The FOR SALE sign jutting out from my front yard glowed against the dark as I drove up the street way too slowly. The whole trip home I was petrified of getting into an accident with my precious cargo. The housing market was a mess, but not as big of a mess as what I’d just made of my life as I pulled into my driveaway with my newborn baby girl. Yes, it was a she! I had checked, of course.

Outside in the yard, Oliver, Cody, Debra, and Joe were loading boxes into the moving truck. I hadn’t planned to share my kidnapping escapade with the whole family, but they’d all find out sooner than later. It wasn’t exactly easy to hide a living, breathing baby from in-laws you saw weekly.

Pulling up the driveway, my brain raced with a million scenarios:

Take the baby to the police.

The baby will end up in foster care anyway.

What if there’s no other family?

What if there is other family?

I had answers to every possible question, every possible challenge, as if I’d been preparing for this debate my entire life. I wanted this baby. Needed this baby like I needed air. Oliver and I had been trying for years, every month making pregnancy test manufacturers rich when I was barely a day late. And every month I kept tissue manufacturers in business with the tears when it displayed that mocking negative symbol.

Oliver’s dream was to become CEO of the marketing agency he worked for. Mine was to become a mother. It’s why I quit college and got married so young, because a career paled beside the joys and, yes, the sorrows of being a mom. And here that dream was, wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a car seat waiting for me.

We had the means to support a family. And if the strange man had someone else to care for the baby, he would have certainly passed her off to them, not left her on the side of the road. The answer was as clear as the star-spangled night sky. This was my destiny, to become this girl’s mother.

I stepped out of the car, then opened the back door. I unclipped the car seat and hefted it out, resting the handle on my forearm. It felt so good to be lugging this exquisite burden around, using muscles I hadn’t known existed before. I carried her past the scratches on my fender and up the walkway with a proud motherly stride.

Across the lawn Oliver was calling it a night, inviting everyone inside for drinks before heading home, thanking them for all their help. As I approached, a questioning silence settled over everyone as all heads turned. Oliver broke the spell.

“Felicity, what are you carrying?”

“It’s a car seat.”

“Please tell me there’s not a baby in there.”