I.

He takes you to his sister's house.

You've been dating for five months and he walks you inside holding your hand. His sister is just home from the hospital and the baby is small and fidgety and making weird noises like a deranged bird. He holds his niece the opposite way he holds his machine guns and he looks at you with such a sense of pride and success and happiness that you wonder who the real child in the room is.

You're not a fan of small breakable kids, or kids in general, but his sister is giving you a tired but accepting smile and he lowers the tiny thing into your arms and whispers, "don't be such a wimp, Bob," and you want to hit him but he's done this strategically correct because now you can't fight him, you have to balance this little breathing human being in the crook of your elbow.

He comes behind you and wraps his arms around your waist, rests his chin on your shoulder.

"Isn't she beautiful," he says and she is, the baby is beautiful and soft and warm, and you're thinking: this is the man I am with.

II.

He takes you to his sister's house.

You've been married for five months and you walk him inside holding his hand because you know your way around. Molly is waiting at the door and she wraps herself around his leg the moment she can and you just laugh and go to help in the kitchen. His sister is just home from the hospital and you remember when she said she didn't want any more kids, when she said that one was plenty, and you're a part of this family now so you can laugh.

The baby is asleep but that's where you find him, crouched next to the playpen on the back porch with his niece in his lap and his nephew all small and wrinkly and baby and Molly is pointing out his tiny nose and tiny ears.

He notices you standing in the doorway, just watching, and Molly smiles wildly and puts a finger to her lips but says quite loudly, "you can't wake up my brother, Aunt Bobbi."

You sit down next to him and he grabs your hand, running his calloused thumb across your knuckles, and he's watching the baby when he says, "can we get one of these?"
It's so ridiculous that you want to laugh, but he's actually serious so you don't, and you lean on his shoulder and watch the small human and maybe that isn't such a terrible idea and you're thinking: this is the man that I love.

III.

He takes you to his sister's house.

You walk inside together, slowly, with his arm around your shoulder because it's been five months and maybe he feels like he needs to protect you as much as you feel like you need to be protected.

No one is waiting at the door and that's good, gives you more time to steel yourself for the apologetic looks and the actual apologies, because his sister is just home from the hospital and the universe is cruel and unfair. He's watching you out of the corner of his eye and you're watching him, seeing the mirrored pain in every line on his face, and being here is a bad idea but together you head out to the back porch, to his family that's your family that neither of you want to face. Molly and Jack are racing dump trucks in the grass and their laughter makes him falter in his step and you want to pierce your eardrums so you can't hear how happy everyone else is.

The baby is wrapped in purple blankets and you can't look at his niece, at your niece, you don't want to see her smushed little face or her tiny fists, and you don't want to see how his sister and his brother-in-law and his parents are looking at you like you're so easily breakable.

He is handed the baby and he holds her a second before he says, "This was a bad idea," and gives her back.

"Congratulations," he says to his sister and his brother-in-law and his parents, but he's stepping away at the same time, back to your side, into the suffering, into the black hole.

You don't know if you're leaving because he was crying or because you were crying, both being viable reasons, but you're thinking that you wouldn't have picked purple blankets, probably would have gone with teal or light blue.

It doesn't even matter anymore.

He starts the car and his hands are shaking but you can't comfort him because you need all the comforting and you're thinking: this is the man I have lost.