Divided (32 page)

With my suitcases packed, the next morning I waited by the door until I saw his car arrive before I called the cab. Stephen was asleep and would be up any second ready for a bottle. As Ryan walked in the door, I was waiting for him. He noticed the suitcase behind me and his face changed.

“What's going on? Why are your bags packed?” 

“I need to get back home.” I lied. 
At least this time you’re saying good-bye. “
I have to do a couple of things before school starts and you’re doing so great with Stephen, you don't need my help anymore.” I said all with one breath.

“Bug, I don't understand.” Just on cue the cabbie beeped his horn and Stephen began to cry.

“Ryan, this between us, it's been a mess from the beginning. I’ll always love you but it's time for me to go figure out my life.” I walked over to him, placing a kiss on his cheek. “The baby needs to be fed and changed. You’ll be an amazing dad.”

I didn’t wait for him to respond I walked out of the house with my suitcase in hand. After I was in the cab I looked back at the house and unlike last time, Ryan wasn’t there. All I saw was the garage door closing.  My heart shattered into a million pieces all over again. Never once did he ask me to stay.

I walked out of the airplane with my heart on my sleeve. My eyes were puffy and red from crying. I was still surprised security hadn’t stopped me to ask what was wrong. My big sunglasses covered my eyes but there was nothing to cover my runny red nose or the tears that wouldn’t quit and there was definitely nothing that could cover my broken heart.

I knew I did the right thing. I was getting too attached to Stephen and It wasn’t fair for me to ask Ryan to let me stay. He had enough to deal with. After Stephanie’s funeral, it took a long time for him to realize that he wasn’t going to lose Stephen too.  

I dragged my feet as I walked down the long hallways of Newark Airport. I didn’t care how long it took me to walk to baggage claim. With each step I took it was a step further away from Ryan and Stephen. I had never thought that I would want a child that wasn’t mine as much as I wanted Stephen. I had watched him grow from the incubator at the hospital to a chubby active little boy. I remembered our late night feedings, never once letting Ryan do it because he had work in the morning. This time my heart was broken twice and it hurt ten times worse.

I sat in front of the wrong conveyer belt for about twenty minutes before I realized I was at the wrong one. I walked to the correct one and waited for my suitcase. I just stood there dazed, looking at the revolving conveyer belt.  There were only a few left when I realized my luggage had passed me a couple of times and I finally reached for my suitcase.

“I’ll help you with that.” A voice said. That voice was the voice that caused the hair on my neck to stand, the air to vanish from my lungs and cause my heart to skip a beat. I turned and locked eyes with Ryan. He had Stephen strapped to him in a Bjorn baby carrier.

I took my sunglasses off. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. Had I cried so much I was beginning to hallucinate? I shook my head to clear my vision and when I opened my eyes he was still there. A new set of tears formed and I reached up and hugged them both. I cried in his arms until I was able to control the sobs. Pulling away I looked at him and then at Stephen who was sleeping peacefully in his carrier strapped tightly like a book bag on Ryan’s chest.

“What are you doing here?” I asked him.

He wiped a tear away from my eyes. “I’ve let you walk out of my life one too many times. I’m not doing it again.” He said.

The tears wouldn’t stop streaming from my eyes. Speaking was impossible at this point.

“I love you, Alani. I love the way you are, how caring you are and I love the way you love my son. If I need to move here than that’s what I’ll do, but I refuse to lose you again. I know we always played it by ear, but now I’m asking you to stay with me, with us. Permanently.”

I nodded my head yes and he wrapped his arms around me again. I kissed the top of Stephen’s little head. I couldn’t believe this, they were both here.

“Wait, how did you get here?” I asked confused as how he beat me here.

“Your ticket was out of Fargo. Ours was out of Grand Forks.”

I sniffled. “I thought that plane was booked solid”

“Not when you know the pilot.” He smiled at me as he leaned down and kissed me.

“I love you both.” I said in between kisses.

“I know, Bug. We love you, too.”

Ryan gave me the Bjorn with Stephen as he got all off our luggage. We grabbed a cab to my apartment and I opened the door, thanking god that Katie came here at least once a week to make sure everything was ok.

