It wasn’t in your five year plan to have a baby with some girl you met in a bar, nor was it in your regime to get married at twenty-three because of your girlfriends yet-to-be-born baby girl.

And yet…

An array of pictures skewed about your cheap, crappy two-bedroom, one-bathroom apartment told the story of you and Natalie; peroxide blonde rebellion and a contrasting gentleness collided six months into dating and suddenly a baby was thrown into the mixing pot.

Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad.

Paths had been crossed over two glasses of smooth whiskey when Nat was wallowing in her post-crash rot and bitterness, and you drinking away a torrid breakup. Bad combo, right?

Wrong.

You’d hit it off. Dry comments and sarcastic wit flying through the smokey air until you were stumbling into her apartment together.

Dating Natalie was nice. She wasn’t into big romantic gestures, and she’s not particularly interested in big dates or expensive gifts. It was quiet. Calm, almost; except on the days where her time in the Wilderness came back to haunt her.

Moments like that were frequent, but never without you there as a supporting pillar. A good man in a storm. Nat didn’t spare you details—she didn’t tell you anything at all other than “The plane fuckin’ crashed, we got stranded for two years,” and you accepted that answer.

Her proposal to you—if you could call it that—was impulsive and unbothered. “We could just get married. It’s just some papers to sign.” You’d accepted, seeing as if you were to keep the baby together, you might as well be married.

So in your best white dress and her nicest black button-down at city hall, the words ‘I do’ spewed from rushed mouths and signatures scribbled quickly against paper. Legally married.

And now, weeks later; you were here. Crappy 2-bed-1-bath apartment. Married. Pregnant. Cautiously content, and gentle in your happiness. Nat wasn’t particularly doting, but if you asked her for something, she’d run an errand or help you without complaint. She did love you after all.