Twenty-four
Natasha
The past six months had been very good to me. My vitamin levels had been a concern throughout the entire pregnancy, but my prenatals were stabilizing them. I was a bit anemic, which concerned Dr. Bernhardt, so I tacked on an iron supplement on top of everything else. I was on required bedrest still, even though my two babies were growing big and strong. One of the babies still had a slower heart rate than the other, and Dr. Bernhardt wasn’t willing to take any chances.
And I couldn't blame him, because I wasn’t either.
My stomach was massive. Bigger than I ever thought it could get. I was propped up in bed eating ice cream straight from the container and the thing rested easily on top of my stomach. I had been craving cheesecake ice cream. I salivated over it whenever Carter came home with a container. I would dream about it at night and wake up wanting some. So much so that I would wake him up so he could go get me some from the freezer.
Which was how we ended up with a mini-freezer by my bed in our bedroom.
The kids had taken the news well. As well as could be expected, anyway. Nathaniel was very excited to have more siblings and Joshua was happy to no longer be the middle child. He kept saying he wanted to have a little brother like his big brother did that he could protect.
But Clara was a different story.
She didn’t take the news as well as we thought she would.
In fact, she had burst into tears and ran away from the table.
Carter had gone after her to try and calm her down, but she had been in hysterics. Crying about how she wasn’t going to be Daddy’s little girl anymore. It broke my heart to see her so distraught over it. Clara and my relationship was never the same after that night.
“She’ll come around, honey. I promise.”
Those were the words Carter kept telling me every time Clara went out of her way to avoid me. She wouldn't let me dress her or put her down for bed. I couldn't make her plate for dinner or pour her drinks. I had to sit away from her in the SUV, which ended up devolving into driving a separate car altogether when we went to go do things.
She was now pushing for me to not go at all, and it broke my heart.
I rubbed my stomach as the spoon hung from my mouth. Carter was having a late night at work so the nanny was downstairs trying to wrangle the kids for dinner. I knew she needed help. I could hear the exasperation in her voice. But I knew everyone would be upset with me if I went downstairs and tried to intervene.
Including Clara.
I distracted myself with the television Carter had mounted to the wall just for me. There were movies loaded onto it and thousands of channels worth of cable for me to flick through. I had binge-watched every police procedural, medical drama, and court television show since the nineties. I had lines of movies memorized that played over and over again on certain channels. I had a massive journal of recipes I had written down from the cooking channel. Hell, I was ready to start smashing walls in the house and redecorating after days of watching the Home & Garden Channel!
But a small pair of footsteps coming down the hallway caught my attention.
“Hello?” I asked. “That you, Joshua?”
The door to the room slowly slid open and revealed Clara standing at the doorway. I was shocked she was there, but my heart reached out for her. Was she okay? Was something wrong with the nanny? Had something happened to one of the boys?
“Come in?” Clara asked.
“Of course you can, sweetheart. Come here,” I said.
I held my arms out for her and she got a running start. She jumped up onto the bed and crawled quickly towards me. She threw herself at me and straddled my stomach and I wrapped my arms around her tightly.
I could feel her crying into my neck as I choked my own tears back.
“What’s wrong, sweetheart?” I asked.
But all she did was continue to cry.
I held her as close as I could get her. I pressed kiss after kiss into the mess of hair on her head. The nanny poked her head in and held her arms out, but I shook my head and shooed her away.
I hadn’t held Clara in my arms for months. And if this was the only time I was going to get, then I wasn’t going to hold her to a bedtime.
Her sobs quieted down as I rubbed her back rhythmically. Her shoulders were shaking and she was drawing in shaky breaths, but her tears were running dry. I scooted her closer to my body, trying to get her weight off my stomach so I could hold her more comfortably.
Then she slid off to the side and landed in the crook of my arm.
“Would you like some ice cream?” I asked.
“No,” Clara said.
“Do you wanna watch a movie?”
“No.”
“Do you want to talk?”
I watched her nod her head ‘yes’ and my heart began to flutter with hope.
“What would you like to talk about?” I asked.
“Will you love them more?”
I furrowed my brow as I sank down into the covers.
“Love who more?” I asked.
“Them,” Clara said.
She rested her hand on my stomach as my eyes filled with tears.
“Why in the world would you think that?” I asked.
“Because they’re inside your belly.”
“That doesn't mean I would love them more than you, sweetheart.”
“But you didn’t grow us.”
“That doesn’t matter,” I said.
“It doesn’t?”
“No. There are children all around the world who are adopted all the time, and they are loved just as much as children that other families grow,” I said.
“I’m adopted?” Clara asked.
