Our Unlived Life, Part 2

It was Laura who suggested they go.

“I promised them I’d come back,” she said, that morning, folding a dish towel with the careful attention she gave to small tasks. “I don’t want to be someone who doesn’t keep her promises.”

Andy watched her hands. There was something in the way she said it—not wistful, not sentimental, just quiet and deliberate, like a woman checking items off a list she hadn’t shown him. He held her gaze for a moment, searching for whatever it was that had snagged in him. He couldn’t find it. “Okay,” he said.

On the drive over, the sun was high enough to melt old snow into the gutters and fill the world with a harsh, bright light. Laura sat with her hands in her lap, watching the familiar streets go by.

“How long do you think it’s been for them?” she asked. “Since our last visit.”

Andy thought about it. “Ten days for us. But time on the island doesn’t—” He paused. “Could be yesterday evening, from where they’re standing.”

Laura nodded slowly, as if this satisfied something she’d been turning over. “Good,” she said, and didn’t explain why.

He parked a half-block away, just out of sight of the front window. For a moment they sat together, saying nothing. For a long minute, Andy and Laura sat in the parked car, side by side, staring through the windshield at the snowy curb. The world outside was bright and ordinary: shoveled walk, salt crusting the gutters, a line of cars up and down the block like chess pieces that had never moved.

Laura—both of her—sat in the passenger seat and in the back seat, hands folded in her lap, gaze steady on the house across the street. Neither spoke, but the air was full of anticipation, the way it always was before a birthday party or a funeral, when the future waited at the other end of a door.

She merged before they got out of the car. One moment, Andy sat with two Lauras: both gazing at the front porch across the street, both with hands laced quietly in their laps, identical tension in the set of their jaws. The next, they folded together—the movement as subtle as a shadow stretching, then snapping back into shape—leaving just one Laura in the passenger seat, hands gripped tight on her knees. Andy watched it happen, not for the first time, but with the same faint awe that always caught him off-guard.

She said, “I want to be just me, for them. Like before.” Her voice was steady, but something in her eyes flickered between hope and guilt, like she was waiting for him to object.

Andy just nodded. “I understand,” he said, and meant it.

They didn’t speak again as they made their way up the shoveled path, boots crunching over salt and gray-packed snow. Laura walked beside him, not behind or ahead, and he felt her anxiety telegraph through the sleeve of his coat—her knuckles tapping a little counterpoint against her thigh, just audible under the hush of the neighborhood. He realized, with a twist, that she was nervous. Not about the surreal, not about the metaphysics or the afterlife, but about facing Carol Cooper, queen of the midwestern kitchen, judge of all snacks and souls.

He knocked, because that was how it had always been. The sound of the knock was so ordinary, so grounded, that it set Laura smiling—she caught his eye, and for just a second, she was thirteen again, waiting on the porch for the promise of hot cocoa and cartoons.

The door opened on the second knock. Mrs. Cooper’s hair was pinned up, same as it had been forever, an apron over her sweater and a dish towel still in one hand, flour ghosting one forearm. She looked at Andy on her doorstep and went still, like she wasn’t sure if he was real, or if she was.

She said, “Andy, what in God’s name—” She closed the space in three quick steps and wrapped her arms around Andy’s neck, squeezed him once, then stepped back to look at him. “You’re not even wearing a coat, again,” she scolded. “You’re going to freeze to death, you big dummy. Is this your idea of an outfit for—”

Only then did she look at Laura, really look. The daylight caught Laura’s face, and the winter sun poured a faint halo around her hair, and for a second, Andy's mother just stared. She reached out and, with hands that had made ten thousand peanut butter sandwiches, touched Laura’s face, framing it the way a person might check for a fever. “It was real.” She murmured, voice breaking.

“Hi, Mrs. Cooper,” Laura said. Her voice caught, just once. “Sorry we didn’t call first.”

Andy's mother didn’t reply. She pulled Laura forward by both shoulders, hugged her tight, and held on long enough that it hurt. When she pulled away, she had tears in both eyes, but she wiped them away fast, like she could banish them with the edge of her thumb.

“Get in here, both of you,” she said, her voice raw but strong. “It’s freezing.”

