“I’ll be in the living room when you’re awake enough to talk.” I take a step down the hall, but Hanna grabs my wrist.

“Come in. Give me a few minutes.” She drops my wrist and leaves me standing in the middle of the bedroom as she disappears into the bathroom.

There’s a small sitting area to the right, so I take a seat and survey the space. Her clothes from last night lie in a heap on the floor. The sheets are rumpled and twisted, and there’s a pile of tissues littering the pale blue comforter, as well as a few on the floor.

Which means there were tears.

Caused by me.

A few minutes later, she reappears, her hair smoothed out, and she’s wearing a long shirt and leggings.

“Are you okay?” I ask.

She shrugs and pads across the room, dropping into the chair across from me. “I’ve been better, and I’ve been worse.”

“I’m sorry about the way I handled things last night. Or didn’t handle things. I know it’s not an excuse, but I’d just started getting used to having an empty house, and Queenie having her own person to rely on. And it took me back to when she was a baby and I was doing it all on my own and how hard it was then. I wasn’t thinking about how you felt or how hard this must all be for you.”

Hanna is silent for a few seconds. “It’s a lot to process, and I don’t expect you to feel good about it, or particularly enthused, but you needed to know. Do I wish the timing was different? That I was five years younger? That our relationship wasn’t already complicated enough without this? Absolutely. But like it or not, Jake, I’m having this baby.”

I wish I’d reacted to the news differently so she isn’t on the defensive. “And I’m going to be here to support you through it. I know there’s still a lot to figure out, but maybe once you’ve seen your doctor we can start making a plan? I’d like to be able to come to the important doctor’s appointments. I don’t want you to have to do this alone.”

She rubs her eyes and exhales a slow breath. “I don’t expect you to fly to Tennessee every time I have an appointment.”

“I know you don’t. I want to be there, Hanna. As much as my schedule will allow. We can use that shared calendar we set up for all the events leading up to the kids’ wedding, so I can keep track of all the important stuff with you.” With Kimmie, I was the one who had to make all the appointments and make sure she went to them. I’d assumed, naively, that once Queenie was born, she’d fall in love with her the way I already had. I don’t get the feeling it’s going to be the same with Hanna. In fact, if I had to guess, I’m going to be the one who has to work to earn her trust back after last night and my jerk behavior.

“Oh. Yeah. Okay. We can definitely do that.” She rubs her temple, her posture relaxing a little.

I knead the back of my neck. “Speaking of the kids, when do you think we should tell them what’s going on?”

She fingers the heart around her neck. “I’d really rather not keep more secrets from Ryan, so the sooner the better, I guess?”

“This morning then?” I suggest.

“That would be best, I think,” she agrees.

I wish she was here longer, so we had more time to get comfortable with this new version of us. Whatever that’s going to look like. I have so many questions, none of which I feel I can ask yet. “Do you want to tell them together or separately?”

Hanna taps her lips. “I think it would be best if we presented a united front, unless you feel differently?”

“United is good.” I move my chair closer and rest my arm on the small table, palm facing up, fingers stretched toward her. “What are you most worried about right now?”

“Everything?” She tips her chin up, eyes on the ceiling as if she’s fighting back tears. “I’m worried for the health of this baby. I’m worried about how Ryan is going to take this and what it’s going to do to our relationship. I’m afraid to get excited or hopeful because I know how quickly things can change. The last time I was pregnant was the beginning of the end of my marriage.”

“Is that why you ended up divorcing?” This isn’t something Hanna and I have ever talked about. I know about her divorce, but I don’t know what happened to end her marriage in the first place. And in some ways our experiences seem to echo each other. We both lost the person who was supposed to be our partner, but I still had Queenie, and Hanna ended up alone.

She slips her fingers into my palm and I curl them around hers and squeeze.

“I don’t talk about this much because it makes me emotional.” She takes a deep breath before she continues, “When I miscarried, I had to divulge that I’d had a baby before. I hadn’t told Gordon that I was Ryan’s biological mother.”

“Why not? You didn’t think he would understand?”

“So many reasons, but I think most of it stems from guilt. The not being able to raise Ryan the way I wanted to. And I guess that secrecy tells me more about that relationship than I’d ever been willing to admit. At least while I was still in it.” She’s quiet for a moment. “Gordon felt . . . betrayed. Which made sense. We’d been married for fifteen years, and it was a big secret to keep from the person you share your life with. When he found out that Ryan was actually my son, he didn’t handle it well. And I was grieving the loss of our baby. He sat on that information for a couple of years, but when I told him I wasn’t happy in our marriage and thought we should separate, he told Ryan the truth, and well, there was no way for our marriage to recover after that.”

After everything Hanna has been through and the ways she’s been let down and betrayed, I’m surprised she’s even willing to talk to me this morning. “That must have been hard for you.”

“Harder for Ryan. I always knew I was his mother, and he always believed I was his sister. It threw his world into upheaval.”

“Why didn’t you ever tell Ryan before that?” That’s one thing I’ve always wondered but never felt I had the right to ask.

“When I was young, I thought it made sense for my parents to take on that role. I didn’t want to give him up for adoption, but raising a child when I was fifteen was so daunting. So when my parents said they would adopt him, I thought it would be best for Ryan. For all of us. He’d still be in my life. But as he got older, things changed. I never moved away for college. I was there for every milestone. And when he made it to the NHL, well, I was so proud.” She smiles, like she’s caught up in the memory.

“By the time I was in my thirties, I started to look at things differently. And I talked to my parents about maybe telling him the truth. But he’d just started his career, and they were worried it would do too much damage. They’d made sure he would have everything he needed to be successful in life, and I didn’t want to be selfish. So I didn’t tell him.”

“That selflessness came at a pretty steep price for you.” She must have felt handcuffed by that choice. Stuck between two roles.

“And I would pay it a thousand times over knowing that Ryan is where he is because he was loved and cared for. He’s a great man, and he has a great partner. I have so much hope for Ryan and Queenie.”