a little surprise

Josie winced when she heard someone was asking for her at the coffee shop. She was in the back, going through supplies. It was a slow morning. Honestly, it did her good to focus on the list, than to think what she should be worrying about.

Willow mentioned something about how the nursery was going.  Sadly, there wasn't going to be one. Not at the moment.

Of course, she'd never seen someone with such a sunny smile, waiting to talk to her.

"Josie? Right?" The young woman put out a hand, then went in for a hug.

Josie was a tad uncomfortable. She only nodded.

"Well, I'm your husband's cousin's wife." She smiled.

"Charlie?" Josie slightly remembered Carson's girlfriend, but it was a while ago. Josie winced even more at the thought of someone thinking she was married.

"Oh, no..I'm not her." Her laugh was soft. "Brittany."

Well, the conversation was dead in the water. Now Josie really felt she'd put her foot in her mouth.

"Uh, let me get you some coffee."

At least Brittany didn't dwell on Charlie. Instead, she took out a notebook from her big tote.

"I'm here to find out when is a good time for a baby shower?" Brittany's smile was open.

"What?" Josie's eyes were so big. This really was a surprise.

"I know Halie would do it, and she'll help, but she just couldn't seem to get the ball rolling..so I thought I'd help, while I had a little time off." She bit a grin.

"Oh." Josie sighed. "Thanks." Josie guessed she better text Henry, because he needed to be in on this too.

Henry could hardly wait to surf the net with Josie when he got home that night. Of course, he created a registry for the baby at Target and Amazon.

He looked at Josie, a tad troubled at all the the baby gadgets.

"You aren't any better, than last time." He recalled how timid she'd been when he'd gone with her to all the department stores, during her first pregnancy. But he'd thought it had to do with all those dominate factors involved. Her father. Derrick. It was practically clash of the Titans back then(and didn't she even have a neglectful college boyfriend, even then). And yes, he'd even fantasied..waaay back then, wishing he'd said he was the father of that baby and had taken care of everything.

But that wasn't life then. Granted, he knew it would have been like stepping off a cliff with no bungy. But it was so different now. They were together and this was their baby.

"Don't go there." She sighed as if he couldn't bring that up. Not her past.

"Well, people, do want to get stuff for the baby." He knew his mother's family were already making phone calls, asking about the due date, and were they ever going to get married.

"I know." Even her Dad's new wife called a few days ago.

"OK, just click on it, for your wish list." He got her situated. There were several other department stores he'd readied for her to browse through.

"We should do this together." She didn't want to go crazy.

"Sure." He'd lead the way. Finally, they found a comfy place on the couch. They could have done this on the Android even, or the tablet, but here they were cuddled together with the laptop.

First, there were the cribs.

She looked up, as if she was trying to picture where it would go.

"Remember, we won't be here forever." His Mom and Dad mentioned of a place on their street that was for rent. Still, he wasn't sure they could afford it. Of course, there was that matter of getting married. He knew the houses where his parents lived were a lot more expensive than where his brother and wife lived, in the older part of town.

But there had been an incident, recently. The police killed a guy when they were trying to arrest him. Still, he didn't think Josie knew about it. Rarely, anything bad happened in Old Towne.

"Are you sure, you're OK? Are you really..." He didn't know if he had a right to ask. "Happy?"

She slightly scowled. As if he really shouldn't have asked.

"You know, what I mean. I mean, I want you to pick out something you want, not what I just want." He meant the crib. He clicked on different colors.

"I'm..I'm fine. I guess, I..I don't know what to expect." She sighed. "I know, its different this time. And I don't want to be overwhelmed. But, is..is it, all too much?"

"What?" He smiled. "I know we'll never win the lottery. And I don't think we'd want that. But, we can do this. And who knows, maybe by end of summer we'll get married. If..if you want too."

She nodded.

He told her how his mom and dad wanted them to move to a bigger place.

"But, we could be here for a few months. You know, it doesn't have to be tomorrow." He looked back to see she'd clicked on a white crib.

"That's the one I wanted, too." He kissed her then as if it would all work out. She smiled as if she was ready to take this one step at time with him.