She towed Laura inside by the hand, then spun back to Andy, her own hand never letting go of Laura’s. “Are you hungry? Did you eat breakfast? Andy, you look like you haven’t had a meal since last week. Now I know you ate last night, so I’m assuming you skipped breakfast. I don’t know what’s going on with you kids, but you look thin.” She gave Laura a once-over too, but Laura looked almost athletic—a fact that made Carol’s mouth twitch, as if she couldn’t quite square the image with her memory of the awkward, always-hungry girl she’d all but adopted so many years ago.

The warmth of the house was immediate, nearly suffocating after the January cold. It smelled of coffee, lemon cleaner, and the last echoes of garlic from last night’s dinner. The rug in the mudroom was the same one Andy had grown up with, the ancient stain from the Christmas cider spill still faintly visible if you knew where to look.

Andy's mother called up the stairs—“Jim! We’ve got visitors!”—then turned back to her charges. She still hadn’t let go of Laura’s hand, and Andy realized with a pang that she probably wouldn’t, unless she was made to.

The three of them made their way down the hall to the living room. Every piece of furniture was exactly where Andy remembered it: the heavy couch, the ancient armchair that Andy’s father claimed by squatter’s rights, the patchwork of throws and pillows that never matched but always seemed to fit. Laura hesitated in the doorway, but Andy's mother all but shoved her in, parked her right in the center of the couch, then took a seat on the arm beside her, as if she meant to anchor Laura there physically. Andy stood a moment, then sat at the other end, his feet almost automatically finding the old grooves in the coffee table.

The house was silent for a moment, then the sound of heavy footsteps came from the stairs—Andy’s father, moving with the slow determination of someone who had never quite gotten used to mornings. He rounded the corner, eyes still adjusting, and stopped in his tracks. He wore a button-down shirt half-tucked into khakis, the sleeves rolled up, and he looked at Andy, then at Laura, then at Andy again, as if recalibrating his whole universe in the span of three seconds.

Echoing his wife, he muttered, “So it was real,” and Andy almost didn’t recognize his father’s voice. It was lower, tired, but not unhappy—more like a man who had decided, finally, to stop waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Andy managed, “Yeah. It’s real, Dad.”

His father let out a slow, private breath, then crossed the room and offered Andy a handshake. At the last second, he switched it to a hug, just a single tight squeeze, then stepped back. He looked at Laura, held out his hand to her, and when she took it, he wrapped both of his hands around hers and held on. He didn’t say anything else, just met her eyes and let the quiet answer for him.

Andy's mother was the one who broke it. “Sit, Jim,” she said, and patted the armchair with the authority of a woman who had never once lost an argument in her own house.

He sat, the chair creaking under his long frame, and for a moment, none of them spoke. Laura, Andy could tell, was at the edge of crying, but she held her face in profile, looking straight at the blank TV, her posture stiff with determination.

Andy's mother said, “I’m glad you came. I didn’t think—” She shook her head. “I mean, you were here last night, but this morning, after…” She trailed off.

Laura said, “We wanted to see you again. Both of you. There’s not much time left, but—” She stopped, swallowing. “I just wanted to see you again.”

Andy’s mother squeezed Laura’s hand, then looked over at Andy, narrowing her eyes the way she did when she thought he was hiding something. “Are you staying long? Do I need to make up the guest bed?”

Andy, caught, said, “We’re only here for the day. Just a day. We have to go back tonight.”

Andy’s mother’s face fell, and for a second she looked older than he’d ever seen her. Then she collected herself, rose, and said, “Well then, I’m feeding you. Both of you. And if you think you’re getting out of it, you don’t know me at all.” She stomped toward the kitchen, her robe billowing, and called back, “Jim, get the good plates. I want this to feel like a holiday.”

Andy’s father shot Andy a look that was half apology, half approval. He said, “She’s been baking since seven. I’d say we have at least three kinds of rolls coming.” He glanced at Laura, then back to Andy. “It’s good to see you, son. And you, kiddo. Very good.”

Andy smiled, not trusting himself to say anything more.

Andy’s father leaned back in his chair, legs crossed at the ankle, and looked at the two of them for a long, assessing moment. “When we woke up this morning,” he said, “your mother thought she’d dreamed it. The whole thing. You, Laura, that nice Arabella woman. She was so sure it hadn’t been real, she almost didn’t want to come down for breakfast.” He looked toward the kitchen, where his wife's voice was rising about the empty milk carton. “And then you knocked on the door, and there you were. I don’t think I’ve seen her move that fast in twenty years.”

Andy didn’t know what to say to that, so he just nodded.

