Pant. Pant. Pant pant.

My mother holds my hand.

"Where is Max?" I demand.

"Right here."

"Right where? Don't lie to me."

Pant. Pant. Pant pant.

Max feeds me ice chips.

"Where is my mother? Tell her ..."

"She is resting. Be calm."

"Don't tell me to be calm!"

"Anna ..."

"Don't call me that. It's not my name."

"Cara ... more ice?"

Pant. Pant. Pant pant.

There is a belief among certain people that you can access the memory of your own birth. Your memory, I have heard, forms in the womb and if you are properly hypnotized, you can remember your final moments there before your mother's body responds to your need to breathe and wiggle outside her womb. You remember the sensation of movement, contractions, then see what you saw in coming out the birth canal.

And can even remember exactly what you were thinking when you forced your way through, aided by a doctor in modern times, of course. Your first breath, the primal scream after you filled your lungs. And it is then that the hypnotist may ask you, "Why did you cry then?"

Was it regret to be in a cold place when you'd left the warmth of your mother's body? Was it fear to be held in free air rather than safely cushioned in a bubble of liquid? Was it indignation that all these people and bright lights were suddenly looking at you when you'd just left your private cave?

Or was it your first chance to demand attention when you had just spent nine months feeling like no one was seeing all the wonder that is you?

I think it's more likely shock that this is where you've landed after nine months ... put me back in, you cry, I don't think this is where I was supposed to be! Who are you ugly people? Get your stupid hands off me! My god, what is that woman doing bawling over there when I'm the only one allowed to be screaming my head off? Let me go! Put me back! Hey, what are you doing, you big galoot? Get away from that! That's mine ... oh no! You idiot! Why'd you cut it?

Pant. Pant. Pant pant.

Max is counting, his face near mine, his breath mingling with mine, his eyes concentrating on mine.

"When do ... I get ... the ... drugs?"

"I do not know, Anna ... come ... breathe with me."

"Fuck the breathing ... I want ... Max ... Max..."

"Nurse! Bring her the drug!"

"Did I break ... your ... hand?"

"I am certain there is no permanent damage."

"I'm ... sorry ... not."

Pant. Pant. Pant pant.

My mother is wiping my face. I am crying. Exhausted.

"I need to tell you a secret, Max."

"I am here, cara."

"Mom, leave ... please ... just give us ... a moment ..."

"Anna ... whisper to me ... tell me ... I am right here."

"Max ... I'm so scared. Don't let go."

"Never."

Pant. Pant. Pant pant.

If this child ever does the pre-birth regression therapy, I beg his forgiveness for the last hours he was in my womb. Although, I think I want him to forgive me for so much more. For the trauma of so much of his gestation period. For the grief he had to bear on my behalf. For the fact I am so frightened of the act of giving birth to him. Will this scar him forever?

Maybe it will all be forgiven, though. Maybe my joy to hold Maximus again washed away every bad emotion of mine that transferred to our son through that connection I imagine exists between mother and child in the womb. Maybe he'll understand me better just to have felt what I felt to have Maximus walk back into my life, back from the dead, back to save my life yet again just by holding me and crying with me to let out the bad, horrible things that had happened to us so that we could let back in hope and belief.

Maybe the feel of his father's large hand, caressing his foot when it pokes me, will be his most singular pre-birth memory of all ... because I felt the poke, then saw Max's face as he reacted and then felt his hand pull my shirt up until his palm was against the bare skin of my distended belly. And I watched with disbelief as he massaged me and spoke to his son and told me he loved me and I thought everything in the world was full of shit except for Maximus.

"Tell me you are not a dream ... not me going mad," I said to Max.

"Tell me how you come to be here ... in Australia ... in a building I do not know ... surrounded by all this ... what has happened?"

"How did you get here?"

"How did you?"

"Oh, Max." I touched his face. "Swear to me you're real."

"I am here. I am not a dream. I do not have all answers ... only those."

I knew I wasn't dreaming. I knew I wasn't mad. I never said goodbye to him ... I never could bring myself to admit, really accept, that he was gone. But I honestly think I gave up the idea he'd come back when I couldn't reach him in that trip I took with Uma to England.

And as for Maximus ... everything made little sense to him once he gave it any thought at all. All he knew, all he wanted was to hold me ... to let me ground him. To know he'd made his way back to me.

Yet accepting that he was really here ... once the shock gave way to the realization that he was alive ... it is unbearable to stutter through such a moment. You could never do it alone. We could only do it together.

There was a moment, crystal clear in my memory of that day ... the day when Maximus walked into that building of Andy and Uma's, rising to the top of the stairs, calling me cara like no one else ever would be able to even imitate, making me believe the impossible - that it was him reaching for me, him holding me, his heart beating against mine again.

And that moment was after we'd huddled on that disastrous couch together, crying into the other, holding each other, unable to verbalize the emotions. And then as we calmed, wiping tears from the other's face, just staring into eyes we'd never thought to see again ... then when we tried to say something, words came out that were halting attempts to figure out what we most wanted to know, most wanted to say ... and were most unable to voice.

He said he was not a dream, that he was real. A thought flashed through me ... that if he were a dream, that's what he'd say, so what did it prove that he said it? And then I noticed a detail ... and then other details ... and somehow, this was all I saw: the details.

I love him.

I never said goodbye ... that was pride or the inability to process grief ... but even at his memorial, it felt impossible to utter the words, "Goodbye, Maximus."

My crystal-clear moment was when I noticed a detail ... blood.

"Max ... you're bleeding!" I whispered, my fingertips streaked with a dark red crust as I pulled them from where they'd stroked the hair at his temple.

"You've grown so large. Look at you, cara," he whispered, his eyes now transfixed on my belly, which he was baring more to look full on it.

"Maximus ... you are bleeding ... you're hurt ... oh, Max! What happened to you?"

"It matters little ... ignore it ... talk to me of you, Anna ... how have you come to be so far from our home?"

"Let me get something ... a washcloth ... some ice ..."

"Anna, hold! I do not need tending to ..."

"Please ... let me ... I have been without you for so very long and I want to take care of you." And what I couldn't say but what I felt so deep inside was the visceral memory of knowing I'd not been there with him when he'd been shot, that I'd not been there to tend to him, to hold him, to save his life.

He must have heard the desperation, the plea in my voice. It's when his eyes came back to mine. And in them, I saw every single ounce of his confusion and his dawning, invincible desire to be in control of his life, of our lives really.

