Kai sat on the bed Cinder with him holding a fussy Yue in her arms. "You need to hold her hand still, so I can clip her nails."
"I'm trying." She said switching Yue forward. She gave a cranky cry as Cinder held against her stomach trying to keep her head up.
"Hold her arm still."
"I don't want to squeeze it too hard."
"Okay I'll hold it, don't move her." Kai took Yue's but then she started crying again.
"Stop, stop she doesn't like it." Cinder said pulling Yue's arm from him and coddling her.
"Cinder she's a baby she doesn't know what's going on she's tense because we are."
"Well she's to wound up now for us to do anything. I'll just put the mittens on her tonight and will try again tomorrow." She got up and started pacing trying to calm the now screaming child.
"Cinder we can't keep putting this off. She keeps nicking herself thought out the day. When she falls asleep were just going to lay her down and do it then." He got up and headed to the kitchen grabbing a bottle with just some water.
The bottle made her stop screaming and Kai enjoyed the quite they finally had. Yue was just a little under four weeks old and had made the move from hospital wing to palace privet quarters two weeks ago. Cinder and Kai had been so happy about her finally come home. They were unaware of how testy she was. Her favorite sound seemed to be her own cries and they were exhausted.
Tonight, was no different thought they were trying to cut her fingernail. They had grown a bit long and this morning she had managed to scratch herself noticeably across the cheek. However, Cinder seem very apprehensive about it.
Cinder cradled Yue until she was done with the bottle, she hadn't drunk much. Kai took over the burping process while Cinder flopped on the bed resting. Yue was much calmer now that the two of them weren't frantically pestering over her.
"I think she fell asleep." Kai laid her down on her back on their bed, every time he sat her down on it she looked out of place, the bed was too large for her.
"Where did I set the fingernail clippers?"
"Do you think we should wait till she's in a deeper sleep before we should start?"
"She's out now and as long as we stay calm, she won't even notice." He found the clippers on the floor and got to his knees and took Yue's hand. Cinder moved closer rubbing Yue's stomach.
"Be careful. Don't take off any skin."
"Did you suffer from a nail clipper injury I'm unaware of?"
"No, but I have had my nails crushed, bent and ripped off before so I know it hurts and her fingers are so little."
"I promise I'll be careful." Yue snored on completely oblivious as Kai took her hand it was very small not even half his size. Starting with her pinky, they both watched her for a second to see if she had awoken but the steady breathing continued.
He moved to the next and the next when he got to the thumb, he was confident in what he was doing. When he clipped the fingernail a small line of blood also came. "She's bleeding, She's bleeding. What do I do?"
He dropped the clippers and held up her thumb as a little blot of blood started forming. Cinder scrambled looking for something then finding a tissue on the night stand. Kai couldn't believe he had cut his daughter he was doing so well, and he cut her.
Cinder held the tissue to the wound still rubbing Yue's stomach. "She slept through it."
"I can't believe I cut her, enough to draw blood."
"I think I put to much pressure over the whole thing. Its just clipping her fingernails its not that important. Sorry." Cinder tossed the tissue into the waste ben and inspected the cut, it was unnoticeable. Picking up the clippers. "I'll do her other hand."
Kai took over rubbing her stomach while Cinder clipped away moving to her toes when the hand was done. With everything done Kai picked Yue up cradling her and taking a seat on the bed with Cinder. It had taken nearly an hour.
"You know eventually will consider something like this a mundane." He laughed. "Not putting much thought into it, just a part of the day." Cinder came up next to him resting her head on his shoulder.
"One day will stop doing it all together. It'll probably be a transition we won't even notice." Kai sighed, Yue was already a month old, it didn't seem possible but soon she's starts rolling and waving and crawling. And as Cinder said she soon get to a point in her life where she is doing things for herself.
"At least we get to do the little things now."
***This was a flashback scene I cut from Kai's story, I added to it a bit so it could stand on its own. As for why I wrote a scene with new time parents clipping their baby's fingernails, not sure I just feel its one of these moments that probably has a lot of anxiety the first time but like with most parenting once you do it enough its normal. Also for a baby Yue's age its better to just file the nail down than clipping them because newborn babies nails are so soft and you are more likely to cut skin by accident.***
