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We’d gone more ‘home and country’ rather than modern.
We wanted our house to be warm and inviting, and our contractor accomplished that to a T.
When I breached the door to the kitchen, I found Michal standing at the fridge with his head stuck in it.
“We don’t have any food in there,” I muttered. “What do you think you’re going to find?”
He backed out of the fridge with turkey, cheese, mustard, pickles, lettuce, tomatoes, and mayo, causing my brows to shoot up to my hairline.
“Where’d that come from?” I asked in surprise.
He shrugged.
“If I had to guess, your parents or mine. Whatever, I don’t care. I’m just glad there’s food. I can’t believe you expected me to live on so little,” he muttered.
He was right.
The food we’d had catered had ran out because I hadn’t prepared for the sheer amount of food that all of Michael’s friends would eat.
Turns out, muscles required about twice the protein of a normal full grown adult.
Who knew?
“Make me one?” I asked, pouting my lip for added bonus.
He gave me a look that clearly said, ‘What do you take me as?’
So I raised my hands up in a placating gesture and walked around the counter.
“Love you, Mikey Mike,” I said before kissing his cheek and patting his ass.
He tossed me another look before kissing my upturned lips.
“Why do you insist on calling me that all of a sudden?” He asked with amusement.
I shrugged and circled the counter once again to leave the room.
“I could call you hubby now, I guess,” I said just as I was leaving the room.
“That’s not any better!” He yelled at my back.
I snickered as I made my way around the house, checking to see if everything I wanted was up to par.
It was.
The furniture had been delivered while we were getting married, and while the rest of us were celebrating at the reception, my sisters came over here and made the beds, and I assumed brought over a few staples for us.
God, I loved them.
Especially when I crossed the threshold of our room and saw the bed already made, ready for my tired body to crawl into it.
Which was what I did.
Falling asleep nearly instantaneously.***Michael
“Nikki,” I said, looking around the room for my wife. “Here’s your sandwich….”
I trailed off as I spotted her curled up around a pillow.
She had half the comforter covering her, seeing as she was laying on it, causing me to smile.
Guess I’d be sleeping with the sheet tonight.
Not that I hadn’t gotten used to it.
I loved sleeping with Nikki, although she did move a lot.
I’d had to sleep a few times during the day when she was gone, since I’d had a late shift, and I’d slept like crap.
Placing the sandwich on the nightstand, I went to the bathroom, stripped out of my police dress blues, and brushed my teeth.
Turning the light off, I walked slowly to the bed, relishing at the way the new carpet felt between my toes before I flipped off the lamp, tugged the cord at the ceiling fan, and plunged the room into darkness.
I crawled into bed carefully, as not to wake Nikki, though I shouldn’t have bothered.
Nothing woke Nikki anymore short of a freight train barreling down on us.
She slept anywhere.
In the car.
In my office chair.
Halfway through dinner.
It was actually quite endearing.
As I settled around her, curling her into my body as best as I could, I closed my eyes and said my prayers. A nightly ritual that I would repeat for the rest of my life.
Thank you God, for my wife and unborn child.Chapter 21The only kids I want are Sourpatch.
-Nikki during the throes of labor
Nikki
“Alright, Jasmine. When you feel the need to push, I want you to bear down, bring your knees up to your chest, and push down from your bottom. Almost like you’re doing number…” She held up her hand to stop me.
Jasmine nodded miserably. “I don’t know why you let me say no drugs. I like drugs.”
I smothered my smile and started laying out sheets.
My big ‘ol belly was in the way, but there was nothing I could do about that.
I’d been a married woman for a little over four months, and I was nine months pregnant.
Our little girl would be here very soon, and it was times like this, with other women giving birth to their own little miracles, that I started to feel envy for them.
I felt like I’d been pregnant for forever!
“I need to poop!” Jasmine yelled in alarm a few moments later.
I smothered another smile and moved closer to her on my stool.
“That’s the urge to push. Bare down,” I instructed.
She narrowed her eyes at me. “But what if I…”
She gestured with her hands.
I waved a dismissive hand. “Shit happens.”
She burst out laughing, but then, just as suddenly, she started to scream as she curled around her belly and gave it all she had.
My own stomach cramped right along with hers.
“Okay, one more push and the head should be delivered,” I told Jasmine. “Tony, do you want to come catch the baby?”
Tony shook his head frantically.
Like all first time fathers, he was a nervous wreck, and anything dealing with childbirth was a very scary ordeal to him.
“Alright, well it’s up to you, Jasmine. Show me what you got…”***Two hours later
“Pick up, pick up, pick up,” I chanted to my phone as I called Michael once I was leaving Jasmine and her newest addition.
You got my voicemail, leave a message.
“Fuck!” I said, walking quickly to my car before it happened again.
‘It’ being those regular pains that signaled that I, myself, was about to have my own baby.
I’d been having them on and off all day long, but it’d only been since Jasmine started to push that they began to become regular and consistent.
At least my water hadn’t broken yet.
Although, that wasn’t a good indication of progress. There were some women that went all the way up to delivery before their water broke.
My next call was to Doctor Mead, my OB/GYN.
Or his office, anyway.
Although I did have his home number, I’d play the good little in labor mom and call the office like everyone else was instructed to do once they were in labor.
