“Please leave, Mom, and don’t ever come back.” I gave my father a quick look, and his eyes were filled with sadness. I went to turn away from them when my mother grabbed my arm.
“Bradley. This has gone on too long. How long are you going to punish us? We want to see our grandchild. We deserve to see her, damn it.”
I let out laugh and shook my head. “You tried to destroy my marriage, Mom. You threatened me and wanted me to leave my wife. I’m sorry…I have nothing left to say to you, and yes…before you even say it, I will always put my wife first. Always. I love her more than I could ever describe. She is my whole world, as well as Maegan and the baby. I’ll never let you hurt any of them.”
My mother put her hand up to her mouth. “Oh…is Amanda pregnant?”
I looked at her with a confused expression on my face. “What? Why would you ask that?”
“You said Maegan and the baby, son,” my father said.
Fuck me.
“Um…” I said, trying to figure out how to dig myself out of this one.
My mother let out a gasp as she looked over my shoulder, and I spun around. Amanda was standing there holding Maegan. Maegan was just staring at my mother and father.
“She’s beautiful,” my mother whispered.
When I looked back at my mother, she had tears running down her face.
Amanda walked up to me and I put my arm around her. I swore I felt her body tremble. There was no way I was going to ever let my mother hurt her again.
My father walked up and smiled at Amanda and she returned the smile. “She’s breathtaking, Amanda.” He said as he smiled down at Maegan, who reached out for him with her hand. He took her hand and kissed it as she buried her face in Amanda’s neck.
I watched as my father talked to Maegan, and my heart broke into a million pieces. I peeked over at my mother and watched her face as my father talked to my daughter. When he stepped back, he looked at my mother. Before she took a step closer, she looked at Amanda.
“May I?” she asked.
Amanda nodded her head and took a step closer to my mother.
“Hello, Maegan. My goodness, you are the spitting image of your daddy,” my mother said as I watched a tear slide down her cheek. My heart was pounding in my chest.
Amanda looked up at me and smiled. “I told Brad she looked like him.”
My mother looked right at Amanda and giggled. “I’ll have to give you some baby pictures, the resemblance is unbelievable.”
“I’d really like that,” Amanda said as her voice choked.
What happened next really surprised me and took my breath away. My mother put her hand up to her mouth and started crying as she looked at Amanda and placed her hand on Amanda’s face.
“Oh my God. I’m so sorry…I’m so very sorry for treating you so horribly.” She turned and walked into my father’s arms. He held her while he stroked his hand down her back and kept saying, “Shh…baby. Shh…”
Amanda looked at me with a stunned look on her face. I was just as stunned and didn’t really know what to do. Amanda motioned for me to invite them into the house but I shook my head no. She tilted her head and gave me another look. She mouthed ‘Brad’ to me and I rolled my eyes. The last thing I wanted to do was open it up for her to hurt Amanda more.
I took in a deep breath and quickly let it out. “Dad, did y’all want to, um, come in for a bit?”
My father pushed my mother away and looked at her. He looked back up at me and said, “I think your mother and I would really like that.”
My mom spun around, quickly wiping her eyes and putting on a smile. “I’d love to be able to get those pictures to you…” her voice cracked.
Amanda nodded her head. “Of course, please just let me know when and maybe we can meet y’all for lunch sometime.”
The expression on my mom’s face was pure shock.
She began shaking her head. “Why? Why would you be so nice to me after all of the horrible things I did to you?”
I glanced down at my beautiful wife. I knew why, because that was just Amanda. She didn’t have a mean bone in her body, but at the same time, she was very guarded and I trusted that she knew what she was doing.
“It does me no good to hang on to hurt and anger. Will I ever be able to forgive you? Yes. Forgetting is hard, but I’m willing to give it a try.” She glanced up at me and smiled. “For Brad, because I love him and I know he loves his parents and I know Maegan will want to know her grandparents. So will the new baby.”
My mother dropped her head and then looked back up. The tears were flowing and a part of me wanted to take her into my arms.
She quickly wiped away the tears and smiled. “Okay, well. We have presents…for each of you,” she said as she looked at me and winked. I had to wonder if they did have presents for Amanda. When my father opened up the trunk of their car, Maegan started clapping and smiling. She somehow knew that what she was looking at would surely mean lots of fun for her.
I helped my parents carry the more than ridiculous amount of presents as we put them under the tree. I couldn’t help but notice that there were about six presents with Amanda’s name on them. I glanced over at my mother, who was now holding Maegan. For some reason I got the idea that deep down inside, she liked Amanda. She was just too stubborn to admit it.
The afternoon went on as my mother played endlessly with Maegan and my parents chatted with Amanda’s parents. We had waited for Amanda’s parents to get there before we opened up presents and poor Maegan could hardly keep her eyes open from all the excitement of the day.
I stood over Maegan’s crib, watching her sleep. Amanda grabbed my hand and I turned to around to face her. The smile on her face about blew me over.
“Are you happy?” she whispered.
I brought her in for a hug and held her tightly against my body. “I’ve never had such an amazing Christmas before.”
As we walked into the hallway I could hear my parents talking to Amanda’s. I was pleasantly surprised at how well everyone seemed to be getting along.
“I love you, Manda. I love you because I know you stepping out of my truck and walking up to my parents with Meg had to have been hard for you. Especially with everything my mother said to you.”
She got up on her tippy toes and kissed me. “I love you. And I see how guarded you’ve been this afternoon. You have to admit it was nice seeing your parents playing with Meg. Didn’t you think so?”
As much as I wanted to admit I loved having my parents here, I was still angry at my mother.
“Brad, let it go. Baby, let the anger and hurt go. We have so much to look forward to and what is in the past is in the past.”
I shook my head. “Manda, how can you say that after the things she put you through? She put us through? She said some horrible things and I’m…I’m just not sure I can forgive her.”
She slipped her hand behind my neck and brought my lips down to hers. She gently kissed me as she moved her hand through my hair. She stopped kissing me and barely took her lips from mine.
“I can forgive her because of this. Our love, Brad. Our love is so much stronger than any words she can spit out, and I really, truly honestly believe that she didn’t mean it. I think you were her baby, and no matter who your wife was…she just had it set in her mind they were not good enough. I think the moment she saw Meg it all hit her. She’s missed out on so much and I don’t think she wants to miss out on any more.”
I took a deep breath in and slowly blew it out as I closed my eyes.
“Listen, I’m not saying let’s have your parents over for dinners and tea parties, but let’s try and let them be a part of our lives. A part of our children’s lives. We’ll just take it one day at a time. How does that sound?” She scrunched up her nose and winked at me and I couldn’t help but let out a chuckle.