From the kitchen came the sound of bowls being stacked, a clatter of utensils, and Andy’s mother’s voice rising in gentle complaint about “who put the milk back empty.” Andy looked at Laura, and Laura looked back, and it was as if the whole world could be reduced to that moment, that glance, the ordinary peace of being where you belonged.

After a while, Andy’s mother returned with a tray: four mugs, each filled with steaming cocoa (no instant mix, real milk and a heap of powder), Laura's marshmallows on a little dish, plus a plate of cinnamon rolls that steamed in the cool air. She set the tray on the coffee table, then sat beside Laura again, as if she’d never left.

“I remember,” she said, “that you liked the corner pieces best. The ones with the crust.” She handed Laura one, then Andy. Andy’s father took his, no fuss, and the four of them sat in a ring, the way they had a hundred times before, minus sixteen years.

The bite of cinnamon roll was almost too much for her; Laura set her teeth in, a measured, careful chew, and for an instant Andy was sure she’d start to cry. But she only closed her eyes hard, and when she opened them again, she was—odd as it sounded—whole. Brighter. The years she’d lost glimmered at the edge of her lashes, and she smiled, the blush starting up her cheekbones in a way Andy recognized from ages ago: the look of a kid who’d done something well and craved the proof of it.

She ate in small bites, each one deliberate, and Andy could see her collecting herself, steadying into the simple act of tasting home. He drank his cocoa, thick and sweet and absolute, and let the moment spool out.

The silence was not really silent. It was the hush of people who’d known each other so long that talk was optional, a living thing. Laura looked at Andy’s mother now and then, her hand drifting toward Mrs. Cooper’s like a dowsing rod, never quite touching but needing to confirm, over and over, that this world was not the ghost of a comfort. Andy’s father sipped his cocoa with both hands, watching them, his eyes flicking between Andy and Laura, as if he could see the old pattern reweaving itself in front of him—two halves, mending a whole.

When the cinnamon roll was gone, Andy’s mother pressed another into Laura’s hand, fussing about her appetite, about how the last time she’d seen her she was “nothing but bones and nerves and the occasional giggle, and now look at you, a real person.” Laura laughed at that, a sound so sharp and clear it seemed to crack the ice of the years off the room. Andy’s father nodded, satisfied, as if this noise proved something he’d always wanted to believe.

They sat together, four deep in the living room, watching the sun melt the frost outside the bay window. Laura watched all of it with bright, unblinking attention, like she was watching the old reels of her favorite movie finally play out on the big screen.

“Are you happy?” Andy’s mother said at one point, cutting straight to the heart of it. She looked first at Andy, then at Laura, her gaze softening. “You don’t have to answer, I just want to know.”

Andy started to say yes, but it came out more breath than word. Laura took a moment, then nodded, slow and sure. “Yeah,” she said. “I am. I didn’t think I’d ever get to be, but I am.”

The answer hung for a beat. Andy’s father let out a small grunt, the sound of a worry loosening. Andy’s mother’s eyes went a little wet, but she blinked it away and busied herself fussing with the coffee table, straightening the mugs, nudging the rolls into a neat line.

For a while, the past was a presence, but not a weight. They told stories. And after each story, Laura would look around, eyes shining, and Andy realized she was cataloging it all, stamping it into memory. He realized that, with the weirdness and chaos of The HH, this was maybe the first ordinary morning she’d ever had as an adult. He watched her hands, the way they circled her mug, the way she blinked against the light, and understood that for her, this was as good as an afterlife could ever be: real milk cocoa, a couch threadbare with time, the company of people who’d once been her entire world.

Andy’s dad, always the one to break the peace, started in on a show he’d been watching. “You’d like it,” he told Andy, “it’s got that cop from the movie you used to love, and the writing’s not bad.” Andy asked which movie, and his father told him, and Andy grinned, realizing it was the same actor who’d played the robot villain in one of their childhood VHS staples. For a few minutes, they debated the merits of the villain’s career trajectory, and Laura jumped in with a memory of a birthday party where Andy had insisted on reciting half the movie’s dialogue by heart.

Andy’s mother, not to be outdone, cut in with news about the neighbors: Mrs. Ingalls had painted her door a hideous green (“Looks like the color of old toothpaste,” she said, delighted), and the Connellys across the way had finally gotten the snowblower fixed, so now there was a stripe of perfectly clear sidewalk from their mailbox to nowhere. Laura asked if the Connellys still did the Christmas lights, and Carol’s face went soft. “Every year,” she said. “You can see them from the highway.”

