“Fuck, angel,” I rasp when she shifts her hands to my chest and then down to my stomach. Letting her go, I take a step back to separate us. “We’ve gotta leave in fifteen minutes, and there’s no way we’re meeting that deadline if you keep this up.”
She opens her mouth to speak, but her phone rings, distracting her. Glancing at it, she says, “It’s Cleo.”
“Talk to her.” I press one last kiss to her lips. “Just keep it quick.” Fuck knows those two could talk for a full twenty-four hours without coming up for air if they had the time.
She waves me away, reading my tone perfectly. “Go do some boy stuff or something.”
I leave her to take the call. Cleo is what she needs right now. Her best friend will help calm her nerves in ways I can’t. And I need the space that Cleo offers with that call, too. I need a breather to get my head sorted before we leave for our appointment.
Life as we know it is about to change, and while I’m keeping strong for Birdie, I’ve had moments of concern that once we start down this path, shit will be out of our control. Completely fucking out of my control. And that’s not a place I ever like to be.
2
Birdie
* * *
“How are you guys doing?” Cleo asks as I watch Winter leave the bathroom. The thing that stands out the most about him today is the fierce way he’s holding himself. My husband is always a take-charge kinda guy, but even more so today. It’s something I love about him, but right now, I could do with hearing some of his fears. With seeing a little more vulnerability from him so I know I’m not alone in all my feelings and thoughts that are making me feel irrational and completely out of my depth.
Exhaling a long breath, because I have so much excess breath inside me, it isn’t funny, I say, “Well, Winter has his shit together, but I don’t. Thank God for him is all I can say.”
“Birdie, you can do this.” She says the words with so much belief and determination and love it’s like a hug through the phone.
She and I have spent so much time on the phone the last month while she’s pep-talked the hell out of me over this IVF journey. I was doing so well with it until yesterday. Today I’m a bundle of nerves and barely recognise myself with the crazy thoughts running through my mind.
“Yes, I can,” I say, trying hard to fully believe what I’m saying. The problem is I know myself well, and while I know I can physically do whatever I need to, I’m not so sure I’ll mentally get through it unscathed. All the what-ifs are swarming in my head, filling it with pressure, and we haven’t even started the cycle yet.
“Remember when we went for our first business loan and how nervous you were?”
“Yes.” I was as messy as I am now.
“Think about how that turned out and how it helped you grow and bloom into the amazing woman you are today.” Her voice softens. “You are so much stronger than you think you are. When I think of the things you’ve done in your life, I’m in awe. You’ve lived through some tough times, Birdie, and you didn’t just survive them, you flourished in spite of them. You might feel fragile sometimes, but trust me when I tell you that you are one of the least fragile women I know.”
“Jesus, woman, you’re going to make me cry.” I swallow and blink back the tears threatening to fall. “Thank you.” My words come out almost as a whisper because I’m suddenly consumed by the kind of emotion that steals my ability to speak.
“Promise me you’ll remember one thing, babe: sometimes the bravest thing you can do is just show up.”
I smile and allow my tears to fall. Cleo has just quoted Brené Brown to me because she knows I need that kind of inspiration today. “For the record, you are both the best friend anyone could have and the worst best friend anyone could have. I now have to fix my face because you made me cry.”
I hear her grin through the phone when she says, “My job here is done.”
“I love you, Cleo.”
“Not as much as I love you. Now, something tells me you should hang up because if I know your man as well as I think I do, he’s got a schedule for you guys to stick to and it probably involves being early for your appointment.”
I laugh at that. “Yeah, he does, and you’re right; he wants us there fifteen minutes early. I’m pretty sure, though, that he really only wants us there five minutes early so he says fifteen minutes because he knows if he tells me five minutes early, we’ll be five minutes late.”
“Yeah, I’m pretty sure of that too.”
“I’ll call you later and let you know how we go. Thank you for calling. I needed to hear your voice.”
We end the call, and I fix my face as I think about how lucky I am to have both Winter and Cleo in my life. I couldn’t do anything as well as I do it without either of them. And Cleo’s right: I need to remember that just showing up is the bravest thing I can do. Really, that’s all I have to keep doing. Our doctor will guide us through everything we have to do, and Winter will hold my hand every step of the way. I’ve just gotta keep showing up. And keep holding faith, which honestly might be the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do. But if Winter can do it, so can I.
“You ready, angel?” Winter’s voice cuts through my thoughts and I turn to face him.
Smiling, I nod. “Yes.”
He returns my smile and holds out his hand. “Let’s do this.”
Winter parks the car and cuts the engine before looking at me, his eyes filled with love as he says, “You good?”
My head is swimming after seeing our doctor. Nothing new was discussed during the appointment; however, Dr McLeod did mention one thing that I haven’t been able to stop thinking about.
“She said that IVF is only as good as the eggs are,” I say. “What if my eggs are bad?”
“What she said was that age is the biggest factor in the eggs, Birdie. She also said that thirty-four is a lot better than if you were forty. Don’t latch onto only one part of what she says. She was trying to be positive for us.”
“I know, but you asked if I’m good, and I’m just telling you where my head is at right now. I can’t stop thinking about this.”
“What will help take your mind off it?”
This is the thing Winter doesn’t get. Nothing will take my mind off any of this. It’s pretty much what I think about from the minute I wake to the minute I go to sleep at night. Even when I’m trying to focus on work stuff, I struggle to stop thinking about IVF. But I understand that his mind works differently to mine, so I try to let him help me shift my attention whenever he attempts to do that. Today I’m not so sure either of us will succeed in that endeavour.
“I’m going to go into work for a few hours. That’ll help.”
He frowns. “I thought you were taking today off.”
“I was going to. A few hours, though, is probably what I need to centre myself after this morning.”
After thinking about that for a moment, he nods. “Okay, but I don’t want you there for longer than those few hours.”