July, two years ago.

A D D I E

There was probably a butt mold from where I'd been sitting on the couch for one entire weekend. Margo took the lead on the events this time, back to normal, and I had been curled up with three books which I finished from beginning to end, getting up only to wee, eat and drink.

Like a cat.

Sunday afternoon sun was pouring in through the living room window and I closed the fourth book on chapter two when the front door opened and closed. Margo appeared in the living room a moment later, fatigue all over her made up face. She was wearing tall heels and a slim full-length play suit.

"Who plans weddings on a Sunday," she groaned, leaning on the door frame. "Sunday?! I need sleep."

"I'd get married on a Sunday."

"You would not."

I grinned and followed her through to the kitchen where she started rummaging through the cupboard for Advil. While she searched, I poured her a glass of water and sat on the lip of the bench beside a Boston fern plant that I had draping over the edge of the counter top. I plucked an apple out of the fruit bowl.

"Have you thought more about the offer that I made last weekend?"

She let out a deep breath and shook her head as she pulled her hair up into a knot. "It's a no just like it was then and will remain."

"I'm kind of offended that you don't want me to carry your child."

"Well don't be offended. I'm saying no for you. You're twenty-two. You're at an age where you should be going out and meeting people and having fun. You should not be walking around, pregnant with someone else's child."

"Margo."

"No, no," she waved a finger at me, but her brows were pinched, and I could tell that she was getting a headache at the mere thought of having an argument with me. "Don't come at me with any of your logical arguments. This is not negotiable."

"Honestly it's weird that you're not all for the idea. I mean, you'd want to trust the person carrying your child, right? Who could you trust more than me? We live together. You'd be right beside me through the entire experience which would make it all the more meaningful for you."

"I get all of that," Margo said after she'd swallowed her mouthful of water and pain relief. "But I can't do that to you, Addie. And you know the reason that I can't. It blows my mind that you'd even ask me."

"It—"

"Moving on," Margo cut me off before I could continue giving her logical arguments, no sarcasm detected, and explain further what a great idea it was. "How's next weekend's bridal shower coming along?"

As much as I wanted to keep discussing the potential of me being her surrogate, I paused because I needed to ask her this question before I forgot, and she'd opened the subject for it. "The client wants to know if she should put a tab on at the bar or hire a private room and have her friends BYO."

"What does her budget allow?"

"A private room or a very small tab."

She lowered her head in thought and tapped the bench top. "I'd do the private room and tell her girlfriends to bring their own alcohol. It ends up being the biggest expense, so it'll save her in the long run. Plus, they can order more from the bar if need be, but they can't bring their own alcohol without the private room. So that's what I'd suggest."

"Hopefully it's not too late to get the private room," I thought out loud. "It's next week."

"No, it won't be too late. It's at High Flyer's, right?"

"Mhmm."

"There will still be rooms available. Give them a call tomorrow though. The sooner the better."

"Alright."

"The best man kept asking after you today. Harlow." Margo raised her brows and her smile was suggestive. "You should call him."

I racked my brain to remember who the best man even was, and it must have been obvious that I couldn't put a face to the name.

"He was the cute one with the man bun. Five, five. Tattoos and a lip piercing."

"You sound like an ad for a dating website."

"Call him."

"Eh," I shrugged, now recalling who she was referring to. "We had two conversations and he talked about gaming and weights the entire time."

"I'm sure that he has more hobbies than that. More going for him. You'll never know if you don't give it a chance. You have to get out of the house once in a while, Addie. You're never going to meet someone with your face in a novel all the time. Those men are not real. They are not going to pop off the page and sweep you off your feet."

"I know that," I snapped and felt a blush trickle across my cheeks. "It's nice to pretend though."

"To be fair, I wish that could happen. Fictional men are perfect."

"That's because they're fictional."

"More men should read romance novels," she said. "It's like, the secrets are all right there. Want to win us over, do some research?"

"I feel like they have no problem winning us over, it's the reveal after a few months of dating and the disappointment begins."

She nodded. "You might be right."

"I am right."

She giggled and snatched up her own apple, holding the stem with a knowing grin. "How about, the fate is in the apples stem?"

My eyes rolled, we'd been doing this for as long as I could remember. A 'school yard' mantra that determined who you were destined to love. At the same time, we held our apple stems, and twisted, chanting the alphabet. Margo's was the first to snap.

"K," she thought aloud, disappointment furrowing her brows. "K? What name—"

"Keegan?" I offered, having paused my twisting.

She scowled. "No. Douche bag name. Carry on. Let's see who you're going to get."

So I carried on and carried on and I got all the way to Z and it still hadn't snapped. So I forcefully pulled it off the apple and huffed with disappointment. "Well if that's not a damn sign that I'm destined to be alone, I don't know what is."

"You got Z," Margo gave me a light slap on the leg. "Don't be so pessimistic."

"Don't be so optimistic. Names that start with Z are so few and far between that I might as well accept that I'm going to die alone."

She shook her head and pushed off the counter top, skipping towards the corridor. "There's someone out there for all of us, Addie," her voice echoed from where she'd disappeared.

