A/N: Hi! Thanks again to everyone who reviewed the last chapter, it's really the positive feedback that keeps me inspired to keep writing :) This chapter is probably my favorite so far, so I hope you all enjoy it as much as I enjoyed writing it!
"Bailey, Zola, can we talk to the two of you for a minute?"
Zola dropped the lego she had been about to add to her skyscraper as her mother came into the living room and sat down on the rug near where Bailey was playing with his trains. It was unusual, and while her four year old brother was quick to climb into his mother's lap in excitement, Zola knew well enough to be suspicious. After all her father was sitting on the couch with the look he always got when he was about to pretend bad news was actually good news. The last time he had gotten that look on his face he'd cancelled their fishing trip and taken her to see Aunt Lizzie instead.
"It's okay Zo," Meredith said, noticing the troubled expression on her daughter's face, "You're not in trouble."
She patted a seat next to her on the rug, and Zola took a few hesitant steps towards her, choosing to sit just a bit further away.
"Are we going to visit Aunt Lizzie again?"
Derek laughed at that, taking care to lighten the expression on his face as he answered, "No, we're not going to visit Aunt Lizzie again. Not any time soon."
This seemed to satisfy Zola, and she turned her attention back to Meredith as she took a deep breath and plastered a smile on her face.
"We were wondering," she started, anxiety rising in her chest as Bailey turned to stare up at her with his big blue eyes, "How you two would feel about having another little brother or sister."
In the silence that followed you could have heard a pin drop from a mile away. Zola looked between her mother's forced smile and her father's pleasant questioning look, her own face a blank slate. Bailey's eyebrows knitted together and after a moment of thought his lips turned down in a frown.
"Will I have to share my trains?"
Meredith chuckled, giving Bailey a squeeze.
"Eventually, yes, but if there's two of you that means two times the trains."
"More trains?" He asked, his face lighting up.
"If you get any more trains you'll have enough to start your own railroad," Derek quipped, but his sarcasm was lost on Bailey, who was already squirming out of Meredith's grasp.
"Sounds good to me!" He shouted happily, finally freeing himself and running back to his toys. Meredith and Derek shared a look, smirking at their son's total nonchalance in the face of having a new sibling. It took a moment before either of them noticed the tears welling up in Zola's eyes.
"Oh Zola, what's wrong?" Meredith asked after what felt like an eternity to the little girl, reaching out and putting a comforting hand on her knee.
"Are you pregnant?" Zola sniffled. She barely remembered her mother being pregnant with Bailey, but she sort of remembered when her Aunt April had been pregnant with her cousin Cece, and she was pretty sure if her mom was pregnant she should be able to tell. As far as she understood pregnancy began when you started looking like you were hiding a basketball under your shirt. So Meredith's response hardly surprised her.
"No sweetie, Daddy and I have been talking about maybe adopting another baby like we adopted you."
But even though it was the answer she was expecting, Zola couldn't help but jerk her body away from her mother as she began to cry hot angry tears. When she reached to hold her Zola slapped her hands away, knowing better than to hit her mother, but too caught up in the moment to care. It was only when she felt her father's strong hands grasping her under her armpits that she stopped fighting and let him lift her into his lap.
"Zozo, can you tell me what's wrong?" He asked gently, holding her as she turned and buried her face into his chest, tears wetting his shirt.
She couldn't tell him what was wrong. She couldn't find the words to explain the way that it felt like a giant hole had just appeared in her stomach. Her head kept replaying the memory of Jeremy Atkins from her swim class telling her that every time parents had a baby they started loving their other kids less. He had four younger siblings, and Zola couldn't help but notice that his Mom yelled at him a lot more than the other moms yelled at their kids. She was lucky, he had told her, that it was just her and Bailey.
Except now it wouldn't be.
"Don't you love me anymore?" Zola whimpered finally, lifting her head from Derek's chest and searching his eyes for reassurance.
"Of course we love you Zo," he replied, kissing her on the forehead, "just because we might adopt another baby doesn't mean we're going to love you any less."
"We have so much love for you and your brother," Meredith chimed in, joining them on the couch and taking Zola's hand in her own and giving it a squeeze, "and if we have another baby our love is just going to grow even bigger."
"Jeremy says when parents have a new baby they love their other kids less."
"I think Jeremy is a little mixed up," she offered, smiling when she felt Zola squeeze her hand back. The little girl sniffled, resting her head back against Derek's chest as he rubbed small soothing circles on her back.
"But why do you want another baby?"
"Well sweetie, there are a lot of the babies in the world who need a home and a family," Derek began to explain. Zola relaxed a little, comforted by the vibration of his voice in his chest.
"And some of those babies have a hard time finding families," Meredith picked up, "because they're sick or they need surgeries."
"Like when I was a baby?"
Meredith nodded, "Just like when you were a baby. A lot of families are afraid that they can't take care of babies who need surgery, so they don't adopt them."
Zola was quiet for a moment, turning that information over in her mind. She wondered what would have happened if her parents hadn't met her at the hospital. They'd told her the story about how her Uncle Alex brought her over to have surgery and they fell in love with her at first sight, but she had never thought about what would have happened if they had never met her. Would she have been adopted? Or would she still be waiting for a family that wasn't afraid to take care of her?
"We should adopt one of those babies," she declared finally, looking between her parents faces as they smiled down at her.
"Yeah? That sounds good to you?" Derek asked. Zola nodded decisively.
"Yeah because you're good at taking care of sick babies. You took care of me!"
He chuckled, "That's true, we did."
"And I can help take care of the new baby. I'll read it stories and hold its hand when it has to get shots so it doesn't get scared."
"That sounds perfect Zo," Meredith said, releasing her hand so she could stroke her hair lovingly.
"There's just one thing," Zola replied, shaking away Meredith's hand and giving both of her parents a deathly serious look.
"What's that?"
"It needs to be a girl."
Across the room Bailey let out a screech as he crashed one of his trains through Zola's lego skyscraper, sending it toppling to the ground and shattering into pieces. Meredith and Derek caught each other's eye, matching smirks growing on their faces as they nodded in unison.
"I think you might be onto something there."
"We will definitely consider that."
A/N: Once again, thank you for reading! Reviews are, as always, much appreciated. Next chapter will be Japril, and I'm hoping to get it up some time early in the week so keep an eye out for it!