June 9th 2022
Chapter 160
Our Love of Sisters
Whenever the day would come when Mackenzie Friar would ask her parents about the day she was born, both her mother and father would have the same story to tell her: it was like a dream.
That was really what it felt like, and how could it not? She was born in the middle of the night, when her parents had barely gotten any sleep before they'd had to hurry to the hospital to have her. And after that, though they did waver in and out of sleep, those few hours went by in a snap until they finally woke up in earnest, after their longest stretch of continuous sleep that night. For each of them, whether it was Maya in the bed or Lucas reclined on the chair by her side, there was just a moment as they were waking up where the night didn't feel real, like they just assumed they were at home, curled up spoon and spoon together, but then… No, this wasn't their bed, and… Oh, there was the ache. Whether it was that of having slept in a chair or that all too substantial post delivery state… Now they opened their eyes, and took in their surroundings, and it came back to them… Tiny… Mackenzie… She's here…
Specifically, she was off with the other newborns, up until a nurse brought her back a few minutes after they woke up. Lucas picked her up, held her a while as he sat by Maya's side before finally passing her over. Once he did, he went ahead and checked his phone, finding it just as he'd expected, overrun with messages. Somewhere about three in the morning, he'd finally sent the news around, as they'd decided to do. He didn't give any more details than the fact that Maya had gone into labor just after midnight, and that the baby had been born less than two hours later. From there, family and friends were welcome to drop by and visit whenever they could. It was a weekday morning, so some of them could do nothing except give their congratulations with a promise to drop by at some point in the day.
Not all of them would have to wait though, and as hoped, the first of those to show up would be the younger Friar sisters along with a couple of their grandparents, three aunts, and an uncle. Eliza and Emma couldn't stay long, as they both had class to get to, but they had just enough wiggle room to come and check on their big sister and meet their new niece. Most anticipated though were the four new big sisters. It really took one morning where they were yanked entirely out of the routine of looking after a five-year-old and three one-year-olds for Maya and Lucas to notice just how much it had come to shape their lives. It felt like there was something so important that they were supposed to do and, exhausted as they were, they just wanted to get to do it. The next best thing was for them to be brought back together.
Lucas heard them coming before they ever reached the room, and he smiled as he got up and walked into the hall. The moment they saw him, Lucy, Kacey, and Remy came dashing to him like they had been apart for days and weeks, and Marianne hurried to follow them.
"Oh, I won't be able to pick all of you up, hey…" Lucas crouched as the triplets grappled on to his legs. Now kneeling in the hallway, he was able to pull the trio bunched together into a hug even as Marianne came and wrapped her arms around his neck and tipped her head to rest against his. "Good morning," he smiled, buried as he was in a mass of little daughters. "I missed you all, too."
"Baby?" Lucy asked, almost nose to nose with her father.
"Yeah, Mommy had the baby, you want to come and see?" he asked, and the triplets nodded.
"Is it a boy or a girl?" Marianne asked, picking at the bracelet around his arm in hopes of finding out something of her new sibling.
"Well, there's one way to find out, go on, I'll catch up," Lucas told her. Getting untangled and back to his feet was going to demand caution, so it was really better to let her go on ahead. The experience would not be the same for her as for her little sisters.
So, into the room Marianne went, and Maya watched her approach, curious but hesitant at first in this setting. But then she saw her there in the bed, and she sped up, pulling the chair closer so she could climb on it. Maya offered her free hand to help her get up on to the empty space next to her before finally holding her in a one-armed hug.
"Morning, pumpkin," she kissed her forehead, kept her cuddled for a few moments before the baby fussed and drew her attention. Marianne looked down and smiled, reaching over to rest her hand on the bundled newborn. When she looked back up to her mother, she had such an expectant look on her face, as though to say 'well, go on, give me the goods.' Maya laughed. "You've got a new little sister," she revealed, and Marianne perked up. "I'll tell you her name when the others come in from the hall, okay?" she whispered. This was acceptable. "You want to hold her?" Oh, did she ever…
This was as much for Marianne's sake as for her own, as Maya knew that the triplets would want to come to her, just as she'd want them, too. Lucas had managed to grab hold of all three of them at once – something he would keep doing so long as he was physically able to and something she could only do from a seated position by now – so he carried them into the room and over to the bed, there to carefully deposit them one by one.
