A Promise For The Twins. Melissa Senate

She could not, it turned out, “do it all”—at once.

      “Ba ba!” Morgan gurgled at his brother and threw his own chew toy on the ground.

      Brooke’s heart melted at Morgan’s thrilled, gummy grin and snatched up the toy; those happy faces of her boys never failed to ground her. Yes, she was stretched to the limit. But look at what she had. These two little dumplings: heathy, adorable babies. Before they were born, Brooke didn’t have a relative left in the world. Now she had two precious children. Life was good. A challenge, but good.

      “Didja hear the news?” the barista was saying to the woman in front of her. Brooke was next in line and could not wait to be sipping her iced coffee, back out in the gorgeous sunshine. She planned to take Mikey and Morgan to the park, spread out a blanket, and she and the twins could watch their favorite nature show: two squirrels chasing each other up and down a particular tree with huge green leaves. Then she’d take them home for their nap and develop a plan to bring in more business. Of course, she’d lost out on potential clients, even when she’d had a part-time nanny—single motherhood made things that much harder on a new parent—so she had no idea how she thought she’d bring in new business with no childcare. The good news was that her industry—weddings—was big business in Wedlock Creek.

      Despite being a small Wyoming town, Wedlock Creek was famous for its century-old wedding chapel, which came with a beautiful legend: couples who married there would be blessed with multiples. Some scoffed at the legend but there were multiples—twins, triplets, quadruplets and even two sets of quintuplets—all over town, so there had to be something to the legend, or just something in the water.

      Weddings, particularly at the chapel for those who wanted many babies at once, were the name of the game here. There were five wedding planners in town, including two newbies who didn’t scare Brooke the way the two other established ones did. But none of her competition was trying to keep their beloved late grandmother’s twenty-seven-year-old business, Dream Weddings, going. Brooke was. And she couldn’t let her grandmother down. No husband, no nanny and very busy little twins aside.

      “The Satler sisters are engaged!” the barista exclaimed, handing the woman in front of Brooke her change. “Isn’t that incredible?”

      Brooke’s ears perked right up. The Satler triplets had gotten engaged?

      When the woman moved to the pick-up area, Brooke rushed herself and the stroller to the counter.

      “Did you just say the Satler triplets got engaged last night?” Brooke asked the barista. “All three of them?”

      “Yup, it’s true!” the barista said. “And I hear they want a triple ceremony and a lavish reception.”

      Brooke’s eyes widened, her mind whirling. A triple wedding. She would estimate the guest list at five hundred. Maybe 550.

      “Isn’t that wonderful?” the barista cooed. “All three engaged on the same night, at the same time, in different locations. The boyfriends planned the whole thing. So sweet and romantic!”

      “So romantic!” Brooke agreed, turning the stroller around and heading for the door. Forget the iced coffee that she could also make for free at home. She had a triple wedding to secure! She rushed the two blocks back to her house, with her mind hard at work.

      “Ba ga ba!” Mikey gurgled as Brooke pushed the stroller up the walkway to her front door.

      She paused and bit her lip. The boys would miss the squirrels. They loved watching those furry critters chase each other. “I promise to take you to see Lenny and Squiggy later,” she told them, opening the front door and wheeling the stroller through.

      The names she’d given the squirrels were a necessary reminder of her grandmother, who used to laugh her head off while binge-watching episodes of her favorite old show, Laverne & Shirley. Lenny and Squiggy were two goofballs, just like the squirrels. And for her grandmother’s legacy, Brooke would focus right now on Dream Weddings.

      She took the twins from their stroller, and with one in each arm, headed into the Dream Weddings office, off the hallway. Her grandmother had turned a first-floor bedroom into an office and installed a door to the outside, with a porch, a hand-painted white wooden sign hanging from ornate iron scrolls, and lush satin white drapery in the bay window that was reminiscent of a gorgeous wedding gown.

      With the twins in their baby swings beside the desk, she sat and turned on her laptop and created a Dream Weddings possibilities file for her prospective triplet clients. She talked through her ideas to Mikey and Morgan, two sets of big blue-green-hazel eyes hanging on her every word. Mikey got fussy, but a brisk walk around the office, with a back rub and extra-animated talk of pretty flowers and the best bands in the county, calmed him right down.

      Forty minutes later, she finished her proposal, forcing herself to wait until the acceptable-to-call hour of 9:00 a.m., and then she phoned Suzannah Satler, the one triplet she knew from the knitting class she’d taken right before the twins were born. Brooke offered congratulations and her services as owner of Dream Weddings, “a full-service wedding planning company, right here in Wedlock Creek.” Because of that knitting class and how open and chatty Suzannah had been, Brooke knew quite a bit about the Satler triplets—that they loved country music, the color hot pink and all things glam. Brooke was able to excite Suzannah over the phone in one carefully crafted sentence.

      The Satler sisters were due at Dream Weddings at 10:00 a.m. to discuss. Yes, yes, yes!

      “I’m back!” she trilled to Morgan and Mikey, waving her hands in the air like a lunatic. Or just like a very excited wedding planner who had to sign the Satler sisters.

      She plucked the twins from their swings, put them in their baby seats and carried them upstairs. She changed their diapers, then settled them against her on the glider chair for a made-up story about their favorite squirrels. Their little eyes drooping, Brooke carefully transferred each back into his baby seat, praying they wouldn’t wake up.

      Yes, success! With an eye on the time, she brought the carriers into her bedroom, set them on the floor and opened her closet door. Thank heavens she’d showered this morning. At 4:50 a.m., she’d taken a fast, hot shower, with the baby monitor on the sink, since the twins woke at five o’clock and, if she wanted to shower in peace, she had to do it very, very early. She looked through her closet, nodding at her elegant white pantsuit. Very Satler sisters. She took off her T-shirt and shorts and put on the pretty outfit, adding a watercolor-patterned silk scarf and three-inch peep-toe red fabric heels, which were also very Satler sisters. A quick application of pressed powder, mascara, and lipstick, ponytail off and hair fluffed, a dab of Chanel No. 19, and voilà—the harried single mother turned into the sign-with-me businesswoman. She stared at herself in the mirror, almost amazed at the transformation.

      Carrying a baby seat in each hand, she headed back downstairs, on heels she wasn’t used to anymore, and went into her office. She gently placed the baby seats under the big ornate desk; its backing completely obscured them from view of the sofa, where her clients would sit.

      Also under the desk was a complete stash of baby paraphernalia: diapers, bottles, pacifiers, chew toys, burp cloths and an extra set of pajamas. A single mother without childcare for the time being had to be at the ready.

      Brooke had timed the appointment for the twins’ usual midmorning naptime, and if things went her way, she would have forty-five minutes to an hour and a half of blessed silence to conduct business with the Satler sisters. Her former nanny, a wonderful, patient saint of a woman, had had to take four to five weeks off to help her daughter, the new mother of twin babies herself. That was two weeks ago. Brooke had had interview after interview with prospective nannies, but for one reason or another, none was right for the job.

      One applicant had reeked of marijuana. Another said she couldn’t stand the sound of crying, but “that’s what binkies were for, right?” A very loud talker insisted that Morgan and Mikey should be separated in the home to ensure independence from each other starting at the most tender of ages. And then there was the one great prospect,