I saw other details as well. I absorbed them. His hair was longer but not as if it had gone uncut for almost seven weeks. His beard, too, was grown and wilder, but no bushier than if he'd not trimmed it for maybe two weeks. He had little smudges of dirt and tiny streaks of dried blood on his face and neck. I took one of his hands and looked at it ... a bit of dirt under his fingernails, as if they needed a good scrubbing. I touched his chest, unbuttoned the first few buttons, while he simply watched me ... quiet, soft, allowing me this. There was a bruise on his chest, his skin was paler than the last time I'd seen him.

"There is another wound ... you will find it if you continue in this manner," he said softly, his voice kind.

"Where?"

"My side ... here ... a bandage covers it ..."

I wrestled with his shirt, one I'd never seen before, one that didn't really fit him. And then I found the top edge of the bandage and traced it with my finger before pulling the shirt away to look at it.

"You're bleeding through it, Max. Come downstairs ... there are bandages for the workers if they get cut ... let me help you ..."

"Anna ... not yet."  His voice was so seductive.

I looked in his eyes a moment before he let me kiss him. He tasted of cilantro and that unmistakable, savory flavor of him. I thought perhaps now I'd wake up from this dream and find that I had descended into madness. Except his kiss for me was so hungry and I felt it in my entire body ... and our son reached out a hand that must have been aimed at where his father's hand gripped and rubbed on my belly.

Max heard the intruder before I did. His arms circled me and he jerked his lips away. My eyes flashed open to see his narrowed and trained on the doorway behind me. His mouth an ugly snarl.

"Oi. Get off'n her, now! You heard me ..."

"No! Max ... wait ... they're just trying to ..."

"You know him, missus, then? We was getting worried ... never seen him before ... you so quiet up here ... coulda been doing all manner of ..."

"I'm fine ... this is my husband ... Max, this is the carpenter, Gerry."

"Husband? But ... you're a widow, so we been told ..."

How do you explain it?

How do you even begin?

The entire world of our friends, Max's work, the officials, banks, lawyers, neighbors, family ... everyone knew he was dead. How do you begin to explain it ... for they will want explanations.

And there's so much to undo after someone's died if they are to then be alive.

Gerry brought me bandages and I filled a basin with warm water that now ran sweet and clear thanks to Jeff's hard work on the plumbing in the kitchen that was taking shape. Max sat patiently atop the work bench there, his eyes on me, his fingertips always in contact with me. It was only later I began having the same compulsion ... to be touching him always, to be sure this dream did not stop and, with it, that we would disappear from each other.

The three men working on that floor would have stayed in there with us following the first flush of excitement ... her husband! What's this? ... except Max gave them one curt, commanding, "Out!" and they scattered before him. We could hear them mumbling to each other until I called out that Jeff wanted the work on the new counter done by the time he returned. And then the sound of their tools took up again.

I washed his temple first. Murmuring to him, standing between his spread legs, kissing the wound when it was clean and I could see the ugly bruise through his wet hair. It was only later, when Hando asked him about the wounds, that I found out these were not from whatever happened at Mephisto. Let me tell you, it shook us all up ... and Ralph's voice was soft when he said, "Then where you were, Max, it was a place to fear."

That brought his memory of the place out ... and I could see it in his eyes. He fought so hard to return to us ... and something else was there that he did not speak about to me.

After I cleaned the wound at his temple and put salve there, I dabbed it all dry. I asked him if his head hurt ... he told me the pain was going away, just from my touch. It made me smile at him, and I felt shy for some reason. Maybe it was the way he looked in my eyes as if he saw everything I've never been able to tell him about how I feel about him in my life. Or maybe it's because I saw in his eyes a love for me that was so deep and so wide, I'd never feel worthy of no matter how I bathed in it.

He told me about coming to in the hospital, about the nurse who patched his side. He told me this as I was slowly, carefully peeling the bandage away and asked him who had put it on there. This wound was more serious.

"This needs stitches, Max."

"It will be fine."

"We should take you to the hospital."

"No. It would be dangerous ... what if they are looking for me to show up?"

"We could go home ... to Folsom ... go to the clinic there ..."

"Why are you not at our home, cara?" he asked me, in a deep rumble of concern.

"So much has changed ..."

"I was warned ..."

"Warned?"

He shook his head and his hand touched at my chin. "No matter ... tell me what has happened to you ... Where is Ralph?"

"Later ... let me fix you up and then you have to let me take you to a doctor ... although we have to tell Uma and Andy first ... they would be so scared if I just left ..."

He didn't say a word. I think now, looking back, he just wanted me to finish my single-minded mission to stem the bleeding of this other wound, to re-bandage it, to have nothing left to do but tell him what had happened while he'd been ... dead.

And I did tell him. But only after I told Gerry and the other workers to knock off for the day ... that I was locking up the work site and going home. It was two hours earlier than I was supposed to but when they fretted at me, they stopped when Max loomed in the doorway from the kitchen, watching them.

When they left, I locked the door, took his arm and walked with him to the corner. We caught a taxi there; I wasn't driving in Melbourne ... I depended on the others for rides and, really, where did I go anyway without one of them?

In the taxi, he leaned back in the seat, holding my hand, looking at me. I could see fatigue ... he let me see it now ... or maybe now was only when he let himself feel it. He wanted to go home ... I did, too, but first we had to tell Uma he was alive. And I didn't know how long they'd be so I called Andy's cell. Uma'd left me her cell to use if I'd needed to call them ... I couldn't use mine here because the international rates would have killed me.

"How long before you're back?" I asked Andy.

"Hour ... maybe a little longer. What's wrong?"

"Nothing. Just ... hurry, okay? Something extraordinary has happened ... something good. Something beyond good."

"What?"

"I can't tell you over the phone. Just come home, okay? I'll be waiting."

At their place, he walked inside and I remember feeling life had come back to me. I don't know why it hit me there ... maybe it's just because this was where I'd spent so many hours mourning him in silence as best I could. Or maybe it's the way he walks, as if all he surveys is under his protection.

I made him sit on the couch; he didn't put up a fight, just held onto me until I told him I'd be back ... I brought him wine ... he asked for water, too. I brought that, too. Tell me what has happened, he finally said, that deep voice of his that can be so soft you want to fall into it.

Perhaps now I know why I kept trying to fetch things for him ... because I wasn't making the transition easily ... but how do you do that? Just mourn a man for weeks and wish like anything to die so you could be with him ... and then he shows up, alive again, and you've no time to even catch your breath or adjust your thinking.

