"Hey there, sexy," Holly whispered quietly as she came up behind her partner and wrapped her arms around Gail's waist, "whatcha doing?"
Gail lay her hands over the brunette's. "Just watching the kids sleep," she answered, and sunk into her love's embrace.
Holly rested her chin on Gail's strong shoulder and looked down at the bed before them, where their children were taking an afternoon nap. Remy, with her long limbs and her messy curls–less halo, more hurricane–strewn across the pillow. Justus in his carrier, dreaming of drinking, apparently, with his sweet lips pursed and moving against an imaginary bottle. And then Victor, their youngest by six minutes, his apnea belt dark against the mint green of his jumper, and its monitor just off to the side.
Three beautiful miracles, Holly thought, and a shiver of things that might not have been shuddered through her.
But only for a moment.
Until it was beaten back by the scent of Gail's bare skin against her own, the warmth of the afternoon summer sun from the open window across the room, the sound of friends and family laughing and talking together on the deck as they supervised the older children shrieking and playing in the lake beyond.
"This was a good idea," she breathed softly into Gail's neck, "to celebrate finalizing the adoption up here at the cabin, with everyone."
"Oh, yeah," Gail asked, "even after walking in on Traci and Steve in the kitchen this morning?"
The brunette smirked. "You know as well as I that they could have just as easily walked in on us if we'd been up first," she answered with a laugh.
Gail acknowledged the truth of the point with a quiet laugh that echoed out of her own bones and into Holly's.
"I mean it, though," Holly repeated, "this is good. Celebrating such an important milestone with the people we love."
She felt Gail's body tense against hers, "Babe, what is it?"
"The doctor, when we took the boys on Tuesday, he mentioned that they're a little behind on their developmental milestones, even accounting for being preemies. How Justus is a little ahead of Victor, and probably always will be, and whether they'll be mostly on track at some point in the future."
They're swaying together, bodies used to the precious weight of sleeping children in their arms. It's comforting, the slow rock back and forth, the gentle mother's dance. It's unconscious now, after so many nights spent rocking babies back to sleep, soothing cries and ills, walking the floors of their home with memory and the light of the moon to guide them.
Holly just hummed softly, well-attuned to her partner's needs, Gail's habit of slowly talking out what was bothering her.
"It's just, I don't want anyone to look at our kids and think they're less than anyone else because they'll probably be smaller and need glasses earlier and Vee will probably have an inhaler his whole life," Gail continued, turning in her partner's arms until she was looking straight into Holly's sweet brown eyes, "Our kids are amazing–they're going to grow up to be amazing– and I just think we measure the wrong things, with milestones, I mean."
"Oh," the brunette said, and began to massage at the muscles of Gail's lower back, the ones that got sore at the end of a long day, having never quite fully recovered from being pregnant.
Gail's breath caught, and she arched into Holly's familiar, healing touch.
"And I don't know, Hol, but it feels like we forget some things, some milestones. I mean, sitting, walking, talking, these are big deals, true. And learning to read, graduating from school, moving into your own place, all important milestones too. But," she paused for a moment, and turned, spinning gently out of the brunette's embrace until they were standing side-by-side, arms around each other's waists, and looking down at their children.
"But there are simpler milestones too. Like how Vee's alarm doesn't go off on the nights when he and Jus are in the same crib. Or how Remy is so, so careful with them, and always wants to help out even though sometimes they're smelly or loud. Some days I come home and the first thing I hear before I take off my boots is one of the kids giggling, or Remy shouting that I'm home, or even one of the boys crying because he needs to be changed. And that, Hol," Gail said, "that feels like a milestone too. Or waking up next to you, even when there's a kid between us. Or watching my mom read a bedtime story to Jus and V, not realizing that they've already fallen asleep."
"I get it, hon," Holly whispered, letting her hip bump gently into Gail's, "there are the big milestones that we use to measure time and then there are the little ones, the ones we use to measure love. And they're far, far more valuable than whether the boys can walk by their first birthday or Remy learns to read before her fifth. And while doctors and teachers and strangers may measure our kids by the big ones, you and I, and everyone who matters? We'll be paying attention to all the little milestones, the ones that really count."