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POV: Zac
Word count: 2027
December 25, 2013
Casey and Robert had taken Alexander for us so we could finish, good lord she’d stayed at the mall literally like twelve hours, I was so tired that I was asleep long before Alexander even got wound down. Yet, we’d needed two days to wrap everything and it was a struggle to keep Alexander from ripping them open. We had gone down to visit Maddi and the crew the Friday before, it was the only time we could get down to give them their things and get ours. They were doing quite well now and that was good.
Alexander was not happy at the moment, I had to put his drum set up because with a newborn in the room and the other 2 it was just too much noise for us adults to bear but that meant nothing because while Sheppard and William didn’t care, Alexander did. He was presently standing at the bottom of the steps screaming because we wouldn’t bring it back.
“He’s supposed to only have melt downs when he doesn’t nap…” Casey said.
“You know Zac you can just bring it back…” Aaron said.
It was Emily who casually slapped the back of his head. “If he brings it back then that tells Alexander that all he has to do is stand there and scream. Do you honestly think that’s right?”
“She has a point Aaron. He’ll eventually calm down.” George said.
We finished cooking breakfast and Alexander wanted nothing to do with anything, in fact he slung the plate across the kitchen.
“Alexander James Walker! You know better than that.” Emily scolded.
I cleaned up the mess and made another plate but he just wouldn’t stop crying. Emily gave me a harsh look when I picked him up and took him out of the room and up-stairs, but I didn’t take him to where I had put his drum set, which was the bonus room here or future music room. Instead, I took him to his bedroom and closed the door, then sat down in the floor with him.
“Go ahead and just cry it out; we can’t play with our drum set right now. The baby has to sleep.”
He kept crying and I kept talking, eventually he stopped the screaming and crying, settled down enough to at least look at me. Emily was right, we couldn’t just give in but at the same time we couldn’t have him crying non-stop for hours either. I finally got him to come sit in my lap, where I wiped off his face and got the trail of snot off his face.
“I know you want to play but sometimes we can’t. Right now we got to be kind of quiet because the baby is sleeping.”
He looked at me and it felt like he understood, but I wasn’t sure if he totally did. I got the pictures of Emily when she was pregnant with him.
“We have to be quiet with the baby.”
He point to her. “Mama.”
“That’s right, that’s mama.” I moved his finger down to her belly, god she’d looked gorgeous that day.
“Baby.”
I turned the page to his newborn pictures. “Baby, Elijah needs to sleep right now. He’s very little.”
It seemed like he was trying to say something, but I didn’t understand any of it. But I sat there and showed him pictures of himself as a baby, pictures of us and when he was completely calm I went ahead and changed him. He laid right there looking at pictures of us as I changed him.
Emily had laid out a pair of blue jeans and a Christmas themes shirt with little trees and presents. By the time we made it back downstairs they were done eating and the men were in the living room finding a game and the women were in the kitchen, cliché and I wasn’t even going to comment because I know for a fact none of them would mind punching my arm and I also knew they could all hit hard.
Emily looked at me. “You did not take him up-stairs to play that set did you?”
“Nope. I took him to his room to let him cry it out and then we talked a bit. He wasn’t going to calm down here, so alone it is. If you’ll just dump his onto mine I’ll feed him from my plate.”
“Ok.” She said.
She reheated both of ours and we sat at the table and ate quietly, Taylor and Natalie arrived and Natalie gave me a weird look.
“You’re eating last? Taylor take a picture!”
“Haha, funny. I had to calm a one year old before we all had a meltdown.”
“Dear god, he’s already had a meltdown today? Zac it’s not even ten yet!” Taylor said.
“Go on Zac, tell them why.” Sophia said.
“I took away his set, between him, Sheppard and William poor Elijah couldn’t sleep and the rest of us couldn’t hear anything.”
“And he melted down over that?” Natalie said.
“Yep. Followed me whining, cried, then screamed and even slung his first plate across the kitchen. So, I took him up-stairs to calm down. He is by that set like River was his blanket.”
“Well, least you didn’t resort to violence.”
I glanced around the room. “I don’t have a death wish Tay.”
He smiled and Aaron and Zander helped him get the bags from the car and settle the kids, before long Isaac was here, followed by my parents, and then Casey who had Robert for a little bit before he had to go to his family. With so many kids’ here it was easier to distract Alexander but I quickly notice he didn’t seem to be jealous of the new babies, no matter which one of us was holding them, not even when Emily fed Elijah or when I had Viggo. Of course, that could change when the baby was always here. He knew these babies weren’t staying here.