The talk wandered. Andy found himself saying less and watching more, letting the normality of it work its way into his bones. Laura, curled on the old couch, sat in the same place she always had—her place, the one they’d never really given away, even after she was gone. For a long time, she went very still, eyes darting around the room, like she was trying to memorize it or maybe anchor herself to it, to prove to herself it was really happening.

Andy’s father, never a patient man, finally said, “I’m for a walk before lunch, Andy, if you’re not too busy.”

Andy’s mother shot him a look—“Jim, don’t go slipping on the ice again, I have enough laundry without bloody towels”—but Andy said sure, why not, and the two of them pulled on boots and coats and stepped out into the brittle cold. The air outside was bright and thin, the kind that made noses run and eyes sting. Andy followed his dad down the driveway, past the ancient mailbox, past the neighbor’s snowman (already half-collapsed from the sun), and onto the sidewalk.

They walked in companionable silence for a block or two, Andy trailing a few steps behind as his dad took big, deliberate strides. At the corner, his father slowed and waited for him to catch up. “It’s hard to believe that she’s really back,” he said, softly. “Laura.”

Andy didn’t know how to answer. “Yeah,” he said. “It still feels like a dream, sometimes.”

His father grunted, then, after a beat, said, “You look happy. I haven’t seen you that way in a long time.” He kicked a chunk of ice into the street, watched it shatter. “Whatever you did, Andy, you brought her back. You brought her home.” He paused. “You did good.”

Andy felt his chest tighten a little, the way it always did when his father gave him one of his rough compliments, heavy enough to bruise. “Thanks, Dad,” he managed.

They walked the rest of the way back without talking. At the stoop, Jim turned and clapped Andy on the shoulder, steady and hard, then went inside. Andy took a second at the door, breathing in the winter air, letting it bite him awake, then followed.

Inside, it was warm to the point of absurdity. Mrs. Cooper’s scream was audible from the kitchen—“You’re not chopping the parsley, you’re bruising it, don’t hammer at it, Laura dear, slice, slice!”—and Laura’s laughter filtered through the house, wild and delighted. Andy’s mother was at the stove, stirring a pot, while Laura worked at the kitchen island, a mountain of vegetables piling up at her side. They looked like a mother and daughter finally allowed to do what they’d always meant to.

Andy stood in the doorway, just watching. He saw how Laura’s hands moved, hesitating from time to time, and how his mother hovered at her side, correcting her, encouraging her, never letting a second pass without a comment of some kind. Laura seemed to love every second of it. She looked over at Andy and grinned. Andy’s mother busied herself with the soup, then with plates, then with the big wooden salad bowl she always used, even if it was just for two.

They worked in parallel for a minute, no talk, just the sounds of slicing and the gentle clatter of ladles and tongs.

Then Laura said, “I’ve been learning to cook. A little.”

Mrs. Cooper stopped what she was doing and turned to look at her. “Oh?” she said, casual but intense. “What do you make?”

Laura shrugged. “Mostly breakfast. Andy likes scrambled eggs, but he’s picky about texture. I tried to copy the way you did it, but—” She glanced down. “It’s harder than it looks.”

Andy’s mother made a noise that was half laugh, half approval. “The secret’s in the heat. Low and slow.” She nodded toward the stove. “You want to try this?”

Laura’s eyes widened, then she nodded. Andy’s mother handed over the spatula, moving aside but not letting go, just yet. For a second, both women stood at the stove, shoulder to shoulder, and Andy, watching from the dining room, saw the micro-gestures—Laura leaning in, his mother’s hand steadying the bowl, both of them so focused it was like the rest of the world had faded out.

After a minute, Mrs. Cooper wiped her hands on her apron and disappeared into the pantry. She returned carrying a battered wooden box, the kind with a sliding lid and a hundred years’ worth of fingerprints rubbed into the grain. She set it on the counter and pushed it toward Laura.

“These are mine. And my mother’s,” she said. “And her mother’s. I think you should have them.”

Laura blinked, startled. “I can’t—Mrs. Cooper, I—”

Andy’s mother waved her off, brusque. “You can. And you will. You’re family.” She pushed the box into Laura’s hands and, when Laura hesitated, reached out and hugged her, sudden and fierce, chin resting on the top of Laura’s head. Laura froze, then hugged back, both arms around Mrs. Cooper’s waist, clinging so hard it looked like she’d never let go.

