AllFreeNovel
Share Us
They said he was huge, but he looked tiny to me.
He had a cute little button nose that reminded me of Shan, and puffy swollen lips just like the rest of us.
Mam’s lips.
We all had them.
All six of us.
His fingers were freakishly long to match the rest of him, but Jesus did he have his mother’s looks.
Honestly, I’d never seen a more beautiful baby in all my eighteen years on earth.
A little while later a nurse came in to check on the line in Molloy’s arm and to replace the bag of fluid on her drip.
“Is she okay?” I asked, instantly on edge as I watched the nurse like a hawk. “She’s been asleep for a long time.”
“She’s fine,” the nurse replied with such certainty that it put me at ease. “Poor mite is exhausted.” Turning to look at me, she offered me a sympathetic smile. “How’s baby taking his feeds for you, Dad?”
“He took two ounces in theater, and another two down in the recovery room, and he’s after taking another three ounces now,” I told her, gesturing to the half-empty bottle resting on the arm of the chair. “I don’t know if I should give him any more formula until his mam wakes up.” Feeling helpless, I shrugged before saying, “She mentioned something a while back about wanting to breastfeed.”
She gave me a sympathetic smile before asking, “Any dirty nappies?”
“Yeah, he’s been wet and dirty.”
“Fantastic.”
“He had the, uh, the black poo. You know the first one they have?”
“Meconium.”
“That’s the name of it.”
She gave me this strange smile. “Younger siblings?”
I nodded.
“How many?”
“Four.”
“Uh-huh.” Her smile deepened. “We could tell.”
My brow furrowed. “We?”
“All of the nurses on the ward.” She smiled again. “It’s not often we see young boys on this ward taking to fatherhood like you.”
“Oh.”
I wasn’t taking to anything.
I was fucking petrified.
But I was determined.
To be present.
To do right by this boy and his mother.
