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My mouth curls up on the right as I continue staring. He uses one hand to secure Charley and the other to drag the nearest rocking chair beside mine before he sits with a loud sigh.
“Penny’s got the hiccups again,” I announce, and he laughs softly.
We rock in silence along with the bustling NICU soundtrack. The nurse brings us a set of bottles and we attempt a feeding, but only Charley gets it right this time. She’s already got a few ounces on her sister, weighing in at almost four pounds. Penelope has been hovering just above the three-pound mark.
Tenley walks in a minute later, and I stifle my protest when she accidentally bumps into the back of my rocker with her belly while she asks about Penny’s progress.
“Ope, sorry,” she apologizes when I hiss quietly after the second time she knocks me forward.
“You’re fine,” I reply, reaching up to pat her baby bump. “Jake just wants to remind us he’s here, right?”
She laughs. “As if my blood sugar would let me forget.”
“Damn. You look like you’ve grown since the weekend, Ten,” Blake comments. But his expression falls when Tenley shoots him a dirty look. “You’re totally glowing, though.”
“It’s the gestational diabetes. And if I didn’t know you were so sleep deprived, I’d tell you to kiss my increasingly large ass, Blake,” Tenley grumbles. Then she turns to me. “Ready?”
I nod before unclipping my nursing bra, and Tenley guides me as we try and fail to get Penny to latch on for a nursing session. I clear my throat and look away, trying to hide my sniffling when Tenley finally takes the baby from my arms long enough for me to redress. I don’t have time for an emotional breakdown right now, I remind myself.
Blake reaches over and wordlessly strokes the back of my neck while I get myself together, then he stands and puts Charley on my chest, taking Penny for a quick snuggle before placing her beside her sister and covering the three of us with a blanket.
“I’ll see you at lunch,” he says, leaning down to kiss my temple before buttoning his shirt and vowing to return with a peace offering for Tenley.
She comes around to give each of the babies a loving squeeze before she follows him out, but she says she’ll be back soon to help with the next feeding. She manages to walk away without adding yet another apology for convincing me to participate in our joint baby shower and not noticing I’d gone into preterm labor until it was almost too late. She’s been beating herself up over the situation for the past couple of weeks, despite my reassurances. Not only had I previously ignored doctor’s orders on numerous occasions, but I hadn’t even realized I’d been having contractions, and I was the one having them. And she seems to have completely forgotten how many times Dr. Rowan proclaimed that if it weren’t for Tenley and Dr. Simms’s quick actions, the twins and I might not have survived.
I sigh as I lean back in the chair, closing my eyes and trying to ignore the way my brain wants to replay the traumatic events of that evening. It’s better to live in the here and now, with my babies out and mostly safe, slowly but surely growing bigger and healthier each day. Except that it feels like we’ll never make it out of the here and now.
I drift off and end up napping until Tenley’s return. We change the girls’ diapers and repeat the feeding process, except this time I get Charley to nurse for a few minutes while Tenley struggles with Penny to take her bottle. Eventually, Tenley gives up on the bottle and squeezes a couple of drops of milk into Penny’s tiny mouth, and Penny smacks her lips. Then Tenley immediately puts Pen on one breast as Charley continues nursing on the other, and I bite my lip to keep myself from crying out when my uterus contracts.
“The pain is a good sign, I promise. It’s natural,” Tenley reassures me. But I think this hurts more than the actual labor did. “Look—she’s getting it!”
I glance down to find that Tenley’s right. Penny finally latches and proceeds to gulp awkwardly.
“You’re doing it, Lo,” Tenley announces proudly, her eyes shining. “You’re such a baddie.”
“Thank you,” I whisper, trying to turn my grimace into a smile. Then one of the nurses comes around to take a picture of our first successful tandem nursing session, even though Tenley’s still technically assisting by holding Penny in place.
Blake walks in just then, and he grins and leans down to kiss me, repeating the same congratulations. Penny chokes a second later, and Blake takes her away to burp her, but the staff all declare it a major victory. I decide to play along, mostly because I’m afraid of what might happen if I give myself the chance to feel anything right now.
Once the girls are nice and milk-drunk, we place them in their incubators for a nap. Tenley goes back to work, waddling away with her new bag of sugar-free cinnamon candy in hand, and Blake and I go down to the cafeteria together.
We fill our plates and sit at a table, automatically swapping out some of the food on our trays and digging in. Blake adds more of his French fries to my stash once he sees how ravenous I am. Though I’m not producing as much milk as we hoped, working as a dairy cow has kept me just as hungry as being a double incubator did.
After lunch, he leads me back to the NICU, where we repeat the same scrupulous hand-washing routine for what seems like the millionth time. Landry is already there, talking to one of the nurses. He praises us for getting Penny to nurse today while Blake picks her up. I reach over and unbutton his shirt for their skin-to-skin contact, and his eyes lock onto mine for a few seconds when my fingers brush his bare chest. I look away quickly when my stomach flutters.
Landry helps me settle in with Charley before he leaves for an interview with a local pediatrician’s office. Now that Mom’s finally doing well on her own, he’s decided to stick around Camellia to be closer to the girls.
Blake stays through the next feeding, but Penny’s still tired from her big accomplishment, and we have trouble waking her to take a bottle. Meanwhile, Charley gobbles hers down in no time and has a little left boob for dessert, and the nurse tells me she’s probably starting a cluster-feeding cycle. I know I’ve heard it before, but my brain still isn’t functioning properly so I just nod and resolve to look it up in one of the baby books when we get home. Blake must sense my confusion, and he leans over to whisper that newborns often go on a feeding spree before they have a growth spurt. I sigh, because my nipples are already sore.
After another changing, Blake gets ready for a couple more hours at work. “I guess I’ll make a quick stop at football practice this afternoon, if you’re okay with that.” He forces a smile, but it’s overshadowed by the set of under-eye circles he’s sporting, which are only slightly lighter than mine. He’s still just as handsome, though, as most of the nurses like to remind me when he’s not around. I reassure him that we’ll be fine until he returns.
We’re lucky that Camellia’s hospital is the best in the area, despite the rural location. I can’t imagine how we’d be getting on without the small NICU unit in our hometown.
Nothing changes for the rest of the day, except that Charley has transformed into a greedy piglet. Tenley stops by for another visit and uses her magic touch to get Penny to eat again. She also explains that Charley’s cluster-feeding cycle is another good sign but adds a caveat about preparing myself in case Charley’s ready to go home without her sister.
Blake comes back with Reese’s pumpkins and an iced coffee, and Tenley groans before announcing that she’s going home to demand a foot rub from JD. It looks like her feet are barely fitting in her sneakers at this point.
I nearly devour the whole bag of peanut butter pumpkins while he leans back and rests both girls on his broad chest. I didn’t think my favorite candy would be out this early, but I shouldn’t be surprised that he’s managed to find it for me.