It was just about 2 when Christopher stood up, I was confused on why even though we were all situation around talking, he clinked his glass and everyone eventually looked at him.
“Craig and I would like to share some news with everyone; I know that it may shock several.”
His brothers seemed to perk up, Emily already knew though so she just smiled. Yet, even my family was keen on the news.
“We decided that we did want children, being around the little ones here, some that aren’t quite so little anymore, and we determined we wanted to have that for ourselves. We have a surrogate and she called us this morning to tell us that the IVF worked and she’s pregnant, if that’s true then our son or daughter should be born in August.”
It took a few moments to let it sink in before the round of applause and congratulations swept the room. Yet Aaron looked at Emily. “You knew about this didn’t you?”
She smiled at him. “I met the surrogate, interrogated her before the procedure was done. Of course, I didn’t know if the IVF would work but apparently it did!”
Everyone seemed happy about it, made me feel good about sharing our news later. We did presents about 3, shortly after their news and Casey sat one to the side, which cause some to wonder but no one asked, I’d seen the tag earlier to little bean from Uncle Casey. We ate after we did presents and once everyone was back in the living room and it was cleared enough to move we resumed the talking, Emily was going to tell them, yet Alexander came to her about 5 and with his hands on her stomach he looked at her and the word was clear as day.
“Baby!” He yelled.
I blinked and she looked a little stunned herself. Everyone of course laughed, not realizing he was right, there was a baby there. I was shocked he had learned the word and that his first chosen spot was right now, like this.
“Mama, Baby!”
She looked a little stunned, not quite sure how he even picked the word up. Taylor nudged my arm.
“I think your son is giving you guys hints that he wants a sibling.” He smirked.
I turned and looked at him. “He won’t have to wait long.”
Taylor look shocked as hell and everyone turned to us, they were already looking because of what Alexander was doing.
“Emily? Zac?” Mom asked.
“We were going to do this whole stand up and clink our glasses but I guess Alexander didn’t want that.” I said.
“I’m due the end of June.” Emily said.
“I was only kidding.” Taylor mocked shock!
“We’re not.”
“God it’s about time! I’ve been dying to hand this box to you.”
Casey sat the box in her lap and Alexander helped tear the paper off the box. Inside was another blanket exactly like Alexander’s tiger cub one, this one however was accompanies by sheets and on top was a little stuffed bean with a face.
“Little bean may stick as a nickname.” He said.
“Where did you find that?”
“Disney.” He said.
I felt the hard punch and turned to Taylor. “What the frick man? That hurt.”
Yeah, I knew my parents and way too many kids were present for bad words.
“Disney? He’s known since Disney? Which means you knew!”
“We found out the 1st of November, but I wasn’t very far along.” Emily said.
“He knew since Disney!” He repeated.
“He didn’t give me any choice, he kept pushing for her to ride the rock n roll coaster and she couldn’t. He was very near going to just shove her in and make her stay. I had to tell him.”
“He has a point Tay; we were without kids the second day and I wouldn’t let it go. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have known either.”
It was Isaac that groaned and I was pretty sure he’d gone back and figured out; he mumbled something no one heard and I was sure it was something about busses. Casey really hadn’t connected the dots and thankfully if Taylor did, he kept quite.
“Least this one isn’t due on your birthday.” Jessica said.
“No kidding, I’m glad for that and it’s not too far into the summer either.”
“Makes it even better, I guess since everyone is sharing news…I should say that Joe and I set a wedding date of June 7th. Mark calendars.”
Another wave of congratulations went around and everyone talked, played games, played with the many kids, had second or maybe even fourths, I was sure Emily had eaten the entire pan of dressing George had fixed by herself, but least she wasn’t throwing it back up. Everyone trickled out after 6, by 8:45 it was just the ones staying with us and she and I. Nadine looked miserable and she was counting down the days for sure. But, twin boys was going to be a big deal when William was going to be quite young still, not that Emily and I were doing better, less than two years between them.
Emily and I had talked about Robert and Casey as well, going back and forth because after thinking about it she agreed with them, yet I wasn’t sure I wanted to add to the number of people who knew me that intimately. Yet, Robert had been very nice about things and he hadn’t once come on to me, would it be different with him? Ian hadn’t asked and not many knew the full details of that day, most didn’t know about the bathroom occurrences where he apparently wanted to watch himself. They weren’t aware of how easily I gave in. The snow globes had buttons, but surely he didn’t record any of that. We hadn’t pressed any of the buttons at all, for fear of what they’d be. I didn’t plan to start now either. By 9:45 everyone had declared themselves done for the day and after getting Alexander settled in his room, we too went to bed.
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