I held the door for Ryan. “This is home.” I said, waving my hand to the rest of the Ikea furnished apartment. “I know it's tiny but its mine.”

“It’s perfect.” He said placing the suitcases up against the wall.

“I’m starving,” I told him, “ and I know I don’t have any food here. Do you want to order or…?”

“Let’s go into the city.” He said eagerly. “I’ve never been and I heard it’s beautiful there and we can take Stephen to Central Park, make a day out of it and maybe grab some street food.”

We walked to the path and we were in the city within twenty minutes. We stopped at the first pizza joint outside of 33
^rd
Street stop. 

“I’m going to show you what real pizza is.” I said to Ryan. We ordered four slices and shared a coke. Ryan ate his two slices within minutes and kept eyeing my second slice so I pushed my paper plate his way and he quickly grabbed it before I could change my mind.

“Oh my fuc…” He began.

“Language.”

“This is the best pizza I’ve ever had.” He said in between slices. At this point I didn’t think he was even chewing.

We continued on up until we hit Central Park, “What is your favorite part of the whole park?” He asked.

“That’s easy. The Bethesda Fountain.”

“Take us there.” He said.

We started walking towards the fountain and I tried to explain all the things I knew about Central Park. He listened to every word and was captivated with curiosity. “So this is it.” I said pointing to the water. “I come here and just stare out at the lake, I can sit here forever.”

“This is beautiful.” He said as he took my hand. “Here give me Stephen. You’ve been carrying him this whole time, your back will hurt later.” I didn’t argue.

I unfastened Stephen’s carrier, and place it on Ryan. He reached out, grabbing my hand and pulled me in for a kiss. This day had started out as the worst day of my life and here I was in Central Park with Ryan and Stephen. I couldn’t be any happier. I sighed and smiled as my lips met Ryan’s before he pulled back and looked at me.

Pulling my left hand to his lips, he kissed the back of my hand. Right before me, he dropped down on one knee, Stephen in tow.  He reached inside his pocket and pulled out a vintage engagement ring with a center diamond and a halo of diamonds around it. My other hand immediately went to cover my big mouth that was currently hanging open.

“Alani Grace LaBelle, I love you with all that I am. I promise to love you for the rest of my life. You make me want to be a better person and I’m so lucky to have you not only in my life but in my son’s life too. You are the most fascinating, loving, beautiful, fearless person I have ever had the pleasure to meet. I know things haven’t always been easy, but I’ll devote my life to always making you happy. Will you please do me the honor and be my wife?”

The tears poured uncontrollably out of my eyes. “Yes. Of course. Yes, I’ll marry you.” He came up from his knee and placed the beautiful engagement ring on my ring finger. His mouth meeting mine.

“Now all you have to do is pick where home will be. Where ever it is, know that I’ll follow.” He said, placing a kiss over my temple.

“Ryan, I love New York City, but home will always be with you in Grand Forks. That’s home.”

Epilogue

Two years later.

I stood in the bridal suite waiting for the processional to begin. Today I was not only marrying my soul mate but I would become a mother, as I would be signing both my marriage license and the adoption papers for Stephen.

“It’s go time.” Katie said as she popped her head in. I took a deep breath and interlocked my arm with my fathers. 

The second the doors opened, my eyes met Ryan’s and then Stephen’s. Tears of joy dripped silently down my face. I had waited for this perfect moment my whole life. After all the crap that I had been through, I knew it was all worth it to be here and now, walking towards my new family. My husband and my son.

As I made my way to Ryan, Stephen ran to me and took my hand. “Huwwy up aweady”

During the whole ceremony, Stephen held tightly on to my hand. Ryan and I chose traditional vows, knowing I wouldn’t be able to speak with all the tears.

“By the powers vested in me by the state of North Dakota I now pronounce you husband and wife. Ryan, you may kiss the bride.”

When Ryan’s lips met mine I felt Stephen cover his eyes with his other hand. I knew that I would spend the rest of my life making him and Stephen as happy as he made me.

I lifted Stephen to me as I was presented with the adoption papers. Once I signed them, Stephen grabbed my cheeks and said, “I now puhnounss you my mommy.” And kissed me right on the nose. I hugged him tightly as I was whisper in his ear, “I promise to be the best mommy possible.”

