“I just saw the storm reports,” he says when I click over to his call. “How are you?”

“Panicked. Jemma and Henry have to go to Providence for her sister’s wedding! I can’t get home for Holly. I’m the worst mother ever!”

I start sobbing.

“I’m on my way to your place.”

“What?”

“You’re not going to get out of there tonight. You’ll be lucky to be home tomorrow.” He pauses. I don’t know how to interpret it, but the silence makes me sit up, tears stopping. “I’ll stay with the baby. Or bring her to my place. Something,” he mutters.

There have been very few times in my life when I have literally been speechless. I cannot think of a single thing to say.

“Chloe? Are you there?”

“Yes! Did you just say...”

“I’ll take care of Holly.”

“No! It’s too much to ask… I don’t know what to say! Do you know how to change a diaper?”

He laughs. “Well, unless the whole concept has somehow changed, I think I can remember.”

“It’s a lot, Nick, and she doesn’t know you that well. She’s teething and gets cranky, and she might have another new tooth coming in...”

We both go quiet.

My call waiting beeps.

This is a very bad idea, but it’s the only idea we have.

“Chloe.”

His voice is so warm, like sunlight on sand. He doesn’t need to say more.

“You’re sure?”

“Chloe.”

“I promise I will be on the first plane to Boston. Or train. Jemma will show you everything. And I’ll be by my phone every second. And there’s a list of emergency information—not that it was any use when this emergency came up—there’s not much food in the house… oh Nick, I can’t believe you’re doing this!”

“Neither can I, actually.”

I think that’s what he says. The connection is breaking up.

I only hope we don’t, after this.

I click over to Jemma, to give her the good news.

Good news. Ha.

Here it is. The moment everyone warned me about. I knew being a single mother by choice would be hard. I knew adopting would bring up my own adoption issues. Do mothers who aren’t adoptees panic like this when it comes to an unexpected absence from their child? I don’t have a barometer for measuring my own reactions against the norm.

I knew I’d need support networks and backup plans and that this fragile little life would depend on me in ways I never imagined.

But this – this isn’t my fault.

So why do I feel like it is?

Nick

“I thought you said she wasn’t my little sister,” Jean-Marc grouses, looking at Holly like she’s a rare animal in a zoo exhibit licking the window.

“She’s not. Chloe’s in a bind, trapped in a freak storm in New York. I’m watching her tonight.” After talking a panicked Chloe down off her snow-covered ledge, I went to her house to find Jemma dressed in an elegant gown, Henry in black tie, and a thirty-page manual clearly written by Chloe, who should turn her talents toward writing pandemic preparation manuals for the CDC.

With assurances all would be fine, I sent them off.

Chloe’s place is tiny, and all three of my kids are home for the beginning of winter break. It seemed easier to bring Holly here, along with half her baby gear, where the four of us can trade off child care. One seasoned father and three young adults should have no problem managing one teething infant.

Holly seems unimpressed by my townhouse, preferring to focus entirely on the button on my business shirt cuff as I hold her. Dark hair, straight and shiny like a wet seal, sprouts from her little head. Her birth mother is Asian and Holly’s eyes are dark, but rounded. Chloe doesn’t talk much about the birth father, but I’m guessing he wasn’t Asian, given Holly’s features.

For as serendipitous as the circumstances of Chloe’s adoption of Holly are, she looks like Chloe. It’s a strange – and beautiful – coincidence.

I’ll have to ask about Chloe’s baby pictures someday.

“Ay ya ga,” Holly says, before dive bombing my thumb joint and clamping down like it’s a chew toy.

I stare at the selection of baby toys I brought from Chloe’s place and let her gnaw on me.

“Yeah. I got the last train out of town. A bunch of my friends are stuck in New York.” Jean-Marc reaches for Holly’s hand. She wraps a slick palm around his index finger. “Like Chloe, I guess.”

“Urg,” Holly says, grinning madly, a string of drool running down to their clasped hands.

Jean-Marc takes it in stride. “Babies are gross.”

“So are teenage boys.”

“It’s not a competition, Dad.”

I laugh. “No, it’s not. But babies don’t forsake paying to do laundry so they can spend more on entertainment.” I look pointedly at his overstuffed duffel bag.

“I budget reasonably.”

“That bag smells like a prison cell.”

“DADDY!” Elodie walks in the front door, eyes like saucers, tossing her own bag of laundry on top of Jean-Marc’s bag of shame. “Is that Chloe’s baby?”

“Nah. Dad just decided to start a day care, El.”

“Shut up.”

She ignores me completely and smoothes back the tuft of hair on Holly’s crown. It stubbornly sticks back up.

“Aren’t you the sweetest!” she says, her voice full of sugar.

“Urg,” Holly answers, opening her mouth and smiling with her whole face.

“Where’s Chloe?” Elodie looks around wildly. “Have you reached the point where you’re having the kids meet? Is it that serious, Daddy?” Her voice has dropped to a whisper.

“Why are you whispering?” Jean-Marc calls out from the kitchen, where he’s digging in the fridge for leftovers. “It’s not like the baby can’t hear you.”

“Because I don’t want to be rude and say the wrong thing in front of Chloe!” Elodie shrieks. The sound could call dogs in battle.

Holly’s happy countenance changes to surprise.

And then her face crumples into tears, her own shrieks surpassing Elodie’s as if this were, indeed, a competition.