Total pages in book: 68
Estimated words: 63970 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 320(@200wpm)___ 256(@250wpm)___ 213(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 63970 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 320(@200wpm)___ 256(@250wpm)___ 213(@300wpm)
Jared nodded. “Of course. I’ll be outside with…well, I’ll be outside.”
She let him go and looked at her best friend. Sometimes she wasn’t sure she remembered a time when they weren’t friends. She knew it existed, but they’d been together for so long that time seemed hazy. Tears pierced her eyes. They’d started out as two subs who were absolutely not looking for love, and somehow they’d become sisters and now sisters-in-law.
“It’s going to be okay.”
Kori reached for her hand. “It better be or I’m going to fuck some people up.” She took a deep breath. “Look, I know it’s going to be okay because it has to. It’s going to be fine and that’s why I want to talk to you about the future.”
“Jared’s taking a couple of months off and then he’s thinking about getting more into the documentary scene,” Sarah explained. “He’s really liked working on this personal one, but he’s been talking to Mia. She’s got some ideas but she doesn’t have any film experience. I think it could be cool.”
“I’m not talking about that,” Kori corrected. “Jared is going to be great at anything he puts his mind to and so will you. And I think you would be the best mom in the world, and that’s why I want to be your surrogate when you’re ready. I’ve thought a lot about this and we could use my egg and Jared’s sperm. Or someone else’s egg. I think Charlotte Taggart has like a lot of them from what I can tell. You might want someone taller.”
She held on to her friend’s hand, utterly floored by the offer. “Kori, you don’t want kids.”
She nodded her head vigorously. “That’s the surrogacy part. You have to take the kid at the end, and you’re probably only getting one out of me because I will not like the whole labor thing.”
The whole world was a blurry mess. “You don’t…”
Her friend stared down at her. “I do because two of the people I love most in this world are going to need a little help and I won’t let them down. I want to do this for you. I want it for me too because I can’t wait to see how you handle being a mom. I’m going to live stream you dealing with the first poopy diaper.”
Laughter bubbled up in her. How had she ever kept this quiet? She needed her family, even if it was small. Even if it was only Jared and Kori waiting for her, she needed them. “And I’ll stream the first time that sucker kicks you from the inside.”
A brilliant smile crossed Kori’s face. “We’ll do it together.”
Like they’d done everything for the last decade.
The door opened and the nurse walked in. “We’re ready for you. And you should know that your husband arranged this with the hospital. That man loves you since he had to bribe them with monthly visits to the kid’s wing from all manner of superheroes.”
“Arranged what?” Sarah asked as the nurse popped the brakes off her bed.
“Every princess needs a royal court,” Kori said with a grin.
She looked down the hallway that would lead her to the elevator to the operating room. The hallway was lined with her friends from the club. They stood on either side, whole families coming out to support her. Ian and Charlotte Taggart were there with their twins, Seth held in his father’s arms. The twins stood with some of the other kiddos she babysat once a week in the nursery. She’d watched them grow and now they were standing there with hand-made signs that looked like they’d bought out a glitter store to decorate.
We love you Auntie Sarah!
You got this!
Jared stepped in beside her and took her hand again. “They wanted to be here for you.”
Kai was at the front of the line. “We’ll be waiting. Not a one of us can work until we know you’re okay.”
She cried as they pushed her toward the elevator, but it wasn’t from fear. It was the overwhelming love she felt. These people she “played” with, who she’d met in a place where they didn’t have to be real, turned out to be far more real than she could have imagined.
“You got this,” Serena Dean-Miles said as she passed. Serena had been faced with this same surgery before. “I’ll see you on the other side and we’ll compare notes.”
“Don’t worry about a thing.” Mia was there and Sarah had been almost certain she’d been in New York yesterday.
“Did you fly in?”
Mia smiled. “I wouldn’t miss it. Not for the world. Love you, sister.”
They said it over and over, each one offering her words of love and encouragement.
Jared walked with her right until the elevator doors opened.
The rest she had to do on her own.
“I’ll be here,” he whispered, kissing her one last time.