Hanna awoke to a strange, but somewhat familiar, feeling in her stomach. Before she knew it, she was darting to the bathroom, where she proceeded to spill her guts into the toilet. As she wiped her lips, Hanna groaned to herself and rested back against the cold, tiled walls. She thought she was over that stupid sickness, but obviously not. When Hanna decided she wouldn't need to use the toilet bowl again, she slowly crept back to the bed, where Caleb was still snoring away. Thankfully, he didn't wake when she slid herself back into bed.
Only two hours later, Hanna was awake again, but this time was seeing to Madelyn, who had awoken bright and early. The blond looked over at the clock hanging on the pink wall and noticed it was only quarter to five, not a time Hanna liked to be awake at. Considering she was still feeling slightly nauseous, Hanna wished she was back in bed, asleep. Instead, there was a very awake toddler bouncing up and down on her bed.
"Maddie, stop," Hanna said, half-heartedly. She retrieved her daughter from the bed and let her run free down the hallway. At this point, she didn't care if Caleb was woken. If she had to suffer, so did he. Madelyn carried on running right into her mom and dad's bedroom, where she definitely woke up Caleb. The two-year-old began jumping excitedly all over him, and didn't even stop when Caleb moaned and batted her away. Hanna didn't attempt to help, just stood in the doorway laughing to herself.
"Han, get her off," Caleb called. His voice was still sleepy and hoarse, and he still had his head buried in his pillow, but Hanna heard him. Although, it didn't seem like it. She continued to make no further attempt to stop Madelyn, as she had her own little amusement show happening right in front of her. "Han, please," he begged. Feeling suddenly piteous, Hanna padded across the room and fetched Maddie, who let out a loud groan when pulled away.
"But Daddy!" she said to Hanna.
"Daddy wants to sleep, Maddie. You need to let at least one of us sleep," Hanna replied. She then murmured to herself, "Although Mommy wishes it was her sleeping."
Maddie bounded into her playroom the second she reached the bottom of the stairs, and began pulling out piles and piles of books from the shelf. A whole load fell down with a plonk, and Hanna was sure that was not going to help Caleb fall back asleep, if he already hadn't. She hurried over and quickly picked them all back up, piling them on the table.
"Do you want me to read you a story?" the mother asked, holding up a book. Madelyn nodded, but took the one from Hanna's hand and replaced it with another: Sleeping Beauty. At one point in her life, Hanna used to love all the Disney princesses. Now, she'd rather stick pins in her eyes than read Sleeping Beauty one more time. Hanna was sure Madelyn did it just because she knew her mom didn't like them. "Can we please read a different one? Like, The Hungry Caterpillar?"
"No Mommy. Seepin Beauty," Maddie replied firmly. Well, that was Hanna told. She reluctantly began reading it, and was surprised when the toddler perched herself on Hanna's lap and actually listened to the story, instead of completely ignoring it and doing something else like she usually did. When Hanna reached the end on the book, she nearly cheered. "Gen, gen!"
"No, Maddie, not again. We can do something else like…ooh, should we have breakfast?" Hanna was not going to read Sleeping Beauty again. Ever. In fact, she was ready to throw the book straight out of the window.
Madelyn contemplated the offer for a while, and then nodded. "Food!"
10 minutes later, the little girl was happily singing as she sat at the kitchen's island and waited for her breakfast. Hanna was cooking pancakes, and kept looking back every so often and laughing. Madelyn was trying to sing Justin Beiber's song, Sorry, but didn't know any of the words. Hanna could only work out it was Sorry because she was being constantly asked to have it on in the car, and Maddie would try and sing along to it then, too.
As the blond served up a blueberry pancake — with a dollop of syrup on the top, just as Madelyn liked it — Caleb walked in, yawning and scratching his neck.
"Did we wake you?" Hanna asked. She knew fine well that they did, since she hadn't bothered at all to make Maddie quiet. Caleb nodded sleepily and slumped onto a chair beside the toddler. She was still singing, but stopped when Caleb shushed her. "Hey, Mads, don't stop. I liked it!"
Caleb shot his wife a death glare, making Hanna smirk. "I hate you," he muttered. Hanna shrugged, and went back to making more pancakes. She poured the mixture into a pan and as it started to cook, she breathed in the supposedly heavenly smell. Only it wasn't heavenly. And it made her feel even more nauseous than before. Leaving the frying pan on and cooking, Hanna ran out of the room and headed to the downstairs bathroom, where she repeated what she'd previously done earlier that morning.