After a while, Andy’s mother let her go, wiped her own face with the back of her wrist, and went back to the stove.

Andy, in the dining room, felt it all through the wall. He and his father set the table, Andy counting plates and glasses, his father unspooling the flatware from the napkin rolls Carol insisted on for even the most informal meal.

At one point, Andy’s father paused, a handful of forks in his hand. “She cried, you know,” he said, voice low. “This morning. Before you got here. She woke up and thought it was a dream, and she cried so hard I almost believed it was too.”

Andy set down the glasses he’d been holding, not trusting himself to reply.

His father nodded, as if the silence was the answer he expected. “She’s tougher than she looks, though,” he said, then added, softer: “They both are.”

They finished the table in silence.

When the soup was done and the salad tossed, Andy’s mother called everyone in with a single wordless shout. The four of them sat, Laura in her old chair, Andy to her left, his mother on Laura's other side, and his father at the head of the table, same as always.

Lunch was soup, salad, and the kind of bread that could only exist in winter: warm, crusty, and dusted with enough flour to leave powder on your lips. There was pie for after, of course, and Andy’s mom portioned it as if she expected Andy to die of starvation before the next meal. It was everything Andy remembered from a lifetime of Sundays, the only difference being the girl at his side, hands folded neatly over her lap, eyes taking in every moment like she was saving it for later.

They ate mostly in silence at first, but as the bowls emptied and the pie made its rounds, the talk began to wander. Andy’s father brought up the time Andy had tried to fix a toaster and nearly burned down the kitchen; his mother countered with a memory of Laura and Andy using her living room to build a “spaceship” out of every blanket in the house. Laura listened, smiling, not denying a thing. She had always been good at taking blame, even when it wasn’t hers.

It was Laura who changed the subject. She did it so gently, so easily, that Andy didn’t even notice until she was two sentences in.

“There’s something else we need to tell you,” she said, after clearing a second bowl of soup and most of the salad. She dabbed her mouth with the napkin, then set it down flat on the table, smoothing the wrinkles out of it. She looked at Andy, then at his mother, and then at his father. “About me and Andy. About what happens next.”

Carol put down her fork. She did it slowly, a surgical gesture, like she already knew what was coming and just wanted to see how it would play out.

Laura didn’t hesitate. “When we left yesterday, we had just… eloped, I guess. At the footbridge.” She looked at Andy, then back. “But there’s going to be a real wedding, soon. Like, with a ceremony. And…” She glanced at Andy, and he could feel her resolve shoring itself up like rebar under a bridge. “It’s not just us.”

Andy's mother made a face, something between a frown and the hint of a smile. “Not just you and Andy?”

Laura shook her head. “Not exactly. It’s—we’re all marrying Andy. Seven of us.” She set her hands flat on the table. “The others aren’t going anywhere. They just aren’t there yet.”

For a second the only sound was the tick of the kitchen clock.

Andy's mother looked at her napkin. She folded it once, then again, pressing the crease with her thumbnail. Then she looked up at Laura, and the kindness in her face had gone very precise. “Seven of you,” she said, “are marrying my son.”

Laura met her eyes. “Yes.”

“You’re all marrying Andy,” she said. Not a question, exactly. More like she was hearing herself say it out loud to see how it landed.

Andy's father looked at Andy. “You always did overachieve.”

Mrs. Cooper shushed him with a look, but the corner of her mouth twitched up.

“Can I ask who?” She said it gently, but there was no mistaking the undertone: you’d better tell me before I find out on TV.

Laura went through the list, slow and clear, like she’d rehearsed it in her head. “Me,” she said, then she continued, “Erin—”

Mrs. Cooper’s face lit up, then went blank, as if she’d hit a patch of black ice. “Erin Delgado?” she asked.

Andy nodded, smiling. “Yeah.”

His mother said, “Oh, good! I never stopped sending her Christmas cards. Not even after—” She cut herself off. “She never wrote back, but I always hoped.”

Andy smiled. “She mentioned them. She just didn’t know what to say back.”

Carol looked down, the ghost of a smile crossing her lips. “You know she came here once, after you two broke up? She just stood in the driveway. I saw her out the window, but she left before I could say anything. I thought maybe she wanted to say goodbye.”

He’d never heard that before. Andy tried to picture Erin, in the grip of that old stubborn loneliness, just standing at the curb like a ghost waiting to be noticed. “She probably wanted to,” Andy said. “She just didn’t know how.”