And you might ask me: how could you not be filled with happiness right away? I'll tell you why ... because first you have to shove the sorrow out of every fiber of your being.

Besides, I knew it would come ... the moment when we had to talk about this. It was hard to tell him, hard to know where to start. How do you tell someone what your life has been like while they've been dead? How do you do that without crying? How do you do it without breaking his heart?

This was what we talked of, though, as we waited. And of changes and news in the group that was our family of the pub.

Until at last, it seemed all the urgent things, all the chaotic recitation was over ... and anything else would be details that I couldn't even remember just then. By then, I was leaning back against his good side, his arm draped over me, his cheek resting against my temple. He didn't say anything for a while.

"Max?"

"Huh? What?"

"Were you sleeping?"

"No. Just resting."

"Why don't you come into my bedroom? Take a nap on the bed until they get back? You're all done in, my love. C'mon ..."

"Where is the bathroom you use? I'd like to ..." He gave this deep groan as he tried to help me stand up ... as if moving hurt him right down to his bones after he'd let himself rest in place for a while.

"Take a long, hot shower? A bath? Yes ... That'll be good for your poor muscles ..."

He was smiling when I struggled up from his hold. Smiling at me. So tired and yet smiling. I smiled back. It was a real smile now. "This is nice," he said to me as I tugged on his hand. "I do enjoy when you tend to my needs ... in your own style."

Inside the bathroom that was just next to my bedroom, I helped him strip. It hurt to see him ... a bit dirty, a few more blood streaks, especially below the wound at his side where the nurse had obviously done her best to clean his skin... but also, bruises ... and so many of them were not even obvious until after he sunk into the bath with a satisfied groan and the water began dissolving the grime. I knelt on the floor, despite his protests and that "tsk" he makes at me when he disapproves of something I've done. I just wanted to stay near him.

I watched him scrub with a washcloth and soap. Then lean back all the way into the water to wet his hair, lather it, rinse it. And then just relax in the warmth, his eyes closed, his hand holding mine. When at last he rose up from the water, he pulled me to my feet with him. I raided Andy's closet for clothes. The ones Max had on were so very oddly fitting and he told me where he'd got them. Thief, I told him, feigning shock. I've been called worse, he countered.

He shuffled off, nude, damp. Into the bedroom. Climbed into the bed that had borne my heartaches for long weeks. Held out a hand ... and then settled down, his head on my chest, a light kiss at the rise of my breast, his hand caressing and then slowing until he was just cupping my belly. Moments later, he was asleep. Exhausted beyond all measure. Weak and needing me.

Under him, I stayed, awake and running everything through my brain. How had this happened? I still didn't know the details. Was he safe? Was someone hunting him? How had he come to this country? How had he found me? Would he be able to stay with me? Was I going to lose him again? How would we undo all the legal things I'd had to do when he'd died? Was he safe now? Was he going to stay with me or would he disappear?

The sound of a familiar car pulling up to the building roused me to action. I slipped from his hold, reluctant to leave him ... at the door, I looked back ... his eyelashes fluttered in his sleep and I hoped he was not having a nightmare. If I left him there to go greet the others, would he still be here when I came back?

I heard Uma's voice calling my name as I closed the bedroom door softly. I waddled swiftly into the front room ... Andy and Jeff already in the kitchen, getting drinks after the hot drive ... she took one look at me and it was like someone had pushed her back a few steps.

Her mouth opened ... her eyebrows went up, as if in question.

"Sit down, Uma, I have news ... shocking but good," I said, taking her hand, leading her to the couch where Max and I had so recently cuddled together.

The moment her hand touched the cushion, she gasped.

"He's back," I said, a whisper only for her. "Maximus ... our Max, Uma. He's back."

"What? Are you mad?" she hissed, her face now white, her eyes worried as she grabbed my hand in hers.

"I don't know the details ... but he's alive ... he came to the restaurant ... I brought him here to rest ... he's been through something rough ... he is injured but not bad ... Uma, Maximus is alive. He's sleeping on my bed in there."

"Ann ... that isn't possible ... what is ... what is happening to you?"

"Tell me you don't feel him? Tell me, Uma. Listen to that part of you that knows ... he's here."

"Who's here, love?" Jeff asked, coming in behind me, his hand stroking over the top of my head. "Uma? What is it, Uma? You look like you've seen a ghost."

"Jeff, Andy, come sit ... you won't believe it any more than Uma, but soon you'll see and then you will. I'm not having a hallucination ... the workers saw him, too ..."

"Saw who? Uma?" Andy sunk into the couch next to her, sliding an arm around her.

"Maximus ... she's seen him," Uma said, her voice hushed. "He's here ... in her bedroom."

Andy looked at me. I nodded, smiled. He looked at Jeff. Then back at me. "Ann, love, I thought you were well past all this sort of ... thought you were moving on ... whatever you think you've seen ..."

"Maybe it's another Maximus. Like Hando ... and Bud," Jeff said, now standing and pacing a step away before returning. "Is that what you mean? Another Maximus? Ann?"

"No. Not another Max. My Max. Our Max. That's what I mean."

"And he's ... in your bedroom?"

"Yes."

"Right now?"

"Yes."

They both looked at each other. "You don't think ... you don't find it odd he came straight away to your bedroom? That maybe it's just a dream you've had, say?"

"He came to the restaurant. I brought him here to wait for you," I said, frowning. "He's sleeping right now. He has been through hell to get here ..."

"Through hell?"

"Not literally ... I don't think ..."

"No. She's right. He's here ... there is something very different ... and very familiar in all this ... in how I feel right now," Uma said.

We all looked at her.

"Now you're both sounding crazy, you know that, right?" Jeff said.

"There is no way Maximus has risen from the dead and come here," Andy said, his voice rising. "Listen to yourselves. It's one thing for Ann to imagine it, she's none too stable right now ... but Uma, babes, you have to help us with her. Do not start feeding her imaginations ... I cannot have both of you going off on me, now, and you know that."

"He is here, I tell you!" I said, my voice rising also. I reached for Jeff to haul myself up from the chair. "Damn it. I am not crazy. He is here!"

"How could he be here?"

"He came for her," Uma said. "It must be ..."

"Yes," I said. "He found a way to come back because ... because this is where he belongs ..."

"He is not here! Maximus is dead!" Andy said, almost a shout now.

"Then who would I be if Maximus is indeed dead?" said a deep voice from behind us ... and we all turned to see Max standing at the end of the hall, looking at us, a frown on his face. "Is there not a saying in your time ... reports of my death and great exaggerations ... something of that ilk?"

