Apparently I'm just having baby fever this week.
Blaine wasn't sure he'd ever felt happier in his life - excepting the day he and Kurt got married, of course. All of their friends had cleared their schedules for a weekend to come to the city to celebrate the birth of their daughter.
Their daughter.
A squall from his arms distracted Blaine from his reverie.
"Hey, princess, it's okay," Blaine cooed, jiggling Ella gently. "I know it's loud. You get used to it, I promise."
"Is my goddaughter crying?" Sam asked, practically running over from the doorway. "What did you do, Blaine?"
"I didn't do anything!" Blaine said, but Sam was already scooping Ella into his own arms and rocking her. "Babies cry, Sam, it just kind of happens."
"Or maybe she likes me more," Sam said. "She's not crying anymore, see?"
"Because you've bored her to sleep," Kitty said, appearing out of nowhere. "C'mon, Sam, don't hog the baby!"
"But I just-" Sam trailed off as Kitty snagged Ella and walked away, babytalking delightedly at her the whole time. "Okay."
"Go see everyone else," Blaine said kindly. "I'm sure you'll get her back eventually."
Sam wandered off, probably waiting for his Mercedes radar to kick in, and Blaine went to shut the front door behind him, afraid a stranger might try to crash the party. On his way back into the fracas, he literally ran into his wonderful husband.
"Oof!"
"Sorry, babe!" Blaine said, steadying Kurt. "God, where have you been? You told me you were just running to grab Ella a bottle."
"I was, but then Rachel, Santana, and Tina all accosted me and demanded to have their gifts opened first," Kurt said, looking a little frazzled. "I couldn't tell if they'd all gotten the same thing or if they just really loved their presents, but they wouldn't let me leave."
"Well, now I'm nervous," Blaine said, rubbing circles over Kurt's arm to soothe him. "And, uh, not that it matters, but where's the bottle?"
"What? Oh my God," Kurt said, flexing his empty hands. "I think I left it - or maybe Mike took it-"
"We'll find out once she starts screaming, I guess," Blaine said. He felt like he should be more concerned, but he trusted their friends to at least be able to feed Ella. She wasn't old enough for Santana to start corrupting her with tattoos and cursing yet, so there was really only so much damage that could be done, right?
"Who has her right now?" Kurt asked.
"Last I knew, Kitty, but as she was walking towards the living room when that happened, I could already be wrong," Blaine said. "No one's seemed to hold onto her for longer than about a minute and a half."
"Wonder if we should make a rule that whoever's holding her when she needs a change has to be the one to do it," Kurt mused, eyes sparkling playfully.
"Do you want our daughter to be chucked around like we're playing Hot Potato?" Blaine asked. "I don't trust the twins to not accidentally drop her if she goes when they're holding her."
Kurt shuddered. "Good point. I guess we'll have to resign ourselves to only seeing our baby when she needs a new diaper, then."
"We have the rest of our lives with her," Blaine said. "We can let our friends have today."
A shriek from the living room broke their quiet moment. They ran toward the sound, discovering a shell-shocked, barf-covered Tina and a fussy Ella.
"I've got the baby, you help Tina," Kurt said quickly, snatching the baby and running.
Blaine dashed for the kitchen, wetting some paper towels and hoping Tina's dress wouldn't stain. The next few hours passed in a blur as he helped clean her up, got roped into conversations with everyone, and frantically tried to scan the room every so often to make sure his daughter wasn't expelling any more fluids on anyone else.
Finally, Kurt stood up and clapped his hands a few times for attention.
"Guys, it's getting late, and we have a baby who needs sleep. Let's do gifts real quick and then say our goodbyes?"
The guests grumbled sadly but arranged themselves in a circle for present opening with Blaine and Kurt on the floor by the pile of bags and boxes and Marley cuddling the baby across from them. Rachel practically thrust her gift into Kurt's hands, claiming that "as the person who pushed her out of my vagina, I feel like my present should be opened first!"
"Fine, fine," Kurt said, laughing. "Take a seat, Rach, you're still recovering."
Rachel went and snuggled into Jesse's side, and Kurt pulled the paper off the gift.
"Baby's First Barbra Streisand Collection?" Kurt said incredulously. "That's a thing?"
"I found it online!" Rachel said, puffing up a little with pride. "Even though she's not my daughter, she still has my genes, so she needs to be taught young who to look up to-"
"Thanks, Rachel!" Blaine interrupted, hoping to head her off early. "I'm sure she'll love it. Who's next?"
Kurt grabbed a gift off the stack at random. "Quinn and Puck!"
Blaine spent the next hour cooing over everyone's gifts, genuinely delighted by everything (especially the hair bows Sam had found and Jane's handmade Dalton-colored tutu) but so dazed after a long day of partying that he kept losing focus and trying to re-open the same gifts whenever it was his turn to pick.
The goodbyes passed in a similar blur. He and Kurt decided to just station themselves and the baby at the door so their friends could hug and kiss everyone easily as they left. Ella was asleep by then, cradled in Kurt's arms peacefully, and Blaine couldn't help but feel a little jealous - a nap sounded great just then.
"Oh my God, they're gone," he moaned, shutting the door behind Spencer and Alistair with a thud. "I mean, I love them all, don't get me wrong-"
"-But that was really hard to get through on about three hours of sleep?" Kurt finished, looking just as weary as Blaine felt. "I kept calling everything adorable when we were opening presents, I'm sure they could all tell."
"I think I was just humming appreciatively after a while, so at least you were making words," Blaine said. He took Kurt gently by the elbow and started wandering towards their bedroom, where he let go and face-planted on the mattress the second he was close enough. "Our bed is so soft and wonderful."
Kurt sat down next to him and started shoving him to lay the right way across the bed. "We can't sleep yet. We have to put Ella down and change out of our clothes and - and-"
"What if we try co-sleeping tonight?" Blaine said, rolling onto his side. "All the food got eaten, so nothing will spoil, and I can sleep in my clothes. I'm sure Ella will get us up in the night anyways, so what do pajamas matter?"
"You just don't want to get up again, I can see right-" Kurt yawned noisily, "-through you."
"I don't see you moving."
"...Fine. Scoot over so we can make a little blanket barricade for Ella in between us."
"I love you so much."
"I love you too," Kurt said, planting a quick kiss on Blaine's temple. He placed Ella gently between them and tucked their spare blanket all around her, making a buffer in case one of them tried to roll too far in the night. "This good?"
"Perfect," Blaine said drowsily, already half-asleep. He stretched an arm across Ella's legs to Kurt, taking one of Kurt's hands in his and squeezing it once. "Absolutely perfect."
He was out before Kurt could reply, catching two blissful hours of sleep before Ella decided she needed a late-night snack.