He kissed my forehead.
“Then we’ll have no idea together.”
By spring, our home had begun changing.
Two cribs arrived in enormous cardboard boxes.
Daniel spent an entire Saturday assembling the first one, only to realize he had put one side on backward.
I stood in the doorway, laughing.
“You could help.”
“I’m pregnant with two people. I am helping.”
“Fair point.”
Carol, my mother-in-law, came over often.
She brought baby clothes, casseroles, and opinions.
Daniel’s mother could walk into a room, spot one crooked picture frame from 20 feet away, and straighten it before taking off her coat.
She had also started watching Daniel more closely.
I noticed it once while he was painting the nursery.
He climbed down from the ladder, then paused with one hand gripping the back of a chair.
“You okay?” I asked.
“Fine.”
Carol looked up sharply from the baby clothes she was folding.
“Daniel.”
“I’m fine, Mom.”
He smiled at me as if nothing had happened.
“Your husband forgot lunch again,” Carol said.
Her tone was light, but something in her expression wasn’t.
I handed Daniel half my sandwich.
“I’m not stealing food from a pregnant woman,” he protested.
“You aren’t stealing. I’m supervising.”
He took it.
I forgot about that moment almost immediately.
There was so much happening then.
The babies moved constantly.
Owen seemed determined to kick whenever I lay down.
Mia preferred wedging herself beneath my ribs.
At night, Daniel rested his hands on my stomach and talked to them.
“Your mother is already blaming me for everything,” he whispered once.
“I can hear you.”
“Good. They should know the truth.”
Later, he started getting tired more easily.
He blamed work.
Then stress.
Then the fact that we were preparing for twins.
I believed him because I had no reason not to.
At my baby shower, he spent most of the afternoon carrying gifts into the spare room.
Carol watched him from across the room.
“He’s going to be a wonderful father,” I told her.
Her smile appeared too quickly.
“He is.”
I thought she was emotional.
Looking back, there were so many moments I misunderstood.
One night, late in my pregnancy, I sat on the couch complaining for 20 minutes about my swollen ankles.
“They don’t even look like my feet anymore,” I said.
Daniel sat on the rug, rubbing one foot between his hands.
“They’re beautiful.”
“You’re a liar.”
“A supportive liar.”
