'Hey, look who's back, how was the honey-moon, tiger?'

Daniel grinned at Doctor Samson as he washed up in the scrub-room of OR Four. Samson was one of Daniel's favourite doctor's to work with in surgery because the man could actually carry on a conversation like a normal person on the job. He was sharp as a tack and knew his shit cold, which was why anyone who worked with him always felt quite comfortable sharing things with him while they were in the OR.

'Hey, Doctor, the honey-moon was great, we had so much fun.'

'Where did you guys go?'

'We went to Greece for two weeks, spent a couple of days in Athens and then went on a cruise around the islands.'

Samson nodded, his muted brown eyes merry. 'Sounds great. Greta and I, we did a tour of French wine country.'

'We were originally going to make it a diving trip, but after we found out Andrea was pregnant, we decided to make that our one-year anniversary trip instead.'

'Good for you guys.' The doctor looked through the glass window into the operating theatre. 'How did Missus Wilson seem this morning?'

'A little nervous but anxious to get it over with.'

'Good, that's good, always.'

'She's had a dose of Prozepam already to help her stay relaxed, but she's allergic to Demerol so I'll be giving her the special house-blend once she gets in here.'

'Excellent. You have your crosswords handy?'

Daniel nodded. 'Already in there sir, and it looks like our guest is arriving.'

Both men watched the orderlies wheel in the patient, who was in for a patella-ligament repair. The woman was in her mid-fifties and was a triathlete, training for the Palm Springs annual meet when she'd crashed her bike and banged her right knee up something fierce. Since Daniel was ready, he went into the OR where the surgical nurse gloved his hands and he went over to the woman.

'Missus Wilson, good to see you again.'

'Nurse Brick, right? That's your name, not just a nickname 'cause you're built like a brick-wall?'

'No ma'am,' Daniel reassured her with a smile in his voice, 'it is my name.'

'You married, have kids?'

'Just got back from my honey-moon and my wife's having our first baby this August.'

Mrs. Wilson nodded, the drugs already in her system making her sleepy. 'Mine are in the waiting room, hoping everything goes okay. If it doesn't, just tell them I love them and I'm sure you and the doctor did everything you could to make sure I could make it.'

'Hey now, none of that. You need to think positive, studies show that a patient's will to fight can make the difference in the OR.'

'I did the Death Valley Sun Sprint in fourteen minutes and that's a two mile course in the California desert.'

'There you go.'

Samson stepped over, mask on and gloves up just like Daniel. 'Good morning Missus Wilson, you ready to get that knee in shape for Palm Springs?'

'You betcha.'

'In the meantime...' Daniel sat down on his rolling footed stool, brought over the gas-mask for the general anesthetic. 'Speak into the microphone and tell me what you want to have for you first meal when you wake up. Anything at all, doesn't matter if we can get it in the hospital or not.'

'Soul food...chicken and waffles...mash po...pota...toes...and extra...ice...in...the...lemon...lem...'

He checked his instruments, making notes on the chart of the gauge for the patient's initial dose of anesthetic medicine, then passed it over to Samson. 'To quote Sheldon Cooper, you have the con, Doctor.'

'So tell me, tell me, how was the honeymoon, was there lots of romantic walks on the shores of the Aegean?'

Andrea laughed as she wandered around the apartment in her warm leggings and oversized sweater. She'd taken an extra day more than Daniel to get her body clock right, and while waiting for the kettle to boil for some late-afternoon tea she'd decided to return Lili's message welcoming her and Daniel home from their honey-moon.

'Not exactly easy to do that when you're on a cruise, but there was one night when we made love on our private, honey-moon suite promenade deck.'

'Oooh, sexy, sexy girl.'

'Oh, and I'll have to show it to you soon, we did a little dive, like really little. We went snorkeling off the shore of Cristos, this tiny little city just outside Athens and part of the trip was that you got to find a little sunken treasure in its own little old-fashioned treasure chest.' Andrea was still bubbling about it; she hadn't cared at all they were only in twelve-foot shallows or that she had to stay up near the surface. She'd gotten to go diving in Greece with her husband on their honeymoon and that was what mattered the most. 'Everyone got something, but some stuff was better than others. Like one couple got a chest of ancient coin replicas, another got a loose Aegean pink pearl, but Daniel found for me the best prize, a Greek amber pendant with the constellation Orion etched into the stone.'

'Yeah, I definitely want to see that. What? Okay, sweetie, I'll ask. Rosie wants to know if the baby liked the present she and Duncan picked out.'

Andrea laughed again. 'Yes, I know for sure the baby will love his or her 'yo no hable espagnol' t-shirt.' When she heard the key in the locks, she glanced at her watch. 'Oh, no. I better run. Daniel's home late, which can't be good.'

