A steady wail streamed out of the gray speaker to my left.
"Please don't tell me those are the babies again."
Mom groaned. She was sprawled out on the couch, looking thoroughly exhausted.
I sighed. "I'll get em'."
I walked into the nursery, aka, my old room converted into a storage unit, cleaned up, and remodeled. I picked up one baby with each arm, and settled the third on my hip.
I cooed their names and baby talk as I tried to soothe their tiny almost-newborn cries. Walking carefully back to the living room, I laid them all in the pen.
I stood back to see if what everyone said about them was true.
Identical. Yes, they all had red hair like Mom. Yes they all had hazel eyes like Dad. Yes, they were all equal when it came to adorableness. And yes, they all looked equally like the parents, with a nose here and a mouth there.
I tickled their bellies, but they were too young to understand.
"How does Piper look?" Mom asked me.
I looked at the smallest of the babies, the one who had been so much trouble. She looked fine. All the jaundice was gone, and she looked peaceful and sleepy.
"Fine," I said.
I looked at the other two, both boys, and wondered how hard it would be for Piper to grow up with two OLDER brothers.
She had been reluctant coming out.
Blake, Joey, and Piper. I loved them all.
Blake was the biggest, with the greatest amount of red tangly hair I'd ever seen on a baby. He had a chin that jutted out like Mom's did sometime, and had been the first to smile. He was definitely gonna be a big boy.
Joey was the more gentle of the two. He was smaller, and didn't have as much hair as Chance, though you could still see it. He was the only one who hadn't cried when I first held him. Big greenish hazel eyes that were totally gorgeous. He was going to be a heart breaker for sure.
And then little Piper. She had been the tiniest and had looked premature, except she wasn't. She had had to stay in the NICU for two weeks. It scared me a lot. But when she came home, it made it all the more sweet. She had no hair at all. But I loved her because she was my only sister. And when she opened her eyes, you just melted.
My triplets. I was only eleven, but people said I was mature enough to take care of them.
Mom gave me a lot of responsibility. Like now, with Dad so preoccupied with work, and Mom totally drained.
"Are they asleep?" she asked drowsily.
"Almost."
"Give me Blake, would you?"
I handed the chubby thing into her arms.
She coddled with him for a minute. I sat down, as Dad's old album played in the background.
After a little bit of watching her, I got bored. An eleven year old mind can only be occupied with a certain level of precious before it needs other activities.
"Can I go and turn on the TV for a little bit?"
She let me, and I gave them all a little kiss before I left.
Another stupid Hollywood Backstory.
"And tonight, Dak Zevon is yet again exposed to ridicule after paternal tests were confirmed..."
It showed a thin pale thirty-something, unshaven, and depressed. A person who's life was over. With so much dirt dished on them, unnecessarily, it really was no wonder.
A kids face popped onto the screen, with the headline, "Zevon Jr.?"
He was about my age. Maybe older. Thing was he looked so much older than he was. I think it was this look in his eyes. Almost haunted, like he had seen things no adult should ever have to.
I flipped it off. I didn't like that look.
I went back out into my living room, content with drowning out the world's troubles in my family.
But his face stayed with me. Was in most of my dreams throughout the most difficult years of my teenage life. I grew to adore that face as an idol testament to the better condition of my own life.
Things were being decided for me, though I didn't know it. The winds of change were blowing strongly towards Minnesota...
:D Review and tell me what you think!
xoxo
~Starbucks