coming around now, and I guess we had the baby to thank for that. He was a new grandfather, after all.
“Is it okay if I come in and take a look?” he asked humbly.
“Of course,” I said. “Third basinet from the right, top row.”
“Wow,” he said, peering through the window. “I remember looking at Tracianne this way. Congrats, buddy.”
We shook hands. I knew he’d come around eventually. Daughters always have a way of getting their way with their dads.
“How is she?” he asked.
“Doing great,” I responded. “She’s basically healthy. No major complications. She just has a bit of jaundice so they’re keeping her under this light. They said it’s pretty common, though, and nothing to worry about. How about you? How are you doing?”
“I feel like an ass,” he admitted. “I, uh, let this go too far. My pride or whatever. I just don’t know what got into me. I guess you both just surprised me.”
“Look, if it’s any consolation, at first the whole idea was weird and shocking to me, too” I confessed. “I ran through the same thoughts in my head, you know? All the same things you brought up when we told you, because you hadn’t had as much time to get used to it as we had. Thoughts like, who would accept us or reject us? What might people think? And all of that.”
“Yeah. Exactly But then you realize, who cares what people think?” Richard said. “It took me a while, but I got there. I’m glad you two are happy.”
“Thanks, Richard. That means a lot.”
He smiled and nodded a bit and then started to leave.
“Where are you going? Tracianne’s room is that way,” I pointed.
“Oh, I probably shouldn’t go see her right now,” he said, clearly still embarrassed. “She is still recovering from childbirth and I’m likely the last person she wants to talk to.”
“That’s not true at all. She’d be delighted to see you. C’mon,” I said, taking him by the arm. “Let’s start fresh.”
“You’re sure?”
“If the pandemic taught me one thing, it’s the power of the present,” I said. “Besides, Mom’s already in there. We should be a family again.”
“I like that idea.”
He sighed, looking relieved, and we headed the rest of the way to Tracianne’s room together.
“Hey,” I said, entering the room ahead of Richard. “I have a visitor who wants to see you.”
Richard came in then. His body language was a bit sheepish.
“Hey, Princess,” he greeted Tracianne. “Look, I just want to say I’m sorry. I’ve been stubborn through this whole thing and, well, I took it too far.”
“Awww,” said Diamond, who was visiting Tracianne, along with Gillian. “That’s so sweet of him to apologize.”
Both of them had made the trek so that they could meet the baby and support Traci. She had been a bit embarrassed to tell them about our relationship, as I had been with John and Mickey, but all our friends ended up thinking it was pretty inevitable, if not downright cool.