Erica thought we’d get to go before a judge to finalize guardianship sometime early in the new year, which we were all trying to stay cautiously optimistic about. Erica had pulled us aside and told us she thought it was a done deal, but we’d learned to be careful about such things. “This is a good thing, guys,” she’d told us. “You’ll see. I’m never wrong about situations like this.”

We already had everything we needed to get her registered for the new school year next month, something she wasn’t exactly thrilled about. Otter and I decided that we’d wait to talk to her about it more until August, but she knew it was coming, whether she wanted it to or not.

I think she let a couple of bugs into the house on purpose for that.

I was concerned for a little while that she’d feel we were shoving her aside with all this baby shit, or that she’d think she inconvenienced us by appearing when she did, especially with the twins on the way. When we sat her down to tell her that she wasn’t in the way, that we wanted her here, twins or no twins, she looked at us a little funny before saying that she knew that. “Don’t be stupid, Bear,” she’d said, rolling her eyes. “You’ve already done more for me than Mom ever did. I’m not worried about that.”

I’d never felt so bad and so good all at the same time. It was an odd feeling.

So we’re all right. Mostly. I’m still not happy about Ty’s living arrangement, but I don’t think Dom has smiled this much since I’ve known him, so they must be doing okay. I’d told Tyson that he absolutely cannot get married until he finishes college, and he’d given me such a look of horror that I immediately felt better about the entire situation.

Except now I have a breast pump in my lap, and I’m plotting ways to make a ninety-year-old bigot pay for her crimes.

My life is strange.

“Do you really need all this stuff?” Tyson asks, frowning at a giant vat of some kind of cream he’d unwrapped. “Isn’t it a little overkill?”

Dom and Anna had matching eye rolls, like they couldn’t believe the childless people in the room could be so naïve. I forgot every now and then that Dom went through this exact same thing while we’d been in New Hampshire, and I felt guilty at the fact that we hadn’t been there for him like he was here now. There wasn’t much I could do about it, but it still doesn’t sit with me right.