Page 57 of Angel
His hand lingers there. So does mine. And for a second, the bathroom, small and ordinary and cluttered with daily life, feels like the most important room in the world.
The clubhouse looks different, dressed in pastel chaos. I stop just inside the doors and blink. Streamers hang crooked across the beams that usually hold club banners. Balloons bob near the bar like they’ve wandered into the wrong territory. Someone has taped paper cutouts of tiny motorcycles and pacifiers to the walls.
The smell of barbecue mixes with buttercream frosting. A table near the bar groans under the weight of gifts, wrapped boxes, handmade blankets, stuffed animals, tiny boots no bigger than Angel’s palm.
I swallow. For a second, my chest tightens.
Once, being surrounded by children here felt unbearable.
Every stroller.
Every toddler wobbling between boots and denim.
Every proud dad lifting a kid onto his shoulders.
It used to feel like standing in a room full of mirrors reflecting everything I couldn’t have.
Now, my hand drifts automatically to my stomach; it feels like home.
“Look at her!” Carrie squeals from across the room.
She barrels toward me carefully; Polly balanced on her hip, and RJ streaking past her legs like a tiny hurricane.
“You made it!” she says, pulling me into a gentle hug. “Look at you!”
“I know,” I laugh. “I’m enormous.”
“Glorious,” she corrects firmly.
Polly pats my belly with wide-eyed fascination. “Babies,” she announces solemnly.
“That’s right,” I say, grinning. “Two of them.”
Angel stays close at my back, one hand hovering near my waist without gripping. He doesn’t hover anymore. Tank swoops RJ up before he can body-check my knees. Joker nods at me from the bar, a smirk softer than usual. Wolf leans against the wall, arms crossed, eyes watchful in that quiet way he has.
Doc approaches and squints at my ankles with professional disapproval.
“You sitting?” he asks.
“I just got here.”
“You’re sitting.”
Angel immediately steers me toward a chair without argument.See. Balance.Laughter fills the room.Easy. Warm. No sharp edges.I glance around and realize something that makes my throat tighten. They’re not celebrating the babies. They’re celebrating us. What it took to get here.
When it’s time for gifts, someone drags a chair to the center of the room and decorates it with streamers like a ridiculous throne. I sit down, breathless, and emotional, before I’ve even opened anything. Every package is a story. A tiny leather vest with soft stitching and a stitched heart on the back makes me cry outright.
“They gotta start young,” Tank says gruffly.
Carrie hands me a knitted blanket in club colors. “Neutral enough for either,” she says, wiping her eyes.
Angel clears his throat and looks at the ceiling as if it offended him. Trouble One and Trouble Two onesies send the room into hysterics.
“Because of course,” I say, laughing through tears. “Twins.”
“We don’t do anything halfway,” Angel murmurs in my ear.
Halfway almost broke us. All the way brought us here. That truth hums quietly in my chest.
