Page 107 of Curvy Cabin Fever

When we get back, I sink onto the porch swing and close my eyes and let the sun warm my skin. My feet are swollen—I feel like an elephant.

They move around me like planets. Morgan brings me water with lemon, then Rhett disappears inside to prep dinner. Damien tucks a blanket over my legs before sitting beside me, thigh pressed to mine.

“You okay?” he asks softly.

I nod. “Just thinking.”

“About?”

I open my eyes and glance toward the horizon, where the trees blur into blue. “How I got here. How I didn’t even know I was looking for this.”

His hand finds mine. “I know.”

I look at him.

“But it worked out, right?”

Inside, I hear Rhett swearing at the oven and Morgan laughing low in his throat. The kind of laugh that only comes when he’s relaxed.

I sigh. “I still don’t know what to call this.”

“You don’t have to name it,” Damien says. “You just have to live it.”

And I do.

We eat dinner at the table Rhett refinished last fall. The baby kicks every time Morgan talks too loud. Damien reads us something from an article about brain development, and Morgan throws a roll at him. Rhett just shakes his head and passes me more potatoes, his hand lingering on my shoulder before he sits back down.

We make love later, slowly and carefully, the way we do now that my body is changing. Morgan kisses my belly like it holds something so sacred, which is so cute. Damien is careful in a way that makes me feel worshipped, not fragile. Rhett holds me after, our foreheads pressed together, his breath calm and warm against my lips.

“I didn’t know I could want this,” he whispers.

“Me neither.”

“But I do. I want everything.”

The room is quiet afterward, other than the sound of our heartbeats. All four.

“I’m scared of doing it wrong. Of messing this up. Of not being enough,” I admit.

“You’re already everything,” Morgan murmurs.

“For all of us,” Damien adds.

Rhett just takes my hand and presses it to his chest. “You brought us home.”

And maybe that’s true. Maybe I was the storm.

All I know is this—I’m not alone. I never will be again. And neither will this child.

As I drift to sleep between them—safe, held, loved—I whisper a prayer.

Not for anything more. Just for this to last.

Because it’s not perfect. It’s better. It’s ours.