“No, sweetheart. It was just a comparison. Just because I didn’t grow you in my tummy doesn’t mean you are somehow less to me. In my eyes, you are my child. You and Joshua and Nathaniel. And the two inside of me? They’re going to be part of our family soon. And I’ll love them just as much as I love you. But not more. Never more.”
I watched Clara process what I’d said to her before her eyes rose to mine.
“Do you love Daddy?”
The question caught me off guard as I cocked my head.
“Why do you ask?”
“Daddy says people who love each other get married and have babies. But you only have babies,” she said.
“Are you asking me if I want to marry your father?” I asked.
“Only if you love him,” Clara said.
There was a part of me that wished we were getting married. I’d always envisioned being married one day. Having a family and my own career and good man at my side. But I hadn’t given it much thought since things were taken care of. Carter had taken me on financially without question and didn’t hesitate to provide the things I needed. New maternity clothes as I got bigger and medical expenses that were necessary for our appointments. Compression socks to keep my feet from swelling and random food runs when I was craving things.
He had been incredible, and the last thing I wanted to do was bring up some stupid thing like getting married before these kids got here. It was a societal standard thrust upon women who wanted to paint themselves as ‘right’ or ‘innocent’ or ‘ladylike’.
Too much had been going on to give it any thought.
But how was I supposed to boil all of that down to a four-year old?
“I do love your father,” I said. “But sometimes, things don’t always happen in order.”
“Do you wanna be married?” Clara asked.
“I always saw myself as a married woman, yes. But that doesn’t mean it has to happen. I care about your father. A lot. And I know he cares about me. We’re going to be one big happy family with all the love in the world to give one another. And for now? That’s enough.”
“If you get married, can I have a pretty dress?” Clara asked.
I giggled as I pulled her tightly into my side.
“Yes. You can have the prettiest dress ever,” I said.
For the first time in almost four months, Clara nuzzled into me. Like she used to before all of this happened. I watched her eyes close as I kissed her forehead, then soon after her small snores were heard coming from her lips. That had been her fear all this time. That I would somehow love my own children more than them. That she would become the modern-day version of some Cinderella fairy tale and be stuck with a woman that didn’t care about her at all.
It broke my heart to think she had been walking around with that for so long.
I laid down next to Clara and closed my eyes. The rising and falling of her chest lulled me to sleep. I nuzzled my nose into her hair and breathed in her scent, memorizing the uniqueness of her before I slipped into a peaceful slumber.
And when I woke up with her in my arms and Carter wrapped around my body, my heart soared. His strong body was pressed into my back and his arm was wrapped as far around my stomach as he could get. His palm was splayed over my belly button, protecting our unborn children even while he slept. Clara’s lips were parted as she continued to sleep, her hair in her face and her eyes puffy from all the crying she had done last night.
I was encased between two of the most beautiful people on the planet.
I heard the pitter patter of small feet down the hallway before the door burst open. The boys launched themselves onto the bed, jumping and jostling the mattress. Carter groaned and Clara’s eyes flew open as a big smile crossed her cheeks. She got up with her brothers and started to bounce and I nuzzled closer into Carter’s warmth.
“Be careful, guys. Don’t jostle us too much. Natasha’s fragile right now,” he said.
“Nattie! Nattie! Nattie! Nattie!”
The kids were chanting my name and it caused laughter to fall from my lips. I turned my head back and caught Carter’s stare and watched as a grin spread across his cheeks. He leaned in and kissed me, softly and sensually as the kids jumped around us. They butt-slammed onto the bed and kicked their feet, then wiggled their way in between our bodies.
“I want a kiss!” Joshua said.
“Daddy! Wake up!” Clara said.
“Kissing’s gross,” Nathaniel said. “I’ll take a hug.”
“Good. Because I’m the best hugger,” I said.
This was the family I wanted. The wild, crazy, early morning family. Where the kids loved us enough to come jump on the bed and intimacy had to be stolen in every moment we were afforded. The insane family that piled more kids than adults into the car every weekend to drive out and cheer on ball teams and the family that had to scoot tables together in restaurants in order to eat out. The massive family that needed to add chairs to the dining room table in order to accommodate everything for Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners.
Married woman or not, this was the family I wanted.
Married woman or not, I was in this for the long haul.
Because as the kids settled between us and their hands started rubbing my stomach, I saw a light in their eyes I hadn’t seen before. I saw excitement and happiness and a positive anxiety about the change that was coming our way.
And the loving look in Carter’s eyes was one I would forever commit to memory.
“Good morning,” he said as a smile spread across his face.
“Good morning to you, too,” I said.