"Careful, alright, no rushing," he instructed them, and they did well enough. Possibly what prevented them from just pouncing was the sudden mystery of 'how come Mommy's belly is not big like it was yesterday?' This compelled them to come up slower, curious, but once they reached her, all that mattered was that they got to be held by her.
"Look… Look who it is," Maya told them quietly, feeling a surge of emotion at having all of them here with her, five little bits of her and Lucas. The triplets finally noticed the baby now, and there was a collective delay and reaction in all of them, like 'Oh! There it is; there's our baby.' "That's your little sister," Maya told them, lifting a smile toward the others as they had walked into the room and up to the bed. Abigail, James, Emma, Eliza, Wyatt, and Maisie… They all looked down at the baby, who they now knew to be a girl, with big love-filled smiles. "Is it okay if Grandma holds her for a bit?" Maya turned to Marianne. She was hesitant about letting her little sister go, but after a moment she leaned and gave her a kiss on the forehead before looking to her grandmother.
"You gotta be careful, okay?" she told her, and Abigail smiled as she came up and carefully picked up the baby.
"I won't do anything you wouldn't do," she promised. Marianne looked pleased by this, though she still kept a close eye on her new sister. "Hello, sweetheart…" Abigail was all smiles for her new granddaughter, her seventh of those among eight grandchildren. Each new addition was greeted as unique, and so was this one, even before she learned her name. Marianne was eagerly asking to know it, so Maya was more than happy to tell her and everyone else in the room.
"Her name is Mackenzie Abigail Friar," she revealed, with a beat between first, middle, and last, to let them all sink in.
It never stopped being such an impactful moment, when the choice they had made between the two of them as parents was allowed to reach those it was meant to honor. They still remembered how Melinda and Michael Sullivan had reacted to hearing that Lucas and Maya's firstborn would be named after their mother, or how Ree Forster had reacted when Maya had told her that her then unborn daughter's middle name would be Christine in her honor. They remembered when they had told everyone the triplets' names, whether it was Riley for Remy, Katy for Kacey, or Lucas himself for Lucy, and then the grandmothers, Angela Clutterbucket herself but also Charles and Luna Hart for the late Granny Lizzie, and Pappy Joe and Thomas Friar for the late Susannah…
For how much she had taken on the mantle of grandmother – as well she'd earned it – for the now six Friar sisters either born or adopted, there was still this sense as though she saw herself as being on the outside, like she wasn't on the same level as the others, and this was as it should be, or so she figured. But now here was this little girl, only hours old, in her arms, and she had been named for her, as a mark of her importance to her stepdaughter. Every one of the people in their lives who were tied to one of their daughters by a name seemed to have a special bond with the Friar girl in question, and already it felt like Abigail and Mackenzie Abigail would have their own.
As sure as they were that the next people to show up would be the elder or senior Friars – as Katy and Shawn had both agreed, implored by their children, to wait to visit until the little Hunters could come, too – their next visitors were a surprise. But it was a really good surprise…
"Nana!" Tori appeared in the doorway, sounding caught between an urge to shout and an instruction to keep quiet. Both Maya and Lucas barely had time to look up and see her that they spotted Ella coming in right behind her, with flowers, balloons, and a small, plush panda.
They had not expected to see either one of them until tonight, if at all today, as there was no guarantee that Ella would be able to make the drive, with school, or work… But clearly all she'd needed to know what that her mother had had the baby and then she'd hit the road, ignoring her schedule. They would just trust that this was the right call; they were just so glad to have her there. It wouldn't have felt right not to have all their daughters here today.
Mackenzie was surrendered from where she'd been dozing peacefully in her uncle Wyatt's arms for a good twenty minutes and into her eldest sister's hold. She was so happy to be there, to meet her… She'd driven two hours for this, and it could have been twice, three times more and then some. Her parents always knew how much it meant to her to be the best big sister that one could be. Marianne, Kacey, Lucy, Remy, they could all count on her, for anything, anytime, and now, so could this girl all curled up in her Michelle Day-knitted blanket.
"She's my aunt, too?" Tori was amazed when she was shown the baby.
"Yeah," Lucas chuckled as he held her in one arm, the better to allow her to see the girl in her mother's arms. It was suddenly dawning on her how peculiar it was to have aunts who were so much smaller than her, not grown up ladies, like other people's aunts. She would get over it soon enough, while the rest of them would get to keep getting the urge to laugh whenever they'd hear her refer to the infant as Auntie.
TO BE CONTINUED
See you tomorrow! - mooners
