What started off as a Mental Image Moment turned into a full-fledged ficlet. Just a little scene I imagined between Shelagh and Angela following the baby's birth. Enjoy!
For the first time since becoming a family of five, it is just the three of them; Timothy had dashed out to catch his bus after breakfast, with Patrick not far behind him, dropping a kiss on each of their heads before heading to the surgery, having spent the past four days at home. Now, Angela snuggles deeper into her mother's side on the bed, while Shelagh cradles the small weight of blue wool against her chest and uses her free hand to unbutton the top of her nightdress before offering the baby her breast. He latches instantly with practiced ease now and, hearing him begin to suckle, Angela peers over her little brother's head in curiosity.
"What's baby doing, Mumma?" Angela asks, gazing up at her mother.
"The baby is eating, dearest," Shelagh responds, the rays of the mid-morning sun catching Angela's blond hair and spinning it gold. "He's drinking his milk," she says simply, glancing from her daughter back down to the bundle in her arms.
"There's milk in there?" Angela asks pointing to her mother's breast with a mix of surprise and confusion on her face.
"Yes," Shelagh smiles broadly at her daughter's inquisitive nature, so much like her big brother, she thinks. "Mummy makes milk for the baby and this is how he eats. He's small and needs to grow big and strong, so he eats every few hours, even during the night," she explains.
"At nighttime?!" Angela shrieks, shocked that her baby brother is not held to the same bedtime standards her parents imposed on her when she moved to her big girl bed - lights out after a story and a cuddle and no crawling into mummy and daddy's bed unless it was for something very important like feeling ill or a nightmare.
"Yes, even at night," Shelagh laughs. "His tummy is tiny so he can't eat a big dinner like we do, and he doesn't have teeth yet to chew delicious things like fish and chips, does he?" she teases, prompting Angela to giggle and shake her head. "No," she agrees. "Instead, he has a lot of small meals of milk from Mummy, sometimes 8 or 10 times a day. He's quite a hungry little lad!"
Angela stares at her mother with wide eyes, her little mouth forming a tiny "o" and eyebrows furrowed in concentration as she processes her mother's words and further examines her brother. "Did Angela drink Mumma's milk?" she finally asks after a minute of silence.
Shelagh's heart aches with what she knows will be just the first of many pangs of unfounded guilt she will feel in the years to come. She has always maintained that her love for Timothy and Angela transcends blood and biology, and giving birth to a child hasn't altered that - she loves each of her three children with every fiber of her being, regardless of how they came to be hers. Still, Shelagh cannot deny that her youngest son is different from his siblings due to the sheer fact that he grew within her and was born of her own body. Try as she might, she cannot stop this baby from having her pale blue eyes or Patrick's dark hair, nor can she help it that her body is able to nourish him in a way that was never possible with Angela.
"No, dearest, Mummy didn't have any milk when you were a baby," she admits. "Sometimes mothers can't make milk for their babies so the babies drink a special kind of milk from a bottle. That's how you were fed as a baby."
Angela twists her mouth in thought and continues to watch her baby brother feed, hearing him take several greedy gulps in quick succession followed by a series of soft sighs as he pauses to catch his breath.
Shelagh knows she isn't being completely truthful in her explanation, but the answer seems to satisfy the little girl's curiosity for now, and for that Shelagh is grateful. The day would eventually come when they would explain to Angela her origin, because, with an inquiring mind as sharp as Timothy's, Shelagh has no doubt that her clever girl will at some point begin to notice the subtle differences between herself and her brothers. There would be hard questions followed by even harder answers, answers that may in all likelihood cause tears, doubt and perhaps even anger in the future. But thankfully that day is not today, and in this moment, Shelagh wants only for Angela to feel secure and loved - as a daughter, as a big sister.
"But, do you know what, Angela?" Shelagh asks gently.
"What?" Angela wonders, looking back up to her mother.
Shelagh stares into Angela's big brown eyes and thinks how much they resemble Patrick's, genetics be damned. "Even though Mummy couldn't feed you the way I'm feeding the new baby now, there was something special about feeding you a bottle. It meant that Daddy and Timmy got to help feed you, too. Isn't that lucky?" she says with a smile.
Angela grins back and nods her head dramatically in agreement. Just then, Shelagh feels the baby slip off her breast and glances down to see that he has fallen asleep, a trickle of milk escaping the corner of his little mouth, still half-open in contentment.
"Perhaps," Shelagh continues, "once the baby has gotten a bit bigger, you could help feed him a bottle. Would you like that?"
"Oh, yes!" Angela chirps, clapping her hands together with enthusiasm.
"Good," Shelagh nods, feeling her heart swell with more love than she ever thought humanly possible. "I think he would like that, too. In fact, I think he might enjoy a cuddle with his big sister right now."
Angela excitedly scrambles to reposition herself next to her mother, stretching out her little legs on the bed and bending her arms at the elbows, her hands resting on her lap, just as her parents had taught her when she first held him the morning after his birth. Once Angela is settled, Shelagh gently passes the sleeping bundle into her daughter's waiting arms, which she carefully adjusts to better support the baby's head.
"Hi, baby," Angela whispers close to her brother's face before she smacks her lips in a delicate kiss on his forehead.
Shelagh starts to button up her nightdress but her fingers halt when she hears Angela and takes in the scene unfolding beside her. Her mind wanders back over everything that led her to this moment - times of joy, euphoria and absolute bliss, peppered with moments of fear, uncertainty, and heartache. She knows in the years ahead there will be days when bright blue skies are clouded over with gray fog and violent storms threaten to erupt, but today the sun is shining on her family, so she chooses to bask in its warmth. And as she watches her daughter lovingly cradle her newborn son, and thinks of her oldest boy at school growing so quickly into a fine young man, Shelagh silently thanks God - not for the first time - for deeming her worthy of so many of His blessings.