"Christ."

"For fuck's sake."

I was across the room before he had time to come all the way in. He slid me gently under his arm, a warm embrace. I heard nothing but his heart ... and the muffled expressions of disbelief behind me from the other three in this place.

Jeff was the first to touch Max ... I felt them shake hands and then opened my eyes to watch as Andy approached. Max's fist tapped in the middle of Andy's chest. "Thank you for caring for my wife. I am forever grateful for all you have done for her," he said, his eyes saying what words could not.

"You're really ... Maximus? Mate?"

"Yes."

"How? When?"

"Later ... when I have had time to put sense to this. Agreed?"

"Yes. Absolutely."

Max kissed at my forehead and whispered to me. I let him go. I watched as he crossed the rest of the way ... to meet Uma, now on her feet, now stepping gingerly toward him, her wide eyes rimmed with tears.

Whatever they said to each other, I did not hear. He put his arms around her and his lips at her ear. Their private words are just that ... private, between them.

But as the other three began to absorb this, there were so many questions. I never would have voiced them ... but somehow, being with this group, questions came flying out from all quarters. It was nervous reaction, I know that now. At the time, I don't remember what I felt other than a flood of the reality that I was sitting next to him, at his side, holding his hand ... in a state of shock that I did not recognize for what it was.

At some point, three suggestions flew our way ... we should celebrate, we must get word to the rest of the group, we had to find out more about what happened to bring Max back.

But Maximus said, "My gratitude to you for your friendship ... but I am weary ... and I fear for Anna's fortitude. We shall return to our home. Now. Tonight. I have need of setting my feet back on our land again. Tomorrow, we will meet ... and discuss what is needed where it concerns the group. Take care how you notify others for we do not yet have the full understanding of all dangers, do we? But call those who must know. I remain concerned for the unknown risk this may represent to us ... I shall be in touch tomorrow."

He didn't ask, he just said it. He didn't even beg their forgiveness for such an abrupt departure, for leaving them with the task of notifying others in the family. But when he said it, I felt relief. And that this was right ... I wanted to be home. With him. That night. As soon as possible.

I called Ralph; damn the cost of the call. Meet me at Rosie's ... Maximus has come back ... No, I'm telling you the truth and I'm only telling you so that you don't die of shock when he walks out. Come get us ... we want to come home. Don't call my mother ... just come get us.

We were ready for the shock, the disbelief, the shrieks of wonder and possibly alarm from friends who knew he had died. But all through that, in both the Pub and Rosie's, we'd be working our way outside, to wait for Ralph, to go home. To be where we belonged. To give Max rest, to let him heal.

To figure out everything else after that.

As it turned out, only Paul saw us. We'd arrived early afternoon our time. No one else was around. But Paul seemed to be waiting. He was shocked, of course, but he recovered so quickly, as if maybe he'd had some inkling beforehand.

Remembering the small bits of news I'd given him, Max reached to shake Paul's hand, put a grip on his shoulder ... warm, heartfelt congratulations on the birth of his nephew. I saw the affect on Paul ... the genuine pleasure ... the appreciation that Max understood what this meant to him.

We heard Ralph's footsteps striding in, heading for the kitchen. He burst through as if expecting to have bad news and ready to face it. Seeing Max, standing there ... he rocked in place.

There are no words, I think, sometimes.

None that can handle whatever he felt. 

We drove in silence to the farm. I rode between them in the front of the truck. Buck stood, pensive and brooding, in the back area of the cab. He knew Max, of course, by scent if not by sight. Where he thought Max had been, who knows? But he caught the tension, the lingering sense of unreality ... as if he should be alert for anything at this point. More than anything, I imagine, Buck realized that for the first time in so long, he was heading to his domain.

Max's eyes surveyed everything as we drove up but his only words were after we arrived ... he pulled Ralph aside and whatever thanks he gave him, they were between them. Ralph shook his hand and then strode toward the stable, his head high, his eyes out on the far pasture.

Inside the house, we looked at each other. Max opened his arms to me and we stood in the middle of the living room, just holding on. Buck paced before the French doors and kept us in his sights.

"You need sleep," I finally told Max, shoving myself away and then prodding him upstairs. "Do you need food?"

"No, Anna. We just ate with Andy and Uma."

"Oh, yeah. That's right. Sleep then. You're exhausted."

"I need you, cara."

"You have me ... always."

I won't lie and say we didn't touch each other. We did. How could we not? Naked and standing before the other at the side of the bed, somehow reluctant to lie down there until we were able to look and touch and feel. For long moments, that's all we did ... not asexual, but not with sex as its purpose.

Though the feel of his hands did arouse me.

And the feel of my hands did arouse him.

He murmured against my neck after he turned me so that he was behind me, holding me in close to his body. His hands touched me, languid and possessive. I sighed into his hold, closed my eyes, and felt the intense sear of pain over every moment I had known I'd never know his touch again.

"What is this?" he asked me, his hand nudging against where mine now covered his.

I looked down to watch as he turned my hand in his ... revealing the back of my wrist ... where a gold band hung, entwined over my watch strap.

"I've been wearing it ever since ..."

"Have you?"

"Since they gave me your things ... what you were wearing ... I needed it on my skin. I felt ..."

"Connected to me."

"Yes."

"Perhaps you were."

Our eyes met. "I won't lie and say I felt you ... but sometimes ... I know it's crazy ..."

"You heard me say your name once."

My eyes widened. I could only nod.

"I saw you in a vision. I said your name. You heard me, I could tell this."

"Where were you?"

He closed his eyes and sighed. His chest expanded against my back and then fell away. "It is not always very clear to me ... as if it flirts with me, the memories I hold ... but it did not feel as if I were gone as long as I have been. What I remember of it ... I find it difficult to explain."

"Maybe it's not important for you to remember ... if it causes you distress ... it's not worth it. Not to me. I won't ask again."

His smile slowly crept over his lips and then he put his mouth against my ear. "You, cara, may ask me anything. And we will talk of this, as you wish. But tonight ... tonight, I would prefer you only ask me to love you. Will you do this for me?"

My fingers undid my watch strap and I tossed the watch away so that all that was in my hand was his wedding band. Holding his finger steady, I tried to push it on ... but it is so hard to do that for someone else. He didn't try to help me until a curse word slipped from my mouth. And then he chuckled behind me.

"Love me, Maximus ..." I whispered. "I want our symbols back."