Carol looked at Laura. “I’m glad you found each other again. I'm so glad she’s happy. I’m glad you all are.” She really meant it, but Andy could see the calculation behind her eyes, the sorting and stacking of all these new facts.

Next was “Claire,” and at the name, both of Andy’s parents went quiet.

Carol spoke first. “Is that Claire Freeman? The quiet girl from high school?”

Andy, now acutely aware of the color in his face, said, “Yeah.”

Carol’s eyebrows went up, just barely. “You never stopped talking about her,” she said. “For two full years in high school. I remember.” She looked at Laura, then back at Andy, then at Laura again. “I thought—well, I always thought she was your type.”

Laura, never missing a beat, said, “He has many types.” The dry amusement in her voice was unmistakable.

Andy's father, who had been quietly buttering bread for no clear reason, said, “Didn’t she turn you down, sophomore year?”

Andy closed his eyes. “It was a misunderstanding.”

His father nodded, sage as ever. “It always is.”

Laura snorted, and even Andy’s mom broke into a thin smile. Then, “Emi,” Laura said, and at that, Mrs. Cooper’s face broke open with recognition.

“Emi Kim?” she said. “From down the street?”

Andy nodded. His mother's hands flew to her cheeks, a gesture Andy hadn’t seen since he was a kid and had come home with a scraped knee. “Oh, honey. The last time I heard from her must have been, oh, six or seven years ago? She called to ask how you were doing, she said she just wanted to make sure you were happy, wherever you were.”

Andy remembered the scene from the Garden of Glass, when Emi had picked up the phone, called his mother, and discovered Andy was living with Erin. How lonely Emi had been. “She’s still Emi,” Andy said gently. “She draws kids’ books, now. She’s happy, and she's amazing.”

Carol dabbed at her eyes, which had gone glassy. “I’m so glad she made it. She always seemed so fragile.”

“She’s tougher than she looks,” Laura said, warmly.

Next was Dawn. “I don’t know if you know her,” Laura said. “She worked at The Harrington, where Andy used to stay for business trips.”

Andy's mother shook her head, then looked at Andy for help. “She was the one who got me Bulls tickets that time,” Andy said.

Andy's father, who had been quietly sipping his water, said, “Wasn’t that the game you said changed your whole outlook on basketball?”

Andy nodded. “She’s the reason I started following the sport. She’s—” He stopped, searching for the right word. “She’s good. She makes people feel welcome.”

Andy's mother made a note of it, the way she did with every new name, storing it away for future reference.

“Emily,” Laura said, and her voice went warm in a way that made Andy look at her. “She’s—she’s just good. She’s one of those people who makes a room feel safer.”

Mrs. Cooper’s face opened up at that. “I like her already.”

Andy nodded. “You’d love her.”

“And Myra,” Laura said, and there was a brief pause, a small careful thing. “She went to middle school with us.”

The kitchen went quiet in a different way than it had before. Andy’s father put his water glass down. Mrs. Cooper looked at Andy. “Myra,” she said slowly. “I feel like I should remember that name.”

“You might,” Andy said.

Andy's father studied his son’s face for a moment, then looked at his wife. Something moved between them. “Well,” he said finally, with the measured tone of a man choosing his words like he was picking his footing on wet rock, “middle school’s a long time ago.”

“It is,” Andy nodded. His mother held Andy’s gaze a beat longer, then gave a short nod, filing it away somewhere deep.

“As long as she’s good to you now,” she said, and left it at that. “Are you happy?” Carol asked.

Andy looked at Laura, then back at his mother. “Yeah,” he said. “I am.”

His mother turned to Laura. “And you, Laura? Are you happy? It can’t be easy.”

Laura shrugged. “We’re all in it together. The other women… it’s like I said last time. It’s like we’re all sisters. There isn’t any jealousy, not really. I can’t… They all helped me when I needed them, without me even asking. We all get Andy.” She smirked. “I’m the only one married to him by an angel on the footbridge, though.”

Andy's mother watched him, weighing it. Then she smiled, broad and genuine, and reached over to pat his hand. “That’s all that matters.”

Andy's father, who had not said much through the roll call, looked at Andy and said, “You’re a braver man than I am, son. I can barely keep up with your mother.”

His wife shot him a look, but it was pure love underneath.

Then Andy's father frowned, a wrinkle forming above his eyebrow. “If this is all happening so soon, why haven’t we been sent an invitation?”