'Did he lose a patient?'

'I'll let you know. Talk to you soon.' She'd just pressed the 'End' button when the door opened and Daniel walked through, looking very bedraggled and in dire need of a hug. 'Hey, honey, how was your first day back.'

'Hellish. Is there coffee?'

'I just boiled the kettle on for tea.'

'That'll do even better.'

Daniel dropped his bag by the couch, stretched out on his back so that he could watch his baby mama in action as she puttered in the kitchen. Her belly had puffed up almost prodigiously on their first morning in Greece. They woken up in the hotel bed in Athens and Andrea all of a sudden looked most definitely pregnant. Her boobs were bigger, too, though only enough for Daniel to notice it when they'd been getting romantic, which was pretty much all the time; it was their honey-moon after all.

He watched her bring over two steaming mugs fragrant with the decaf earl-grey green tea she favoured in the winter, one laced with honey and lemon, the other unsweetened for him, and felt a little pang of guilt. 'I'm the daddy-to-be, I should be bringing you tea and rubbing your feet.'

'The night is young, it's barely five o'clock.' Andrea sipped her tea, sat down by his feet. 'I take it one of your surgeries didn't go well?'

'The morning one did, Missus Wilson my triathlete. It was the afternoon one, a seventeen year old girl whose parents failed to disclose to the surgeon and therefore me by extension that she had an intolerance for any tetracycline antibiotics, which are one of the common drugs used once the surgery is in the final stages to prevent any internal infections from forming near the stitches.'

'So what happened to her?' Andrea, being a nurse, knew medication but she wasn't the biochemistry expert the way Daniel was, since he dealt with drugs on a regular basis.

'Her heart went into overdrive and we had to try and figure out why the hell she was going sideways when her surgery was a routine goiter removal.'

'Those moments suck.'

'You can imagine what state Samson was in when he went to talk to the parents and they just blithely admit they didn't think their child's intolerance for this kind of drug was relevant. The father works in insurance and her mother is teacher at the culinary institute, neither of them has an MD so who are they to judge what is relevant?'

'I know, a lot of people don't understand that. Would you like something to cheer you up?'

'Your smile usually does the trick, but I could use a chaser of kittens eating lollipops under a double-rainbow right about now.'

'Lili says hello, and that Rosie wants to know if 'the In-ker-di-bi-ble Daniel' and the baby liked the presents she and Duncan picked out.'

Daniel chuckled at the relayed message. 'I'll call there later, talk to Rosie in person. Hey, you okay?' he asked her, noting the way she shifted and was rubbing her newly popped-up belly.

'Yeah, just feel a little weird in the tummy.'

'How do you mean?'

'It's like...these weird little fluttering feelings way down deep, almost like a little fish swimming around inside.'

Daniel didn't say a word, just stood up and went to get the baby books - her copy of What to Expect, his copy of Baby Boom - flipping to the section on foetal development. They sat in silence reading for a moment and then Andrea began to pat her husband's knee wildly.

'It's the baby moving!'

'You sure? It's not just gas?'

'Yeah, listen to to this. 'Around weeks fifteen to seventeen you will begin to feel odd little flutterings in your uterus like a butterfly or a goldfish swimming'. That's exactly what it feels like! Oh, Daniel, this amazing, there's really a little something in there!' She looked at him; Daniel was still reading with a little pout face on. 'What is it, what's wrong?'

'I don't get to feel it, the baby's only big enough for you to feel it. I won't feel it for another few weeks until it's kicking and you actually feel it, according to this. I am suppose continue to be happy and supportive to you. Well, duh,' he mocked the book sarcastically. 'I always do that, you ignoramus.'

Setting the book aside on the coffee table, Daniel wrapped his arms around Andrea, rubbed a wide hand over her lower belly. 'Yo, you in there, hurry up and get bigger, it's uncool you're already picking favourites who gets to feel what.'

'Keep that in mind when we're having fun and sexy naked times in bed, or on the couch, or wherever we end up doing it, and the baby starts kicking at my stomach,' Andrea giggled. 'But speaking of sexy naked times, I was thinking if you're feeling that crummy...'

She leaned in, broke up her ideas with kisses against his lips. 'We could get naked...slip into a hot, steaming shower...get all soaped up...rub each other down...unless you're too tired.'

'I'm never too tired for soapy nakedness with my wife.' Daniel grinned, a giddy bubble in his stomach; the novelty of calling her his wife was going to take a long time to wear off. He got to his feet, pulled her up with him and gave her belly a little stroke. 'Come on there Kinder-Surprise, let's go find some towels.'

R&R&Enjoy