His eyes opened. He pushed his ring on. And then led me to our bed ... where he propped up all the pillows against the headboard, reclined back in such majesty, and let me crawl in until I could rest between his legs, my head back on his chest, my torso enveloped by his arms. My hands were over his. For a while he murmured right against my neck, words in his language, punctuated with long strokes of his lips, his tongue's tip peaking out to make me shiver. I could feel his hardness behind me but he was holding himself back. I know why.

He held me until he fell asleep, safe at last, where he belonged, master of his home. And I followed him into slumber with little effort, exhausted and overwhelmed by the day's events.

In the morning, I woke before him. We had slid down off the pillow mound in the night, our bodies prone on the mattress, on our sides, spooned in contact. Turning slowly, gingerly, I watched him sleeping. Inside my chest, it felt swollen ... and I knew it was because he was here, still here, with me, in our bed ... and it was true, I could believe it.

He turned on his back, edging into wakefulness. He kicked the sheet until it no longer covered his chest. Sometimes, he can be such a furnace that it amazes me. His chest moved ... up ... down ... rhythmic. His hands twitched every so often; he frowned in his sleep a few times.

I still felt the need for tactile comfort. To touch him. I put my hand on his chest to feel him breathing. I tried not to disturb his sleep. My fingers stroked slowly over his chest hair ... up ... up over the rise of a nipple to watch it peak beneath the light touch. And then I traced through his beard hair that had grown down onto his neck. He normally keeps his beard so neatly shaved off his neck. But now, shaggy and rough, there it was ... as if he was too much man to control an orderly beard without constant efforts to keep it at bay.

"What are you up to, woman?" he asked, his morning voice hoarse and gruff.

"Am I supposed to be feeling so turned on by this?" I asked him, meaning to tease him but hearing that in my voice was nothing so much as desire. "Sorry. I just ... you look so good to me. I still can't quite believe it."

"Should I shave it? Does it bother you?"

"No ... leave it like this a little longer? Please?"

His head turned. His eyes were like lasers on mine. "And why is that, Anna?"

Daring me to voice it. "It makes you look even sexier ... if that's possible. Dangerous."

He rolled his eyes. But his hand reached to stroke over my breast. "If you wish it of me ..."

"When you were gone ... this is hard to admit ... but I ... I didn't really long for you in the physical way. And maybe it's inappropriate to say it this morning ... Am I shallow to be so turned on just to see you looking like this? How long before I think we're back to where we were ... or maybe we never get there ... now ... after what's happened. Has it changed us too much?"

Pulling the blanket down so that I was bared to him from the thighs up, he leaned in close to run his hand back up over my form. "Am I wrong to be feeling so turned on by this?" he said, mimicking my question to him as I'd touched his wild beard.

"I don't think so," I said, smirking when he glared up at me, mock sternness to my nerves. "Oddly enough, I kinda think I need to know that you want me ... even now ... especially now."

"These feelings, Anna, do you not believe they are an important facet of how we express love and longing for each other? Could anything be more natural? I am aroused by the sight of you in such a highly feminine state ... my child swelling your form ... I find it more arousing than I can handle this morning, seeing you here, next to me. And you, my wife, find the evidence of my ..."

"Masculinity," I whispered against his ear. "Arousing. Yes. And your voice, Max ... how it gets inside me when you drop it low like that. What are you up to?"

"Is it allowed? This late in your time?"

"I don't care."

But he did. We were very cautious ... and found ourselves deep inside the pursuit of what aroused us ... and perhaps we pushed it a bit too far ... but there was too much to say to each other in this morning, to not use this expression of what we meant to the other.

For long moments after, I lay still and soft in the bed, listening to him showering. And I felt ... stronger. Centered. Calm. Spent, but in such a good way.

I felt reclaimed.

By him.

In a manner only he ever could.

I also felt the exact moment that he gave in to the belief he was home.

We left with Ralph sometime midday. We'd been in bed, Max and I, for more than 12 hours. We had time for conversation about my concerns ... placed at his feet, for him to help carry this load. Decisions would be made and we would deal with it all.

We called my mother to tell her what had happened. It was very difficult on her, the shock, the disbelief, the worry, the need to simply accept without a lot of answers. Max spoke with her after me ... his voice, his manner, his authority all aspects she could cling to in coming to accept it ... and to suddenly be overwhelmed with emotion that he was alive, truly alive.

Back at the pub, we encountered others in the group and eventually wound up at the restaurant-to-be. Safety, privacy ... all were better assured there with the workmen off for the day and only our group able to find the way inside.

It was subdued in some ways but I think the fact that Max seemed so confident, so matter-of-fact really began to wear away the shock and the caution of the others. Was he really our Max ... this, I knew, had to be proven in person for fear to lessen.

Not that there wasn't fear ... and fear over an issue I did not expect.

If it could happen to Maximus ... could this fate be what lay in store for the other men ... what if any of them were killed - would they have a second fight for their lives in this other place between life and eternity?

My eyes were on Max but my mind was wandering. A voice inside said, "Something is different here." 

Try as I might, I could not shake the feeling. Restless, unprepared to hear questions aimed at Maximus that I worried would remind him of the pain he went through to get here, I shifted and twitched until he put a hand atop my knee, as if an absent-minded gesture to get me to sit still.

I watched his hand on my knee. Thought about how we'd found it hard to move more than arm's length from the other since he'd returned. It was then I felt something ... he'd come back in full protective mode. And I thought about all he'd been through before he'd been killed. How he must have feared for me. How he must have rued not being with me to keep me from being taken. And how, as he lay dying, he must have felt he'd left me unprotected in a world so very unsafe for me and his child.

To the others, he was speaking about his memories of the other place, of fighting shadow men, hacking his way through until he found an escape. I pictured the bruises, cuts, scrapes ... and the hard blow he'd taken to his head ... and the stabbing cut into his side. Things the others could not see ... the physical evidence of his horrible travails.

Apparently I gasped when I pictured it. I blinked and everyone was looking at me.

"Anna?" Max asked me softly. "Is this too difficult for you?"

"I think it is," I said, grateful for an excuse to get up and leave the gathering.

"Maybe we should change the subject," Clarity said. "If it disturbs Ann ... in her condition ... after all this she's been through ..."

"No ... I've heard much of this already ... y'all go on ... I just need fresh air," I said, letting Max on one side and Chili on the other help me up.

Chili followed me out, even though I tried to shoo him back inside. "You're very pale," he said, forcing me to sit on a chair on the front stoop, where air flowed but didn't necessarily smell so great to me.

