Page 98

“No, I mean the part where they got to live a long, happy life together. I haven’t seen anything after they visited Paul, but they were still relatively young then.”

“I feel like we would’ve seen another couple by now otherwise, don’t you?” Quinn pulled a book out of the box. “Here. I could still be wrong, and there’s another old book out front that we can check, but this one looked different to me. It seemed handmade; like maybe they bound it themselves. And it’s typed, but there’s not a title or author. I only flipped through it initially but didn’t read anything inside it because then, you were in my life, and everything in my brain kind of honed in on you.”

Abby smiled and rubbed Quinn’s back over her blazer before she took the book from her. That was when she saw it. Cheryl was sitting at her trusty typewriter. Diana was sitting nearby in a recliner, reading something that looked medical in nature, but Abby couldn’t tell what it was.

“This is it,” she said, returning her mind to the present. “Cheryl typed this.”

“You saw it just now, didn’t you?”

“Yes. Diana was sitting there, too, reading a book. They were maybe in their forties, I think. They could’ve been older. I didn’t see Simon, though.”

“Simon?”

“Oh, shit,” Abby let out and went to set the book down because she didn’t want to risk damaging it. “You might want to sit down for this one.”

Quinn sat on the stool in front of the counter and said, “Okay. Tell me.”

“We have another son?” she asked more than told her.

“I’m sorry. What?” Quinn asked.

“They adopted a friend’s baby,” she revealed. “And they named him Simon.”

“We have… I mean, they had…”

“A son, yes. Their friend couldn’t take care of him, or didn’t want to be a mom, so they adopted him.”

“When?”

“In 1964.”

“Two women adopted a baby in 1964?” Quinn asked, doubtful.

“They had two gay guy friends. One of them adopted Simon with Cheryl. So, it’s a much longer story, but Simon wastheirson. They raised him together. I haven’t seen much beyond what I’ve already written, and he would’ve been about eleven then, but he understood that he needed to keep their secret. He was a happy kid, too.”

When Quinn exhaled deeply, Abby wrapped her arms around her neck, feeling like she needed to keep her from falling over. Quinn then spread her legs for her, so Abby moved into her, letting Quinn rest her head against her chest.

“This is a lot.”

“I know,” Abby said gently. “For me, too.”

“I didn’t feel him… And I felt Paul so specifically. Why didn’t I feel Simon?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t feel him, either, until I was writing. Then, it was like I just knew he’d been ours.”

“When will it hit me?” Quinn asked.

“I don’t know,” Abby repeated. “But there have been more.”

“More what?”

“Children.”

Quinn looked up at her then, and all Abby wanted to do was kiss her. She wanted to kiss her forehead, her nose, her cheeks, her lips, her jaw, her neck, her… everything. Quinn was so beautiful. She looked so vulnerable in that moment, though, that Abby felt like it wasn’t the right time. For now, she’d just hold her, so she pulled Quinn back in against her chest.

“Think about it. A woman’s job throughout history has always been to have children. They had to do that with their husbands, but I imagine, with our connection, the women we’ve been raised those kids together.”

Quinn nodded but didn’t say anything.