Hello people! Happy Holidays!
This is a short holiday fic I'm posting daily from Christmas Day until New Year's Eve, and it's my end of year gift to Team Momo.
I gave them all a break for this one, and left the red pen to Midnight Cougar.
But this goes out to Team Momo, and without them my stories wouldn't exist: hats off to Alice's White Rabbit, AGoodWitch, Driving Edward, Mel, Maplestyle, and Eternally Addicted.
This is the penultimate chapter - this short, happy tale will be marked complete tomorrow.
But for now ... Back to CluelessWard!
Chapter 6
Christmas Eve
~~Edward~~
Bella's been walking around with a perma-smile the last two weeks.
She's lighter around the edges, somehow. She's always been pretty levelheaded, spirited, and fun. But there's something about her. I can't put my finger on it. Maybe it's Christmas magic, and I'm an overanalyzing fucker who doesn't know better.
This year we've decided to spend a quiet Christmas at home. We had the whole gang over for Thanksgiving, so when my parents said they'd booked a trip to Scotland as a belated wedding anniversary gift to themselves, we weren't upset at all. We let them go on their trip and made independent plans.
Because it's Lily's first Christmas, we didn't feel like forcing our presence on Em and Rose either. We'll probably go and visit at some point tomorrow or on Boxing Day, but we won't intrude on their time with their daughter.
That little, insistent pang of disappointment returns when I think about that—and Alice's revelations at Thanksgiving. I caught up with her after Jasper consoled her in the bathroom. By then, she'd fixed her face, and her eyes no longer looked like she'd just cried.
But it would have taken a bigger dumbass than me not to notice the subzero temps between her and Rose. My Bella acted tentative around both—as though she was trying to play referee to prevent any further explosions. She didn't pick an easy role for herself in that instance, but if someone could keep the peace between two high-octane personalities like Rose and my sister, it was Bella.
In a way, I could—and still can—see all three points of view in that kerfuffle.
Over the last few years, Rose has reshaped her entire life for the sake of motherhood; she's yearned for that with determination and desperation. Being a mom is part and parcel of her fundamental make-up.
Alice … well, Alice isn't like that. She is the least cold or detached person I've ever met, her energy has no bounds, and she loves with the heat of a thousand suns. But motherhood? That's not for her. She's never imagined her life around the idea of a husband, a white picket fence, and two point five kids. Heck, I'm surprised she said yes when Jasper proposed. I thought they'd live "in sin" in his loft in Islington forever. And it would have been fine—if that were their choice.
Then … then there's my Bella. One would think a woman with a kickass career like hers wouldn't want to bother with motherhood, with all the hard work, time commitments, and traveling her job requires—now and in that glorious year in which she straightened my clueless ass out. But for Bella and me, having a child has always been more than crossing an item off a list, or a stage in a roadmap of life cooked up by society.
To us, it's always been a matter of overflow. Overflow of our love—and that's where we want to put it. Into a tiny human who may or may not look like us—and who will hopefully have their mother's smarts, for everyone's sake.
Bella's been out at a long-ass meeting with Vic and Ang. The umpteenth meeting in the HBO filming rights saga. I'm absolutely elated for her, because this could send her work into planetary fame, if whomever the studio picks to develop the project knows how to do their job. I've had to dodge a few dangers of that kind. Thank fuck for Ang doing the legwork, or I would've starred in the last season of Game of Thrones.
Left to my own devices, I've been wandering around the house, feeling philosophical all day. The least I can do while I'm waxing poetic and waiting for my wife to reappear is to try my hand at dinner without setting the house on fire.
Well, yeah. I've learned a thing or two in seven years past bachelorhood. That, and Bella left a pan of lasagna ready to go in the oven with strict instructions, which minimizes risk of clueless operator error.
The oven temp just dinged, so it's time for me to stick that casserole dish of gooey goodness into the oven, and keep an eye on it for the next half hour, while I try not to dip into all the treats Bella's prepared for tomorrow. My attempt at using "quality control" as an excuse while she prepared them yesterday crashed and burned under Bella's death glare. Message received.
"Honey, I'm home!" she calls from the front door about twenty minutes later.
She flies into the kitchen, that perma-smile of hers still on display, and mischief and a different kind of joy dancing in her eyes. I take a good look at her in her work finery. She's mixing business and party today, in a dark burgundy power suit that shimmers with the changing light, and some shiny black patent leather boots.
"Hello, Mrs. Cullen." It's been my standard greeting since we got married. It reminds me that she said yes. That she'll always be mine.
She puts her arms around my waist, and burrows into my chest. "Home," she whispers.
Her words kindle something inside me—the rightness of this moment warming up my core.
"I missed you today. It's boring here when you're not around. Mmm, I like this—it's soft, almost as soft as you." When I embrace her, I end up with a handful of her suit jacket under my fingers.
"Pure velvet will do that to you. Let me ditch this for something comfier. I don't want to end up with melted cheese on it. Alice would kill me." She starts disentangling herself from my grasp, but I won't let go.