"Man, there is nothing quite so revolting as the stench of garbage in the city," I groused.

"It takes some getting used to," he allowed.

"Do you know what I just realized ... and what I already know that Max knew instantly? And will probably never voluntarily mention to me?" I asked Chili, leaning back with my hands folded over the roundness of me.

"You saying he's holding back? Something important? Ann, he's been through so much ... you can't be expecting him to just tell you everything, not at once. He never was that way."

"I know and I don't mean that as criticism. Just ... actually, it rather shames me that I didn't realize this until just a few moments ago."

"Something that bothers you?"

"His wound ... the one in his side?"

"Yeah?"

"It's where Commodus stabbed him."

I looked down at Chili, where he was sitting on the top step. He was wearing his sunglasses so I couldn't see his eyes. "That's weird."

"When I first changed the bandage, he said something like ... I think he said that in that other place, wherever he was, he fought with a messenger of the gods ... with swords ... and that he'd felt him cut him there."

"So that's how he got hurt then ... or are you saying he lied to you?"

"I'm not saying that. I'm just saying ... it's the same place where he would have had a wound when he died in the arena. Can you imagine the odds on that?"

Chili looked off, his lips pursed. For a long time, we just said nothing, both lost in thoughts. At last he said, "Long odds, eh?"

"I wonder what he felt to see it ... when he realized ... You know what, Chili? Sometimes, I wish he was easier for me to read ... and maybe I'd pick up on things like that or maybe he'd just tell me. He carries so much inside him ... so much he believes he has to shoulder all on his own."

"Men are kinda that way."

"It can be so frustrating ... but it also makes me love him. I don't want him to change ...maybe I just want ... oh, crap ... I don't know what I want. I like him like he is. He's perfect. But frustrating. Crap ... would you listen to me? Can you believe I said something like that ... today of all days!"

"Women."

I chuckled. "Yeah, we're pieces of work, eh?"

"You got that right."

"Oh."

"What?"

"Nothing ... I think ... Uhn."

"Ann?"

"No ... it's nothing ... indigestion ..."

"You sure?"

"Uh. Yeah. Sure."

"Why are you staring at your belly that way?"

"Uh ... just ... I ... go get Max ..."

"Why?"

"Why do you think, Chili?"

I'm sure it's nothing. It's just some mild cramps from gas. Something I ate. The boy has the hiccups. And already, only a half hour, they are definitely easing. Yeah.

It's still early ... he's not due for, well, a bit over two weeks.

Surely he doesn't want to come out now? I mean, hasn't he learned anything about how unstable this world is? Why would he be so anxious to come that he'd come so early?

When I'm not ready?

Well, I'm ready ... I mean, I've got the room, the supplies, my Mom's on standby, my bag is packed ... my Mom was going to be the one in the delivery room with me after Max died ... she said, "Lamaze schlamaze ... I been there, done that ... I think you damn well already know how to breathe ... and I know a thing or two about having babies."

And believe it or not, when she said that, it sounded good to me.

But if and when this does happen, now at least I've got a trained man next to me ... meaning Max ... who did take the classes with me ... because I insisted we do them early ... wanted to be prepared. Truth is, I took them early because I was pretty sure I'd flunk the first go-round and need to take it a second time. But, lo and behold, we sailed through. I studied very hard, mind you, and listened intently to the instructor, who I'd checked out and reliably felt she was the one for us.

Because if and when this does happen, I want a trained man with me ... not some woman willing to wing it with the excuse she's had her own babies so she figures she knows what she's doing. You know? A lot's changed in all those years ... what's she know about the right way? This isn't the Middle Ages, after all.

Do you think it's because we had sex this morning?

Oh, god.

Imagine what my doctor will say! You had sex ... at this stage? Are you nuts? Shame on you both!

Well, duh.

We were careful. And very gentle.

But, still.

It cannot be happening now.

Haven't I been through enough? Don't I earn a break on this part?

It was only a bit of cramping ... couldn't even really be called contractions. I'm sure it's just nothing but an upset tummy. Maybe the baby farted or something.

"What amuses you, Anna?"

"Nothing. You wouldn't want to know."

"How do you feel now? Is the pain worse?"

"I'm fine. It was nothing. Just my imagination ... I'm sorry I bothered you now."

"If you feel you could walk ... perhaps we should make our way home? It is the prudent place for you to be ..."

"But ... are you all finished with your discussion?"

"I am. All that concerns me is you, cara. Is this not how you fantasized? Me, on bended knee, focused on nothing but your slightest need?"

"Oh, stop. You're going to make me believe I really am hallucinating all of this ... Say something grumpy or rude ... just to prove you can."

He grins. He leans in to kiss me, gently. He follows that by leaning in to say something crude in my ear.

"I'm going to make you prove that, big man," I tell him when he leans away to give me that look of his.

"I look forward to it. I believe I can live up to the advance billing."

"Thank you."

"For what?"

"For reminding me of how we are ..."

I wake in the middle of night. The night after imagining contractions I'm convinced were nothing. Actually, it's happened a bit off and on that day but I never said anything to Max because ... well ... I don't want to be silly and send up a false alarm.

I am sweating, drenched. My heart is racing. I screamed but don't know it until I focus my eyes and realize Max is leaning over me, worry on his face.

"It was a nightmare," he says, hoarse whisper. "Do not be afraid. I am here with you."

My breathing is ragged, tight. "I was suffocating," I tell him, my voice panicky.

"You screamed," he says. "You have never done that before ... screamed while dreaming. Tell me what you saw, Anna."

"I don't remember," I say, now lying, unable to voice what already seems ridiculous.

"Tell me. Please, cara. Let me make it go away for you."

"You died," I say, my voice cracking.

He says nothing. He strokes my body ... my belly, my breasts, my neck.

"I saw it coming ... I tried to warn you ... an owl came and it flew at me and I couldn't make a sound ... I kept trying to scream and scream ... and then I saw blood ... it surrounded me and I was still trying to scream ... and then ... I don't know what happened but I realized I couldn't breathe ... I was suffocating ... a hand was over my mouth and nose."

Burying my face in his neck, I feel the trembles still making my heart race. He whispers soothing sounds in my ear and rubs my back, which seems to ache so much lately with the baby's weight.

"I had nightmares while you were ... gone ..."

"While I was dead," he says, a mild correction, letting me know it's okay to say that.

"I drowned a lot."

"Drowned?"

