Stuck Like Glue

When they finally allowed us to hold her for the first time, Jack cried. I remember him looking up at me, those eyes shimmering with happiness as he quickly turned his gaze back to her. I knew what he was thinking, that if he looked away for longer than a second, they would whisk her away. But here she was, lying in Jack’s arms, snoozing away. We’d held her before, sure, but she wasn’t ours. She wasn’t our daughter then. The paperwork had finally been sorted out, and they had finally said that we could take her home.

“Alex, she’s perfect,” he sniffled. I leaned in and kissed his forehead.

“Yeah, she is.”

Jack gently shifted her into my arms and my heart stopped. The world slowed down. Nothing mattered but me and this little pink bundle.

“You’re free to take her home any time now. We’ll be calling to set up a time to come by and see how she’s developing and how things are working out,” the agent, a thin woman with severe brown eyes and a high blonde ponytail said. Her name was Rita Collins and she was the reason that there was a little girl in my life. Jack and I used to lie awake at night, holding onto each other, and pray that our application wasn’t denied because we were gay. But because of Mrs. Collins, we had our baby girl and no one was gonna take her away from us now.

“Let’s go home, Jocelyn,” I whispered and kissed the sleeping infant on the forehead. She was so soft, and breakable.

“You’re gonna have to put her in the car seat now,” Jack informed me.

“Shut up, I’m holding my daughter,” I replied, looking up at him. He grinned, pecked me on the lips and then eased the bundle from my arms. I watched as he buckled her into the seat and turned to Rita.

“Thank you. You have no idea how much this means to us,” he said. She smiled, her severe face softening as she looked in on our little family coming together.