Five.
He felt unbelievably guilty for letting her sit on that bench alone. They hadn’t been in a fight or anything like that, in fact they never really had a serious argument. He didn’t know fathers were supposed to bring the car around. If he had known, he would have done it. But the thought didn’t even occur to him, and even if it had for a fleeting moment, he probably would have brushed it off because he didn’t want to leave her—them, in the hospital without him.
He ran to the car, sprinting and sweating reminiscent of the suicides he would run on the basketball court in high school. He was pretty sure that he was running faster than he ever had before, even during his two-on-one breakaway in the championship game. It was as if he was trying to outrun a hungry lion, his strides covering more and more ground each time that his foot slammed on the pavement. He had already made one mistake, and he had to fix it as damn well as he could. He was a bad father already, screwing up before they had even left the hospital. He ran even faster, trying to escape his thoughts of being a bad father.
He knew there were more constricted speed limit rules in a parking lot, but it didn’t matter. If he got a ticket, so what? He needed to get to Pam and Cecilia. What if something happened to them? What if there was a baby stealer and Pam was too weak to defend it? What if there was a rabid squirrel that jumped out of nowhere? Or worse, what if Dwight had found them and was proceeding to mark the baby in some inhumane manner?
As he pulled up to his wife and child, he slammed on the breaks and hopped out of the car, only to get back in it three seconds later to put it in park. There they were, sitting peacefully on the bench. He checked for signs of baby stealers, squirrels, and Dwight, and was relieved when there were none. Pam’s smile was contagious, as she proudly told him that CeCe was finally taking her. He sat down next to her, putting his arm around the two of them, marveling at the miracle of life, the miracle of motherhood, and the miracle of true love.
Neither of them cared that the car was illegally parked, or was wasting gas, or that a security guard was rapidly approaching. They sat there blissfully, admiring CeCe’s small hands and small feet, and beautifully green eyes as she squirmed in her mother’s lap. Pam was afraid to move, worried that CeCe might not take in any other position. Jim was happy to just sit there and watch.
CeCe pulled away and snuggled her little head up into the crook of her mother’s shoulder, and soon her squirming stopped as her eyelids gently fell over her and began to sleep. Pam was ton between looking down at their child and looking up at Jim, and started to cry in amazement.
“We did it,” she said to him, “We really did it.”
“Well, you did most of it,” he said with a little bit of a laugh in his voice, not wanting her to miss out where credit was due. “But I got the car.”
He opened the door to the car and took Cecelia from Pam’s hands as he fastened her into the car seat, handling her like precious glass or the Queen’s china, not wanting to cause a scratch or a stray mark for the life of him. He shut the door gently, purposefully not making the slightest of sounds that might startle CeCe. He opened the passenger door for Pam, but she hesitate before she said anything.
“Don’t you think I should sit back there with her? I mean, what if she wakes up and she can’t find me?”
He almost laughed at the question, but he saw the worry in Pam’s eyes and knew at that moment that she was going to be the best mother the world had ever seen. He wanted to let her sit back there, but he couldn’t.
“She’ll be fine. I want you next to me.”
Pam nodded as she stepped into the car and leaned back against the seat in exhaustion and closed her eyes. Jim remembered one time that he had seen her like this before, and had to stop for a second just to revel in how far he had come.
“Hey, Pam?”
“Yeah,” she said, with eyes still closed.
“I love you so much.”
“Love you too,” she replied. It wasn’t much longer before she was completely asleep, and Jim laughed at how both her head and CeCe’s fell heavily to their left sides.
He drove home slowly, careful not to make any sudden movements that might irritate his sleeping beauties. He kept his left hand on the wheel as he held Pam’s hand with his right, feeling her exhaustion flood into him with the collision of their skin. As he pulled into their house, he quietly opened CeCe’s door first and brought her upstairs, introducing her to her new home and laying her down into the bassinet they had set up next to the bed. He tiptoed down the stairs, wincing at every creak, as he went back out to the car and lifted Pam out of her seat and into his arms. He carried her up their walkway, pausing in the doorway to again revel in the nostalgia and the perfection of this moment. He took a deep breath, bringing him back to reality, as he held her closely all the way to their bedroom, where he tucked her in and collapsed next to her, looked around, and said a quick prayer to thank God for how perfect his life was.
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