Daddy's Home!
Calleigh smiled seeing her daughter's eyes dart toward the porch hearing the front door open and close. She knew it was daddy because Eric had called moments ago.
"Who's that? Is that daddy?" She asked Nevaeh.
Nevaeh's face broke into a grin. The baby girl stood up and ran toward the porch. Calleigh laughed watching the fast pace the diaper-clad butt ran to meet her dad, it was more like a waddle.
"Dada!" She heard the little girl exclaim. She knew that never failed to make Eric smile.
"Hello princesa," he said picking the baby up. "Daddy missed you!" Eric smiled as his little girl laid a big, wet kiss on his mouth and then put her short arms around his neck and hug into his shoulder.
"We missed you, too," Calleigh said, walking into the porch and kissing her husband.
Though Eric definitely missed seeing Calleigh at work all the time, he knew their baby deserved one parent home at least half of the time and he would never be selfish enough to ask his wife to change that for him. If his wife had felt differently and had wanted to go to back to work full-time after their daughter was born, regardless of anyone's opinion he would have been more than happy to stay home with Nevaeh. No matter how "unmanly" that role seemed to some.
The Delkos were very happy for Ryan and Natalia. Though they joked the two were going to get a rude awakening to the reality of it–as they had themselves, once the baby came.
Many people told them about how much less sleep they would be getting but that never sunk in till they had Nevaeh that first night. When Nevaeh was three-weeks-old on a brief trip to the lab Calleigh asked Alexx "do newborns ever sleep?"
Her and Eric were totally exhausted at this point.
Alexx laughed. "They do. But unfortunately just not when you want them to."
As usual, no one ever knew how, Horatio overheard this, too. He went to the couple's home after work, getting there a few minutes after Eric had arrived home from the lab. He told them he was there to babysit while the two got some sleep. The two looked so tired that he knew once they got to bed they wouldn't be able to do anything else.
Eric finished feeding the baby, burped her and handed her over to her godfather. The parents were even too tired to eat dinner. Horatio told them to get some sleep first and then eat dinner. He'd stay for a while. He chuckled seeing the onsie Nevaeh was wearing. The words 'tiny but trouble' were written on the front.
"Very true tonight, huh?" He said. "Won't sleep for your mommy today, sweetheart?"
Nevaeh responded with a gurgle.
The couple felt bad when they slept till 10:30. Their baby girl was still awake but starting to fall asleep. Horatio had changed her into a sleeper and was feeding her a bottle. He told the couple to go eat and he'd tuck the baby in.
"He's wonderful with her, isn't he?" Calleigh said to Eric in the kitchen.
"For sure. And from the way he looks at her, I'm sure he'd take her home if we said the word."
Nevaeh could feed herself with a spoon. And was quite proud of it, she often refused to let someone spoonfeed her now. Now she didn't like wearing a bib, she started to resist this in the past few weeks. This evening she happily ate mince meat, peas and rice with tomato sauce sprinkled with cheese, but without the spices or the tortilla her parents had.
She also knew one word that she would get a "yes" to if she ate all her dinner.
"Cookie!"
"What else do you say?" Eric asked.
"Me cookie," she said, pointing at herself.
"No," daddy smiled. "Try again."
"Pease," the baby said.
"Thatta girl," Eric said, giving her a chocolate chip cookie.
After she ate her cookie, Nevaeh wanted to get down. Her parents knew it was unrealistic to ask a 16-month-old to stay seated in her high chair longer. She had sat and ate without a fuss, except for getting her bib on. That was all they could ask of a child so young.
"Book?" Neaveh said, going over to her child's size table in the corner of the room and bringing one of her favorite books Put Me in the Zoo over.
"I'll read to you in a bit, okay?" Eric said when his daughter came over to him.
Dad had got the chance to change his clothes and wash up before eating dinner with his family. This was something he didn't get the chance to do often and he savored it. The little girl seemed to understand. Nevaeh went back and sat at her table, sat down and began to scribble with crayons. Her parents chatted at the table for a while. When she heard the dishwasher start, Nevaeh looked up.
Calleigh laughed.
"I think that's your cue, daddy."
"Yeah," Eric smiled, kissing his wife. "I have another date. I promise I won't be late."
Calleigh didn't tell her husband but when she were taking a bubble bath, she enjoyed listening to them during their daddy-daughter play probably as much as the two enjoyed that precious time together.
