“It wasn’t until after I heard confirmation from the doctor that our baby did in fact look healthy and well, until after I wiped the gel off my stomach and pulled my shirt back down — until I got outside even, on the way to our car — that it really sunk in. I was having a ****. I am having a ****.”

“There were good reasons we hadn’t started trying. But the bigger reason, which came out right there in a flood on cobblestones in the French Quarter, was that Simone wanted me to carry her baby, and that was maybe going to be impossible to achieve.”