She walked back into the kitchen a good five minutes later, with her head hanging low, as if she were embarrassed. Caleb was now standing up, guarding Madelyn as she stuffed as much pancake as she could into her mouth. He turned when he heard the padding on Hanna's feet against the floor, and looked worried.
"I would have come and helped you but the stove was on and Maddie was—"
"It's fine," Hanna mumbled. "I'm fine."
"Babe, you're not fine," Caleb said. He wandered over to where she had stopped and leant against the wall, and rubbed her arm. "I thought that sickness thing had cleared up."
Hanna shrugged, but looked up at Caleb. "It did."
Confused, Caleb asked, "So what was that?" He gestured to the hallway, where Hanna had run through to get to the bathroom.
Hanna knew exactly what it was. As she sat on the floor by the toilet, she'd had some time to think about this nausea. It didn't feel like what it had been like just two days before, but Hanna couldn't put her finger on what was different. Then it suddenly hit her.
"Han?"
That afternoon, Hanna and Caleb walked around Target like headless chickens. They had no idea where to look for what they needed, and it didn't help that they'd never been in the shop before. Thinking that Target would sell the best brands, they'd decided to travel to the next town over. But it didn't look like that was the best decision.
"Han, I've found them!" a voice called out. Hanna, along with Madelyn in her arms, ran to where the voice had come from. Maddie was giggling hysterically as she was bounced up and down when Hanna ran, and was still laughing when they reached Caleb. Hanna and Caleb both stared at the rows and rows of different makes. "So…which one do we want?"
The blond reached out and picked up one, read the back of the box, and then threw it in their basket. She repeated that three times with another three different boxes, before turning to her husband and saying, "I think these will do."
"Are you sure?" Caleb took a sharp breath and held it, only breathing out when Hanna nodded. He took a hold of Hanna's hand reassuringly and led her to the pay. As Hanna handed over the 4 boxes, she noticed the Target employee give her a weird look. Caleb noticed, too, and responded with an equally rude glare. The woman at the checkout was about to open her mouth, but Caleb interrupted her before she could spit out one word. "That'll be all thanks." He handed over the money without counting and grabbed his wife's hand again, dragging her towards the exit. Hanna barely managed to grab the shopping bag as she was pulled away. "Did you know her or something? She gave you the bitchiest look ever," Caleb said as they walked back to the car.
Hanna shrugged in reply. She wrapped the bag around her hand and began poking holes through the plastic. It wasn't as if she were scared, she was just…well maybe a little scared. She'd never taken a pregnancy test before. When she and Caleb suspected they were pregnant with Madelyn, they'd gone straight to the doctors to get it confirmed. But Caleb didn't seem nervous at all. In fact, Hanna got the feeling he was actually excited. Only would Hanna be excited if she was actually pregnant. And she didn't want to get her hopes up.
After loading Maddie into the back of the car, Hanna hopped into the passenger seat and took out her phone from her back pocket. She debated texting her mother to let her know what she was doing, but then decided against that. If it turned out Hanna was indeed with-child, Hanna wanted to surprise her mom.
"This is so exciting!" Caleb said as he climbed into the Land Rover. He sounded just like a little boy on Christmas Day. After strapping the seatbelt around himself, Caleb looked over at his wife instead of starting the car. "Hey," he said in a much calmer voice. "Are you okay?"
Hanna snapped out of her thoughts and started nodding enthusiastically. "I'm great." Hanna wasn't convincing herself or Caleb.
"Babe, it's going to be okay. You don't have to be scared or anything," Caleb said, reaching his hand out to her thigh. Hanna strained a smile as she looked back at him, but he could still see she wasn't "normal" just yet. "Why are you scared, anyway?"
"How do you know I'm even scared?" the blond snapped. She purposefully jerked her leg away so Caleb's hand would fall off, and as it did, Caleb immediately pulled it away. Hanna looked to the window and watched an elderly couple hobble to their Toyota. The man grabbed his wife's arm and led her to the passenger side of the car and carefully sat her in. He even kissed her cheek as he pulled away, and Hanna felt her heart melt.
"I can see it in your eyes."
"That's some cheesy shit right there, Caleb," Hanna muttered as she continued to look out of the window. She didn't know why she was suddenly being so moody with Caleb; it just came out of nowhere. When Hanna heard Caleb let out a big sigh, she knew he didn't know what do say anymore. "I know we don't even know if I'm actually pregnant yet, but if we are, how are we going to work it around moving to New York?"