Andy looked at Laura, who looked back at him, and for a second the table went completely silent.

“We’re not sure about the venue,” Andy said, improvising.

Laura added, “It’s complicated. The wedding is going to be on the island. The one from the show. It’s all being handled by the Host. They said we could bring guests, but—” She faltered, and Andy could see she was trying to spare his parents from the specifics.

Mrs. Cooper’s lips thinned. “So you’re not having a real wedding.”

“We are,” Andy said. “It’s just… not here.”

Andy's father grunted. “So it’s a destination wedding.”

Laura, with a little desperation, said, “You’ll be invited. I’m sure. It just isn’t—” She made a gesture, the same one Andy’s mother used to make when the words ran out. “It’s not traditional.”

Andy's mother watched the two of them for a few more seconds, then held up a hand. “Enough.” She looked at Laura. “If it’s real to you, that’s what matters.” She paused. “But if you think I’m not going to have a party here, you’re delusional.”

Andy grinned, and even Laura seemed relieved.

Then Mrs. Cooper’s eyes narrowed a little. “Seven women is a lot, Andy. But I don’t think you’re telling me the whole story.”

Andy went red. He felt it climb from his collar to his cheeks. Laura, feeling it too, reached for his hand under the table and squeezed. “He’s marrying seven, but there are more than seven, only the others aren't ready yet.” she said, grinning, enjoying his discomfort.

Andy's mother said, “How many?”

Andy looked at Laura, who gave him a little nod, like: do it. Suddenly, he felt very much like a child again, standing in front of his mother after she just discovered the wreckage left by one of his building attempts, and desperately trying to justify himself.

“Thirteen,” Andy said.

The room went dead silent. Mrs. Cooper, who had just taken a big gulp of water, sputtered and nearly choked. Andy's father reached over and patted her on the back, deadpan. “You alright, hon?”

Andy's mother, after catching her breath, stared at Andy. “Thirteen.”

Andy, not meeting her eyes, said defensively, “I’m not marrying all of them yet. Some haven’t decided.”

But his mother seemed not to have heard. “Thirteen women.”

Andy's father, totally straight-faced, said, “Guess he finally learned how to talk to girls.”

Andy's mother shot him a look, but this time she didn’t even try to hide the smile. Then Andy, sensing that the only way out was through, said, “Uh, since we’re on the topic, there’s something else.”

“Of course there is,” Andy's father said.

Andy glanced at Laura. She gave him another squeeze, then let go. “Uh, at least three of them are pregnant,” he said. The words landed like a stone.

Andy’s mother made a tiny, choked noise. “Claire is having a girl,” Andy said. “Erin’s carrying twins—a boy and a girl. And Chloe, one of the other women, is having a boy.” He paused. “They’re all due within a few months of each other.”

Andy's father, who had at some point crossed his arms, went very still. Andy's mother, after a few seconds, set her glass down very deliberately, as if she’d never wanted it in the first place. She said, “Are you really the father?”

Andy nodded.

“For all of them?”

Andy nodded again.

“Are you sure?”

Andy nodded one more time. His mother blinked, then looked at Laura. “What about you, honey?”

Laura, soft, said, “No. Not yet. But it wouldn’t be the worst thing.” She said it with a gentleness that made it clear she’d been thinking about it, maybe since the moment she saw the nursery upstairs.

Andy's mother looked around the kitchen, her eyes going from Andy, to Laura, to her husband, and then to the old table itself. For a second, Andy thought she might break down, or laugh, or both. Instead, she said, deadpan, “We’re going to need a bigger table.” Then, with a decisive nod, she added, “And a bigger house.”

Laura laughed, sudden and loud, and Andy's father reached over and took his wife’s hand, squeezing it tight. She squeezed back, not taking her eyes off Andy, and the room filled with the sound of all of them at once: laughter, and the clatter of plates, and the strange, unmistakable harmony of a family stretching itself to fit a whole new world.

For the rest of the lunch, they talked. About logistics, about names, about whether or not the babies would visit in the summer and who would get first dibs on holidays. Andy's father, at one point, suggested that if Andy was going to keep adding to the family tree, he might as well plant an orchard out back and get it over with. Andy's mother made plans to visit “wherever you end up", and Laura, her head full of dreams and possibilities, promised to make it happen. At the end, they all stood in the kitchen, together, four hands on the same bowl of pie, serving each other like it was any other day.