"One thing before you go." I cradle her face in my hands and capture her lips with mine. It's a hello kiss with a promise. Promise you'll catch me if I fall. Promise you'll be here on the bad days. Promise you're the brightest thing in my world. Promise I'll love you no matter what. "Hurry back to me, Mrs. Cullen."
"Always."
###CluelessChristmas###
Hours later, we're sitting on the floor in our living room; our legs stretched out and intertwined. Holiday movies play in the background, and the fireplace roars in front of us. Martha Stewart's website vomited all over our Christmas tree—turns out, Bella has a thing for Christmas ornaments, and she's been collecting them since we got married. Our tree is a chronicle of our marriage.
"Are we doing presents tonight or tomorrow?"
Breaking our contented silence now seems like a crime, but I'm curious, and I love opening presents. I've started wondering if Bella's perpetual cheer in recent weeks is because she's got something epic lined up for my Christmas gift.
She turns and looks up at me. That flash of mischief still bubbles up, lighting up her eyes and her smile. "Tonight?"
"Deal. Who starts?"
I don't even have the time to ask my question that she's already flung herself forward, reaching for a big white box with a red bow from under the tree. Clearly, she's made her decision.
Sitting up beside me, she pushes the box toward me. "You first. Please." She rubs her hands together, then holds them up in front of her, almost in prayer.
The atmosphere around us crackles, and it's not merely the fire.
Slowly, carefully, I undo the bow. When I start removing the wrapping paper, I catch Bella winking at me. The paper won't budge, but after some maneuvering, I find it's one of those pre-wrapped boxes, and the top of it is made to come off like a lid. A few smaller gift bags are nestled inside the box.
"Is there any particular order to this?" I ask, because sometimes she does this—putting a method to her madness.
"Green first, then red. The white one goes last," she says, pointing to the bags.
I grab the two bigger bags in the order Bella indicates. I know better than to mess up her system. The bags are both soft to the touch, and whatever is in it doesn't appear to have sharp corners or edges. I pull on the ribbon of the green one, and reach inside.
"It's a stocking!" And it's green, just like the bag. It's one of those cable knit, big stockings you'd hang on the mantel. There's a leather tag sewn onto the front; it says "Bella." Definitely mine. "We've never had these before."
"I figured it was time to add these to our décor," she explains, her expression kind of cryptic.
It's a mystery why they're in my gift box, though. But onto the red one. Maybe things will get clearer. The red bag is also squishy, and sure enough, a candy apple red woolen stocking emerges from it. This one says "Edward."
"I'm sensing a theme here. Maybe we should hang these on the mantle, where they're supposed to be?" When I try to stand on my feet, she stops me.
"No!" Her voice sounds almost panicked. "Open the rest. Please?"
I can't say no to her. I never could.
The white bag is smaller, but only slightly. Still feels mostly squishy, but something else is in it; there's a faint clicking and a hollow sound, like plastic rattling against something. Cardboard, maybe? I stick my hand inside the bag.
"Is anything breakable in this?"
She shakes her head. "No, nothing fragile." She's smiling from ear to ear.
"Then you won't mind if I do this ..." And dump the entire contents on the rug.
Two more baggies come out of it—these are smaller—and a red, cardboard cylinder. "You got me a Christmas cracker?"
She nods. "Open it! I'm dying here."
Like a kid, I smile at her and pull on the ends of the cracker. It pops open, and a bouquet of plastic sticks explodes in my hand. I pick one up and look at it, then the next, then another. There's five of them. Some white, some blue. Some purple. Some white and blue. Oh, God. Oh, man. I can't believe this … because they're...
These are all pregnancy tests.
Positive. A plus sign. Two blue lines. Another plus sign. Pregnant.
Hope, fierce and fiery, bubbles up inside me. But I can't give in to it. Not yet. Of their own accord, my hands tear at the other pieces of this delightful puzzle.
A smaller cable-knit white stocking. The tag on it says "Baby."
A rolled-up sign, which reveals a mock-up movie poster with a picture of a dazzling, smiling Bella holding the bouquet of positive tests. The block lettering on it says, "Baby Cullen. Coming in 2020."
And that's when my restraint fails. I can't hold it in any longer, and my happy, elated tears flow free in between laughter and sobs. With one move of my hand, I slide everything to the side and reach for Bella.
She falls into my arms, laughing and sobbing just as I am.
"Are we?"
"We are."
We roll onto the carpet, our limbs tangled together, and kiss and make out like teenagers. Sometimes we stop for a minute to catch our breath or just laugh out loud. There's no containing our happiness tonight.
I walked into this Christmas a tad clueless, but Bella hit me with the surprise of our lives. That wave of overflow love hits me, and my hand cradles Bella's womb in delicate, reverent gestures.
"Hello, there. It's your dad."
A bunch of you guessed it ... RIGHT!
We have Baby Clueless on the way :)
See you tomorrow for the last chapter of this itty bitty tale.