“Ladies and gentleman, I’d like to introduce to you for the first time ‘The Kraft Family.” Ryan and I each grabbed Stephen’s hand as we made our way down the aisle.

One year later

“Mommy Mommy, are you okay?”

I quickly picked up Stephen and made my way down stairs. “Yup, honey, everything is fine. I’m going to need you to be a good boy, ok?” I told him as pain shot straight through me.

“OK” He nodded as I placed him on the kitchen counter.

I grabbed my cell phone off the counter and dialed Ryan. I didn’t want to call him but I had no choice.  “Hello?” There was screaming and crazy fans all around him.

“Hi, I’m so sorry to bother you, but its time.”

“FUCCCCKK.” he screamed.

“Language.” I said in between a deep breath.

“Ooooo, daddy said a bad word.” Stephen said pointing to the phone.  I quickly smiled and took a deep breath.

“Alani, I told you, I shouldn’t have come to this game.”

“It’s ok, I’m going to call your mom. Don’t worry I just wanted to let you know.”

I hung up the phone before he had a chance to argue with me. I quickly sent a text message to Katie, informing her that she would be an auntie for the second time and grabbed my hospital bag while mentally going over my checklist as I waited. My contractions weren’t that close to one another so I knew I still had some time.

As I called Rosemary, I took a second as the phone rang to enjoy the last few moments I had with my giant belly. Ryan and I were expecting a little girl. At first he was scared because he knew what trouble girls could be, but Stephen jumped on top of him and said: “Daddy, I’ll take care of her,” relaxing Ryan’s concerns for some time. I also explained to him that girls only got hard when they were teenagers and usually they were daddy’s little girl and mom became the enemy.  Rapidly his fear about having a girl vanished.

“Hi, Ally, What a pleasant surprise.” Rosemary was such a sweet woman and I loved her as if she were my own mother.

“Hi Rosy, my water just broke, do you think that maybe you can bring me to the hospital and that Robert can stay with Stephen?”

I felt another contraction coming and slowly let out a breath. Tiny little hands found mine. As I opened my eyes I saw perfect blue eyes staring at me with concern.

“Yeah sure, we’ll be right over,” Rosemary said.

I took both of my hands and placed them on Stephen’s cheeks. “You don’t need to be scared, Mommy is ok. It’s just your little sister throwing a fit.” I kissed his forehead. Stephen was an exact replica of his father but with Stephanie’s light features. His eyes were crystal blue like a summer sky and his hair was a perfect shade on sandy blonde.

“Was I throwing a fit too when I was in your belly mommy?” He asked.

“Oh no honey, you were on your best behavior but you were in your mommy Stephanie’s belly.” I said to him.

“Oh yeah.” I never wanted to hide that fact that I wasn’t his biological mother. It was hard to explain to him at such a young age, what happened to his mother, but we worked around it. Ryan would spend nights telling him stories about his mom and I made sure that there were pictures around the house of her so he would never forget her.

⌘

I made my way up the maternity wing, Rosemary was so afraid that she remained quiet which was so unusual for her. I was greeted at the nurse’s station before I was wheel chaired off to my room. Aside from the contractions every once in a while, I felt fine. There was pressure but nothing too painful.  After the doctor examined me, I was notified that I had only dilated one centimeter and it might be a while. 
Great.

Eight hours later, the pain was horrendous. My contractions were closer and closer and I tried to calm my breathing, praying that she stayed put until her father was here. Ryan already missed the birth of his son. I knew it would kill him to miss the birth of his daughter as well. Ryan didn’t want to go to the championship game with the university since it was so close to my due date, but I pushed him to go. I knew he didn’t want to leave my side, his biggest fear being potential complications. We spent almost forty weeks at each other’s throats. He was so picky about everything I ate, never wanting me to run, and any sign of heartburn was a reason for him to call the doctor.

The hospital room door opened and in entered both my husband and Katie. Ryan was pale white and Katie was smiling from ear to ear. “Finally,” I said. I knew Katie would hop on the first plane the second I informed her, so I knew she would be here either before the birth or after. I had been more concerned with Ryan getting here before. “I’ve been trying to hold this baby in just for you.” I said.