How she remained so optimistic after what Pete did to her, I had no idea. The fact that she was considering a surrogate rather than waiting for Mr Right was unbelievable on its own. That wasn't like Margo. She was so invested in finding her forever. But after watching what she'd been through, I had to admit that real life relationships looked somewhat disappointing.

I was more in favor of her achieving her dreams to have a baby, without the help of a man. I understood why she was reserved when it came to the idea of me being her surrogate. There were. . . reasons, for her to be hesitant. But I wanted to do this for her, and I wasn't giving up that fast.

The cashier at Target swiped the pacifiers across the scanner, dropped them into a re-usable bag and then looked at the big boxed crib that I had rested on the shopping cart.

"I'll just manually tap that in," she said, tapping on the screen. "Expecting?"

"No. Hopefully my sister."

Her brows pinched for a moment and I wondered if she'd ask what I meant by 'hopefully'. I'd sure be curious but she didn't mention it. Instead, she rung me up for a total that was so abhorrent I almost passed out right before I swiped the business card through the machine and hoped that this all went according to plan, and Margo decided to put her baby in me.

Wow. It might be best I don't ever mention that out loud. Not without some context at least.

Before I went home with a backseat full of items to create the perfect nursery, I stopped at the library. Not for one particular reason, I just made it a habit to go in and browse, return my designated car book and see what else I could find. I loved the library. It was quiet, so quiet and even if there was chatter, it was low and didn't disturb.

There were teens draped in bean bags, reading together. Children exploring picture books, adults on their laptops, earphones in, concentration solid while they wrote. . . whatever it was they were writing about. There was an absolute sense of peace and belonging in this place and I loved it here. Loved it. I wandered through the fiction aisles, fingers running along the spines of stories while I skim read the titles.

When something stuck out to me, I pulled it from the shelf, read the blurb and decided whether I would take it home with me. There wasn't much that I wouldn't read. If it was romantic, fictional and had at least one good review on the cover, I was interested. Margo once told me I should have selected men like I selected books and I told her that was just careless. 'If he can give you a brief run down on what he's about and a review from at least one friend, take him home and settle in for a cover to cover exploration.'

She'd been kidding of course. For the most part. I knew that she was desperate for me to meet someone, fall in love and live a fairy tale outside of the pages. However, I knew that wasn't realistic and I was quite content with waiting for someone to come along at chance, rather than searching and winding up disappointed.

I rented three new titles. The Hating Game by Sally Thorne. Vision in White by Nora Roberts and The Dry by Jane Harper. That last one was a thriller, which was a little outside of the norm for me but it sounded intriguing so I thought I would give it a go. I decided that would be my new designated car book. That would mean I would be reading during day light and therefore, could not read it in bed, alone at night, and end up a petrified mess.

At home, I crept inside and checked on what Margo was doing. She was curled up on top of her bed, fast asleep, a light snore humming from her nose. If I'd been caught right now, I would look like an absolute creep with the cunning smile I wore as I slipped off to get the items out of the trunk.

"What the fu—"

"Surprise!"

Night had fallen and Margo had emerged from her afternoon snooze to find me in the office at the end of the corridor. We had a desk, a cabinet and an armchair but the rest of the room was spare space. I figured that it would work to get my point across and if needed, we could make permanent re arrangements later.

Margo walked into the room, slow and blinking, as if she thought she was still asleep. She looked at the change table against the wall, art decals above it, the crib in the corner, a Finding Nemo mobile hanging from the ceiling. There was a new chest of toys, nappies, wipes, a small set of drawers with an outfit laid across the top of it. A bouncer and a pram were in the closet, but I left the sliding door open so that she could see them. I spun around and gestured at the room.

"So?"

She looked at me with her mouth hanging open. "Addison?"

"Yes?"

"Wha—"

"You have to let me have the child now. Or I bought all of this stuff for no reason."

She rubbed her temples, eyes closed and breathing deep.

"Relax, huh? Just. . . let me do this. Please?"

She looked at me and folded her arms with a raised brow. "Why is it so important that you're the one that carries the baby?"

"Because," I took her hand and gave her a soft smile, one that I liked to use whenever I was in trouble and needed to butter her up. She was a mom already to be honest. Even if I wasn't her daughter. "You've done so much for me, Margo. I would have been so lost if you hadn't stepped up and taken me in after mom and dad died. I was a teenager and that can't have been easy. I want to give back, so much. This feels like such a small gesture in the grand scheme of things. I want to do this. For you."

Her lip quivered and she bit down on it.

"Don't," I giggled, wiping at her face when a tear escaped. "You're so emotional."

She slapped me on the arm. "You say stuff like that and expect me not to be?"

I shrugged. "So? Mmm? Doesn't it look great in here. The one thing that's missing is a bubba."

She searched the room with her tearful gaze again. I knew that I was winning her over, she was caving, and I felt a little surge of excitement bubble under the surface. It escaped though, in the form of a clenched jaw squeal and I started bouncing on the spot.

"I can't wait to give birth to my niece or nephew."

Margo curled over with an exhausted laughter and held her palms to her face. "No, no. I haven't decided."

"Nonsense. It's the perfect solution."