Caleb had begun to pull his keys from his back pocket, but put them back and looked over at the blond. She had her chin resting on her palm, which was resting on the car door. "That's what you're worried about?" Caleb replied in a calm voice. "Babe, we can work our way around that. It's not a big deal."
"Well a baby would kind of muck it up. We'd need even more people to help us move, and there aren't that many who can actually help right now." Hanna finally turned her head so she was facing Caleb and felt his deep, dark brown eyes warm her heart. "Plus, we weren't even planning on having a baby."
"So? Maddie wasn't planned and look how that all turned out."
The blond sighed. "I'm just scared," she mumbled.
"Don't be. Everything is going to work out just fine, I promise." Caleb gave Hanna a reassuring smile and squeezed her hand. "Imagine another little Maddie running around. How cute would that be?"
"I suppose it'd be kind of cute," Hanna said slowly. She even managed to give her husband a smile, but a genuine one this time. "I still don't think it's the right time," she added quickly.
"It is. Trust me."
After the relatively short journey back to the house, Caleb jumped out of the car and hurried around the side to help Hanna out. She gratefully took his hand and stepped out, before opening the next car door and helping Madelyn scramble out. The toddler darted across the driveway, straight to the front door, where she began jumping up and down. Maddie wasn't even aware what was going and already seemed more excited than Caleb.
"Okay Maddie, Mommy needs to do something in the bathroom, so can you play in your playroom with Daddy for a moment?" Hanna asked as she pushed her daughter through the door. Caleb followed behind, threw the keys onto the table, and then swung Maddie into his arms.
"How about we play princesses?" Caleb asked, tickling the little girl's belly. Madelyn let out a squeal and threw her head back in laughter. "I'll take that as a yes then."
Grinning to herself, Hanna wandered off to the downstairs bathroom, feeling a little more at ease with the situation. She dropped the shopping bag on the floor and pulled one of the boxes out, reading the instructions. She gulped down a glass of water she'd quickly poured for herself, and did as instructed. Hanna then repeated the process with the three other tests.
When 5 minutes had passed, Caleb began to get worried. With Madelyn perched on his hip, he headed through the house and tapped on the bathroom door. "Hanna? Is everything okay?"
Hanna opened the door to reveal 4 pregnancy tests lying on the side. "I need to wait one more minute."
Caleb nodded in understanding and was about to say something when the toddler in his arms suddenly leant over, causing him to nearly topple. Maddie was leaning towards her mom, and had her arms stretched out. "Mama," she called. Hanna smiled and tilted her head sideways, before reaching out and retrieving her. Madelyn immediately nuzzled into Hanna's blond hair and wrapped her tiny arms around her neck.
A sudden beeping sound echoed around the bathroom, and Hanna giggled as she grabbed her phone and switched off the alarm she had set. Hanna looked at Caleb and took a deep breath as her hand took ahold of one of the sticks.
"What does it say?" the brunette asked, his voice wobbling with a sudden wash of nerves.
"I can't do it." Hanna held out her hand towards Caleb, who slowly took the test from her hands. Everything turned silent for a moment as he read it, and Hanna was sure her heart was thumping in her chest so loudly, people could hear it in the next house. "Caleb?" she whispered.
"It's positive!" he exclaimed. Hanna looked up wide-eyed, expecting it all to be a joke. When she saw her husband's genuine grin taking up half his face, Hanna knew he wasn't lying. She forgot Maddie was in her arms and threw herself into Caleb's chest, squealing.
"Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God!" Hanna squealed. She began jumping up and down on the spot with excitement, making Madelyn giggle. Hanna looked down at her daughter, grinning. "You're going to be a big sister!"
Madelyn didn't understand what was going on, and completely ignored her mother's comment. She started begging to be put on the floor, so Hanna let her run free. As Madelyn's feet trotted into the kitchen, the blond stared at Caleb, still smiling. She collapsed into his arms and sighed, "We're going to have a baby."
A/N - i hope you guys all liked this chapter! let me know what you thought of it by leaving a review!
i seem to be getting less and less reviews and its making me feel kinda like i shouldn't bother to write anymore chapters. i don't want to stop writing, but when you guys actually do review, i feel motivated, so please keep reviewing!
can we get 5 reviews for the next chapter?