"I never was afraid of water. I don't know why I dreamed of drowning. It was always black water, so deep and so black."

He kisses the rise of my breasts as he slides down, until his breath falls even and warm against the side of my belly. He lays his cheek there, rubbing lightly. His beard feels lush, masculine against my soft skin. I put a hand on his head and play with his hair.

When at last he speaks, I wonder if it's me he wants to hear this ... but I know he does it because it's hard for him to be back here without some of the darkness coming along ... and he would never say that, for he is a man who accepts what is thrust at him, then does his best, and then goes into the future a bit wiser, a bit less willing to not hold on to what he cherishes.

"What I remember most is rage. I remain troubled by how easily I descended to savagery."

"Oh, Max. You are a warrior, yes, but you are so much more than that. Look at you right now ... so tender and gentle with my foolish nightmares when I should be so happy that nothing bad could have intruded."

"I was brought back for a reason. I thought I had learned whatever lesson there was for me ... but I believe my lesson remains waiting for me."

A funny feeling inside me makes me shift to take the pressure off my back. "Hey ... Maximus ... Max ..."

"As for your nightmare, Anna ... how can I chase it away in this night?"

"You've done it already. Would you like to feel how steady my heartbeat is?"

He turns just his eyes toward me. His voice is low, smoky, rumbling from somewhere deep inside. "I would rather come feel how easily I can make your heart race," he says.

"Okay. I'm up for that."

"I can be as well."

This is him. This is me. And I can see that the answer for me this time is to learn to accept my good fortune. To not look so deep, as if there is a catch.

All it takes for him to make my heart race is to crawl up toward me. That look on his face. The one that is almost disdainful of my ability to resist him. His ear on my chest to listen to my heart's rhythms makes me breathe funny. But his hand between my thighs, like an absentminded caress, makes me suddenly realize ...

"Oh no."

"What?"

"Uh ... I have to ... go to the ..."

"Now?"

"I'm sorry. His butt's probably crowding my bladder again."

It happens when I'm coming back out of the bathroom. I've washed my hands and then turn to tuck the hand towel on the rack. And then I take one step into the bedroom.

"Oh!"

"What?"

"Oh ... my god!"

"Anna?"

"Oh, Max!"

"Why are you standing like that? What is wrong?"

"No! Don't come over ... stay there! Get me a towel!"

"What? A towel? Why ... oh ... OH!"

"What are you doing?"

"Calling the doctor ... your instructions were quite clear on my duties."

"Max, get me a towel, for god's sake ... then call her."

So much for pride, dignity and all our planning. When it comes right down to it, neither one of us are truly ready, I suppose. We are both flustered and both uncharacteristically unable to focus clearly on our careful plans. I even wrote this down ... a checklist ... where is the fucking checklist?

"My suitcase!"

"Doctor? This is Max Cooper ... my wife has ... Yes, it is Max. Yes, I am alive. Doctor, we can discuss this at length another time perhaps? I am calling to report my wife has gone into labor."

"What's she saying?"

"Yes. I am quite sure ... I believe the expression is that her 'water has broken.' Is that right, Anna?"

"Where are my shoes? I do own shoes, don't I? Wait, I want to wash up first ..."

He comes in to find me standing in the middle of the shower with no water on. Just standing there. Well, not just standing. I am clutching onto the towel rack with both hands. I am grimacing, I'm sure. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that I'm going at the whole labor thing in my own way. The books all say everyone's different but everyone I talk to has contractions before their water breaks. I'm one of those who will do it different.

"Breathe ... relax," he says, coming to stand next to me, rubbing both my back and my belly.

I picture what is happening as if it is a wave that will press my body one way and then the other ... and I can go with it ... ride it ... welcome it.

And then it's over. I look in his eyes. I wish I had a picture of his face to show but that would be just cruel.

The doctor has told him not to rush, not to worry. But to come in when we can get ready. Not to worry unless the contractions suddenly come on and start coming faster than three minutes apart, she tells him.

So I shower. Max is pacing, dressed in jeans and a Henley when I emerge. You forgot your socks, I point out. Your shoes, too. He looks down and shakes his head. I get dressed. I spray on perfume ... mainly because he's going to be in there with me and I figure ... shit, I don't know why I do that, honestly. It's just some odd thing about me.

He's pacing, holding my suitcase. And timing ... just in case.

Relax, I say to him. He gives me a strange look. Is he afraid? No ... it's not that. I think maybe it's that he is just now realizing he's about to see me go through a lot of pain. Either that or he's been hiding how squeamish he is about the actual birth all this time. Well, he's not getting out of being with me. He's in this. All the way. He's my coach, my teammate, my breathing partner. He's promised to tell me stories and make them very mystical to take my mind off things.

Ralph is waiting by the car when we come out. He's pacing, too. Is this a male reaction to a woman's labor? Turns out that Max called him after he called the doctor. He just wants to wish me luck ... says he'll be in later, see how I'm doing. We all know I have a lot of hours ahead of me, right?

I call my mom on the drive to the hospital. The drive takes 15 minutes. My mom hyperventilates for about five of those. Okay, I'm exaggerating. She's actually pretty cool about it. I make her promise to have Pete drive her over later in the morning. I don't think I want her behind the wheel because she sounds jittery. When I'm saying goodbye, she says something about how she doesn't know how she'll react when she sees Max ... and I realize that she hasn't seen him since he's returned.

The doctor stares at Max for a while. I say that it's a long story but basically it was all a huge case of mistaken identity. What can she say? He's standing there, right in front of her so she knows he's alive. But she saw me grieving so she knows I believed he was dead. When I say he just returned like two days ago, she says it must have been quite a jolt to my system ... and that it undoubtedly accounts for the baby coming early.

But I kinda am thinking the other way round. That maybe the baby coming early was already happening ... and maybe that's really the final catalyst to Max breaking through to return to us. He's made it back just in time for his son's birth. This can't be a coincidence. Or maybe I'm just looking for mystical explanations.

Pant. Pant. Pant pant.

Max is counting.

"Do I sound like a walrus?" I ask him.

"No. You sound like a woman in labor."

"Make them come soon ... the drugs ..."

"The nurse says once this contraction is over ..."

"Hurry ... I am such a wimp."

"You are very brave. You are perfect. Just as you are."

"Liar."

"Breathe with me ... come, Anna ..."

Pant. Pant. Pant pant.

Everything I read could not prepare me. I know this.

"No more pain?" Max whispers, his eyebrows up.

