Alya groaned as the baby gate clattered for the umpteenth time.
"Can that boy not leave it alone for one second?" She pondered, forcing herself up to retrieve her son from the top of the stairs. He squirmed in her grip as she brought him back to the guest bedroom where she was talking to her parents.
"Welcome back." Fitz said dryly.
She smiled through gritted teeth and gently placed Deke back onto the carpet.
The second his feet touched the ground, he was crawling off again.
A tired sigh echoed throughout the room.
"Seriously," Alya remarked, "I'm starting to think that it's physically impossible for him to run out of energy. That or he's just sucking mine like a vampire."
The gate clattered again.
She stood up with rage in her eyes but her mother caught her arm.
"Leave him be." Jemma said. Reluctantly, Alya sat back down again. Her son wasn't even a year old yet and he was still the biggest challenge she'd ever had to face. Being a mother was tough.
Although she was extremely grateful for her son, Deke was a nightmare. First of all, the fact that he couldn't even stand on his own two feet but still speed-crawled off into the distance whenever you put him down was starting to become a challenge. He also refused to go to bed by himself, so instead of having his own room he slept sandwiched between Alya and Owen. If that wasn't the case, then his grating screams would echo throughout the street, and Alya wouldn't be surprised if the sound travelled the distance from Manchester to Inverness. And that wasn't even touching on the fact that…
"What's he eaten today?" Fitz asked, bringing Alya back into that world of stress.
Her son was far too skinny. Not anything extreme, but his ribs were visible enough for a mother to be blocked from having anything else on her mind.
She sighed as her son's efforts to break the safety gate drilled into her brain. "He had that apple mushy thing. I tried to get him to eat something else but…"
At that moment, as if he sensed that he was being talked about, Deke crawled into the room.
"Awababa."
Jemma smiled at the sight. "Aww." She cooed.
Deke turned to look at her angrily. "Awababababa!"
With a groan, Alya picked up her monster of a son and looked towards her parents apologetically. "Sorry, but I'm pretty sure that means he wants some milk."
Baby Deke's face had gone red with anger by that point. There were a few seconds of bliss before the crying started.
Standing up, Alya tried to shush him on her shoulder. "I'll go feed him, you guys can stay here." She instructed, hurrying out of the room.
Over her shoulder, Deke glared at his grandparents.
"Awababobo."