The Anti-Boyfriend(82)

Carys now held a part-time position as an instructor for a local dance school. She’d tried enrolling Sunny in some classes there, but all our daughter did was fidget with her tutu and make silly faces at me. She had no interest, but she was always excited for her soccer practice and games.

“Well, if Sunny’s going to be a tomboy, maybe I can get this one to dance with me.” Carys kissed the top of our baby boy’s head.

“If he wants to dance instead of playing sports, that’s his choice,” I said.

Jack had been sleeping in the carrier on Carys’s chest the entire game. He was six months old now—exactly the age Sunny was when I met Carys. We’d waited to have a baby so we could give Sunny as much attention as possible in her toddler years. Then when Carys found out she was pregnant, she decided to leave her PR gig to devote more time to the kids and not commute into the city. Our boy evened out our little family of four. And I was much better equipped to change diapers this time around.

We got to the car, and Carys got Jack into his car seat while I fastened Sunny’s seatbelt as she continued to eat her ice cream.

As we drove through the parking lot, Sunny yelled, “Monkey bah!”

Carys and I turned to each other.

“Did she just say monkey balls?” Carys asked. “Who taught you that, Sunny?”

Sunny pointed to her left. “Monkey bah!”

I realized she was pointing to the playground. Monkey bars. “Monkey bars!” I said.

“Oh!” Carys started to laugh. “For a second, I thought you taught her that.” Carys turned around. “No playground today, honey. We don’t have time. Maybe next weekend.”

As we traveled down the tree-lined road, I could see Carys smiling over at me.

“What are you smiling at, beautiful?”

“When I met you, I couldn’t have imagined the stud next door would end up my husband, and we’d be living in the suburbs with two kids.”

“And that I’d be coaching soccer. Not exactly playing the field in the same way anymore.” I chuckled and reached for her hand. “But you know, it all makes sense now.”

“What does?”

“Everything had to happen the way it did. Could you imagine if I’d gone on to play for the NFL? I would’ve never met you. I probably would’ve gotten myself into some kind of messed-up shit. I guarantee you I wouldn’t be this content. All those years I thought losing that career was the worst thing that ever happened to me. But my second act? This? I’d take it any day over that other life.”

Carys squeezed my hand. “When you said that, you reminded me of something. Did I ever tell you how I came up with Sunny’s name?”

“No.”

“I was all alone in the hospital after I had her. The entire pregnancy had been scary with so many unknowns, and on top of that, I’d just learned my baby had Down’s. Fear had nearly crippled me.” She stared out the window a moment. “The day before, I’d given birth to her in a blur with a ton of drugs. After everything I’d been through, for the first time, it was just me and Sunny. She looked up at me, probably wondering where the hell she was. I looked out the hospital room window and saw the sun coming up. I just kept looking at that sunrise over the city and back at her little face. She’d just been through the hell of birth, yet she was so peaceful. She was alive and content in my arms. And I realized I wasn’t alone at all anymore. I had everything I needed. Sunny. The light that emerges from darkness.

“That’s beautiful,” I said, feeling a lump in my throat. “I’ve always loved her name. But now I love it even more.”

In the rearview mirror, I glanced back at Sunny, whose ice cream cone was now melted all over her face.

The light that emerges from darkness. “You know how you felt when you saw the sun that day, Carys? Pretty sure that’s exactly what I felt the first time I looked into your eyes.”





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