"It's not so bad now. The drug ... it's pretty ... I'm gonna be fine."

"More ice?"

"I'm so tired."

"Sleep, cara. Rest."

"Promise not to leave me."

"I will stay right here."

"This isn't even the bad part ... I haven't even started pushing. Oh, Max."

You can't really sleep. Not real sleep.

He wants out. I want to meet him. So does Max.

So does my mom. She cries a few times but thankfully she waits until after I've had the epidural because now I can deal with it even if I am a tad cranky. Thankfully she never says something stupid like, "my baby's having a baby." Instead she mutters about two lives coming to save mine ... and I know she means Max and the baby. Both coming to me within days of each other ... both restoring my will to love with an open heart.

Ralph is the first one to visit me.

After.

He's been out there, in the waiting room, for so many hours. But he only comes in after the birth. He walks in, gruffly shy, holding a huge honey-colored teddy bear with a green bow around his neck. The bear has the bow. Not Ralph, I mean. Ralph is wearing a t-shirt under his leather jacket.

I am alone when he comes in. My mom is somewhere, crying probably or passed out in exhaustion. Max is near the baby, in the nursery, watching as they clean him up and settle him in and check him out. He's doing this for me ... I was not happy when they took him away from me ... I didn't want to let him go ... and yet, it was nothing for them to lift him from me. I want Max to just watch over him, just until they are sure he's okay.

"Have you seen him?" I ask Ralph.

"Not yet."

"He's so beautiful," I whisper, awed. "Just wait until you see him."

"He had a set of lungs. I heard him hollering from the waiting room."

"Did he cry? I don't know if I remember ... no, wait. I do. He did. It was beautiful to hear him. You should have seen Max's face. His smile."

"You look tired, Ann. You should sleep."

"I am so tired. I am sleeping, aren't I?"

"Okay, you sleep. I'll go look at the baby."

When I wake, Max is sleeping in a chair next to me. He is holding my hand. I find that so sweet that I start crying. When I sniff, he snorts and jerks upright to attention.

"Where's the baby?" I ask him.

"Sleeping ... in the nursery." He pushes the hair back from my face and kisses my lips. "Did I thank you, Anna? For my son ... did I thank you? I am so grateful for this gift."

"You make me cry, Maximus, when you say such things so sweetly ... I love you so that sometimes I cannot even breathe. But I don't want you to thank me ... he's come here for both of us, right?"

"They let me hold him. Let me place him in his little crib."

"Really?" He is so serious. So in awe over his son.

"Yes. I needed to look in his face. To really look into him."

"I can't believe it's real."

"He is in fine health. The doctor says he is a good, healthy size. Not so premature as you might worry over."

"Well, he's your boy. Guess we'd know he'd do it right."

Just then, they bring him back to me. Time to nurse. Or at least my first attempt. The nurse is very patient. I have read all about this so I am thinking I'll do fine. She gives me a few reminders. My brain's still rather fuzzy.

It would be good to get this right the first time. Shouldn't it be natural? But I don't manage it right away.

And this is when it happens.

I'm listening to the nurse and trying to get him to just latch on to the nipple but I'm doing something wrong.

And he just looks at me ... and, yeah, I know he can't really see, but still, it's what he does. He gives me a look and his mouth gets this pucker, like he's going, "tsk." And I start sobbing and laughing at the same time. And inside me, something big opens up and I am so instantly in love with this boy ... this boy who just looked at me and made me see Maximus in every pore and fiber of his being.

Later, after I've finally succeeded in feeding him a bit, I am just holding him and staring at his toes and fingers. He is not yet ready to sleep but he seems very close.

Max sits on the bed, against my knees, watching us. Smiling. His son is holding his little finger, a grip we are both inordinately proud of, like he's a prodigy or something.

And then Max softly scoops him into his big hands, holding him out before us both. I am taken by the sight, so utterly masculine. A strong, big man holding a tiny infant with such care and looking at him with such a look of affection, love, commitment.

"As you have agreed, I will follow my people's custom of naming my child," Max says, glancing at me but then quickly turning back to our child.

"I'm glad ... can I watch?"

"I would have it no other way."

He stands and steps toward the window. It is night again. He looks down at his son to say, "I have waited until I met you to understand what your name is to be. And now I name you and I introduce you to our ancestors."

Long before this moment, he has told me of this ritual. It's why I have wanted him to perform it ... it's why it's been my wish that he name the baby. I find it comforting that he wants to do this according to his own customs. I only asked for veto rights because I don't want a name too Roman that he'd be laughed at by the bullies throughout his life ... though right now, I cannot imagine vetoing anything Max will do. Maybe I never could.

So I watch as he places our son on the floor, at his feet. Just for a moment. Just long enough to be there, helpless and in need. Then Max carefully lifts him up and holds him above him, looking up while our son looks down in his direction. He says the words in Latin but he's told me what they mean in English. He says his own name ... Maximus Decimus Meridius ... his real name, and where he is really from ... Trujillo ... and identifies himself by his former position as General and his present place in life ... and as my husband. I hear my name, my formal name, said in his voice ... it sends a light shiver through me. And then he formally acknowledges that he is the father of this boy and vows to raise him, his second son, and dedicates him to his ancestors. And then he names him ... I hear him say, "Bennett Meridius Cooper" and realize this is our son's name. Max finishes by asking 'the great Mother' to hold our son in her care, to watch over him all the days of his life.

Bennett Meridius Cooper. I say it in my head, listening to how it sounds to know my son's name. And to understand that his middle name is a link to Max's true history, to his father ... to his real name.

"Bennett? What does it mean?" I ask when he returns our baby to me and I gaze down at him. I know there is a meaning in the name. I know Max well enough to know that.

"It is a Roman name ... modernized out of consideration for this time in which he will live his life. It means 'little blessed one.' For he is blessed ... I see it so plainly written upon him."

Bennett.

A gift from the gods. His father's son already.

I remember Max once saying to me that our son would never stand on shifting ground - that he would have a firm foundation thanks to how we would love him and stand by him. But now I think it is Bennett who will be our foundation, our firm ground in this uncertain existence that we are facing.

Max has gone home, to shower and change ... he will be back soon. I sit up in bed with Bennett at my breast. We did better this time. He seemed more pleased with me.

My nipple slips from his sleepy mouth. His lips curl up into a gurgling smile.

I was not ready for this. Not for how I'd feel.

It has all been worth it ... the entire path to this point in our lives. Worth it and then some. He must have been the lesson all along.