She takes Sia out of the car seat and I grab the baby bag from the trunk. I can’t help but reach for her feather-soft cheeks as we walk toward Chris and Claire’s front door. I wish I could touch those cheeks all day long.

Senia doesn’t bother knocking or ringing the doorbell; she just walks right in. Old habits die hard and Chris and Claire are family so it makes no sense to knock here. Besides, I work here and they’re all probably out in the backyard celebrating Jimi’s fourth birthday already. We’re a little late to the party today because Senia wouldn’t leave until Molly understood the concept of standard deviation. I’m glad someone in this family understands statistics.

I don’t know much about anything other than music, which is why, when I decided to quit touring, I expanded the small music studio I originally installed in this house — with Chris and Claire’s permission. We now record all our albums here in Cary, but when it’s time to tour, Chris and Jake take Will Rawlings in my place. I know Grandma would be proud to know that I never abandoned my family when they needed me.

Jake spots us first as we walk through the back doors out onto the patio. It’s a small party for a few family and friends, so I should have no problems executing my plans for later today. I just need to make sure Chris and Claire do their part.

“Hey, man,” Jake says, giving me a one-armed bro-hug.

Rachel kisses both Senia and I on the cheek, then she gazes longingly at Sia. “Can I hold her?”

“Of course,” Senia replies as she hands over my precious girl.

Rachel wanted to wait until the touring slowed down before she and Jake had kids. They were all set to start trying for a baby next year, until Rachel developed PCOS – polycystic ovarian syndrome. Now, she’s not sure she wants to take the risk of having a miscarriage. I’ve tried to get Senia to talk to her about it, but Senia still has a little bit of a problem talking about the baby we lost. There’s something that happens when you lose a child, no matter what stage of their development. The experience definitely made us appreciate what Chris and Claire struggle with every day. I just hope that one day, the hole in Senia’s heart will close a little bit more. And I hope that Rachel and Jake will get the chance to feel what I feel every day with my Sia. Like a part of my soul that died a long time ago was reanimated, given a second chance.

Rachel and Senia wander off to deal with the kids and to show Sia off to all the other parents. Jake turns to me with a serious expression. “I got what you asked me to get,” he mutters out the side of his mouth. “It’s in the freezer.”

“Thanks, man.”

We set off to find Chris. I need to make sure he and Claire came through with their roles in today’s surprise. On the way to the kids’ play area, I’m stopped by Joel, Jackie’s new husband. He could be Jake’s dad with that lumberjack beard.

He claps me on the arm. “Where’s your wife and baby? We got something for the baby.”

“She’s not my wife, but she’s right over there,” I say, nodding toward the patio area where Claire, Rachel, and Senia are fawning over Sia.

“Well, you should get on that. Girls like her don’t come along but once in a blue moon.”

I sigh at this advice. Joel is a great guy, but he’s become quite comfortable with telling me I need to hurry up and get married. He doesn’t know that Senia is the one who has refused to marry me. I’ve asked her to marry me twice and both times she shot me down. The first time she told me she wanted to finish school before she started worrying about planning a wedding. I asked her again the day she graduated from UNC – I’m nothing if not completely compulsive and eager when it comes to Senia. She still turned me down. She didn’t want me to just ask her because “It was time.” She wanted me to ask her when the time was right. She said I’d know when that time came. And she was right – as she always is.

It seemed logical that I should ask her as soon as we found out she was pregnant last year, but I didn’t. I knew she wouldn’t want to look back on her wedding pictures and remember that she was two months’ or six months’ pregnant. I knew she would want to wait. So I’ve waited patiently for the past ten months, biding my time and making my plans. I don’t know what she’s going to say, but I hope to God that I’ve planned it right this time.

After the birthday cake is cut, I walk inside the house to begin putting the plan in motion. If everything is going as planned out there, Claire should be offering to take Sia while Senia goes to look for me. I can just imagine Senia’s face when Claire tells her that we’re going to play hide-and-seek.

I open the freezer and retrieve the surprise that Jake brought for us, then I reach into my pocket and retrieve the ring that Chris just handed to me behind the bouncer. Now, I just have to get to my hiding place before Senia gets there.

Once I’m settled into the darkness of my hiding spot, I close my eyes, trying to keep calm, as I wait for her. She’s going to say yes. She has to.

She’d better say yes or I’m going to ravage her tonight. She’d like that.

The door handle turns and the sound of Senia’s laughter is like music to my ears. A crack of light appears, just enough for me to see my surroundings and I quickly rise from the bench and turn on the light switch. Senia opens the door all the way and shakes her head when she sees me standing in the steam room, holding a bowl of frozen yogurt, with a ring sitting on top like a three-carat cherry on the life we’ve built.

She presses her lips together as I take her hand and pull her into the steam room. “Yes,” she says with a nod. “Just … yes.”

I scoop the ring out of the yogurt and she smiles as I lick it clean then I slide it onto her finger. I plant a soft kiss on the back of her hand, then I kiss her madly.

“If you didn’t say yes this time,” I whisper in her ear, “I was going to break out the whips tonight.”

“In that case, no.”

I kiss her again and a million thoughts race through my mind, but the one that stands out amongst them all is this: You can’t let your past define your future. Once you get that figured out, you begin to understand the joy of living in the present. And the present is full of tiny gifts that we can only see when we stop looking behind and ahead of us. Sometimes, these gifts land right at our feet. Sometimes, it’s our feet that carry us toward them, running at full-speed until our hearts nearly give out. Either way, never stop noticing them, and never stop wishing.