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“Our decision,” she reminded him.
“Yes. Ours.” Their futures were now intertwined. Whatever path they took forward, they’d be taking it together. “We should pray about it, though.”
Holding hands, they each took turns praying about the situation with Skylar, asking for comfort for her, and wisdom for them as they took on this new responsibility. They also prayed for peace for everyone involved.
“You know I’ll support you whatever you decide,” Blake said when they finished praying. “There is one other thing you might want to think about, though.”
Charli’s brow furrowed as her hands gripped his more tightly. “What’s that?”
“It might be better for us to go through the adoption process as a married couple.” He paused. “Which means we’d have to get married sooner rather than later.”
She appeared to consider that for a moment. “Would that be a problem?”
“Only because I don’t want to deprive you of the wedding you’ve always wanted to have,” he said, recalling the times she’d talked to him about the wedding she wanted, which had been a lot like Kayleigh and Hudson’s. “We wouldn’t have much time to plan anything like what you wanted.”
After sitting quietly for a moment, Charli said, “I don’t want a big wedding anymore. We have more important things to spend our money on. Unfortunately, I think the girls have pretty high expectations.”
Blake chuckled. “Yeah. They do.”
“But I think we could make it work. We can still make it special, even if it’s not very elaborate.”
“Yeah. I think we can.”
With the decision made, their conversation immediately turned to future plans. Including a wedding and a new baby. They were each going to jump from small families of two to a combined family of five.
The girls were going to lose their minds over the news that they were expanding their family even more.
“One thing I will insist on with Skylar is that she tell our parents. She’s going to need them after she has the baby. And I don’t want to have to lie to them because they’ll want all the details once they hear we’re adopting.”
“And your siblings? I can’t imagine Janessa, Jay, or Gareth letting you get away without telling them everything.”
“Thankfully, not having a lot of details about the parents giving a baby up for adoption isn’t uncommon. We’ll just tell them the truth. We were approached about adopting a baby from a woman who wasn’t able to keep it and after praying, we decided to say yes.”
By the time they left to pick up the girls, they had a plan for getting married. It would confuse most people, but as long as Skylar told their parents about her pregnancy and her request of Blake and Charli, they would understand why they were having a quick and scaled back wedding, and that was the most important thing.
~*~
Charli looked at herself in the mirror, and for one brief moment, her heart longed for the wedding dress of her young self’s dreams. Instead, she wore a cream-colored dress that she’d found on Amazon. Bought from there, because of two-day shipping.
It had a fitted lace bodice and long lace sleeves with a flared satin skirt that reached mid calf. It wasn’t ugly, and it looked wedding-ish.
The dress and the wedding ceremony were a part of a means to an end. Not just the adoption, but also the marriage. They represented the two things she’d always wanted to be. A wife and a mother. And not just a wife and mother, but a wife to Blake and a mom to two beautiful girls and a yet unknown baby.
So sacrificing a fancy dress and an expensive wedding in order to gain so much didn’t really feel all that much like a sacrifice after all.
“No regrets?” her mom asked as she joined her at the mirror.
It was just the two of them in her mom and dad’s room, so they could speak freely.
“I know you wanted a wedding more like Kayleigh’s,” she added.
“That’s true,” Charli said. “Once upon a time. However, I’ve discovered I want the marriage and the family more than the wedding. So, no. I have no regrets.”
“Thank you for doing this for Skylar,” her mom said, her gaze shiny with unshed tears. “Your dad and I will do what we can to help you and Blake.”
Skylar had waited until the day after Christmas, right before she planned to go back to college, to tell their parents about what had happened. As expected, Skylar’s news had gone over as well as Charli’s had twelve years earlier.
Charli still wasn’t sure if her parents blamed her for being a bad influence on Skylar, and she didn’t plan to ask. However, she did wonder if Skylar seeing the obvious proof of the decisions Charli and Jay had made when it came to the physical aspects of their relationships had made it easier for her to make that decision with Aiden.
