Our Family

“So, have you two decided? You want to leave it as a surprise, or should I tell you now?” Doctor Susan asked as she continued to look at the monitor.

“Yes, we’ve decided. Please tell us the gender of our baby,” I replied excitedly.

I could feel the tension and excitement in the air as Edward and I both held our breath while we waited for the doctor’s answer.

“Congratulations! It’s a boy,” Doctor Susan announced with a joyful smile that proudly showcased all the wrinkles on her face. It was such a happy smile and I wished that I could smile so radiantly like her when I got to her age.

“Wow! Did you hear that, Edward! It’s a boy!” I shouted excitedly as I lost myself in the joy of the moment. I would have been happy either way, but I thought we made the right decision of wanting to know right away.

“Yes yes, I heard. Congratulations to us!” Edward replied before he bent down to kiss my forehead.

I couldn’t stop smiling. In a couple of months, we’re going to become parents.

…

True to his word, marrying Edward turned out to be what was best for me. Choosing to accept his marriage proposal on that day on the cruise was probably the best decision that I have ever made in my entire life.

I wouldn’t go as far as to say that I knew what a ‘perfect’ husband should be like, but Edward was probably close. Edward was caring, loving, passionate and above all else, he always strives to put our family first.

He fully supported my personal growth while acting as the main anchor for our small family unit of three people. After I had given birth to our son, I took a couple of months of maternity leave before returning to work to progress my career and follow my professional ambitions. Of course, Edward was there to support me through it all and he was determined to make it possible for me to go back to work.

Obviously, the money I was making was less than a rounding error to the money in Edward’s account.

However, he fully supported my career and gave me advice along the way. Since after the birth of our child, Edward helped me take care and raise the baby, he had been travelling abroad a lot less. We spent a lot of time together after we explicitly decided that we wanted to raise our baby by ourselves as much as possible.

“It’s weird, isn’t it?” I asked out of the blue while we were dressing our baby after giving him a bath.

“What is?” Edward said, his eyes looking dotingly at our baby.

“I don’t know. I guess, you and me trying our best to be good parents…” I said as I tried to explain and voice out loud what I was feeling.

“Hmm…how so?” Edward asked. It was clear that my comment had piqued his interest.

“Well, you and I didn’t really have standard parents. I mean, I didn’t have a father growing up. When I found out that I had a father he had already passed away and my mother…you know…she died when I was young…” I began explaining.

“Oh, I see. My father was a tyrant as you know. Clearly not the best father to have. My mother was an angel, but I didn’t get to spend much time with her,” Edward said reflectively as he started to get my point.

“Yeah, so I thought that it’s a little funny how two people who didn’t have the most normal experiences with their parents are trying so hard to raise a child together,” I told Edward as I turned to smile lovingly at him.

“Having regrets?” Edward teased.

“Never,” I replied confidently.

I leaned in and kissed his warm lips. The kiss was slow, loving and made me tingle inside. I stared into his beautiful green eyes when our lips parted and realized once again how in love I am with Edward and how lucky I was to have him by my side.

“I love you…” I whispered earnestly.

“And I you,” Edward replied without hesitation.

The high-pitch cries of our baby caused our short romantic moment to come tumbling down. Perhaps, our little boy felt left out from the conversation or felt like he wanted to have some say because he started wailing louder and louder.

Bringing our son into the world changed my life for the better. If nothing else, I found something and someone worth devoting my life to, and this small bundle of joy also helped keep my mind off troublesome things such as the ongoing lawsuit against Madame Francesca and Lucien’s struggle to keep the company afloat.

It would be around a year after that that Madame Francesca would be charged and arrested to finally pay for her sins…

…

Three years after our first child was born and I felt like our lives have settled and adjusted enough to support our child and our own happiness, I decided that it was probably the right time to have more children. However, I wasn’t sure how Edward would take it and I wasn’t sure how to bring up this topic with Edward.

It's not like I can go up to him and say ‘Hey, don’t you think it’s time we had children of our own?’

Sure, Edward considers our son his son. However, the truth was that our son wasn’t biologically Edward’s son for what that’s worth. I wasn’t sure if Edward wanted biological children of his own, but as time went by and I saw our first child grow up, I started to wonder what my child with Edward would look like. Would he have the same beautiful green eyes just like his father?

Watching Edward playing the role of a father had me convinced that having more children together would be a great idea. He was just so caring with our son, and it was clear that he enjoyed spending his time with children.

--To be continued…