All familiar characters belong to Janet, the rest are mine. I apologize in advance if there are more typos than usual.
"There you go, Olive. You just got even cuter," my wife told our baby. "As if that's possible. Good call, Jules."
Under Julie's influence during our usual interactive morning call, Steph had wrangled Olivia's equally unruly waves into a ponytail. But unlike her Mama's typical yanked-back, distracted one ... our daughter's silky-soft hair was all carefully gathered up to the very top of her head again.
"Every time you do that, it looks like her hair's acting as an antenna to pick up more thoughts on what she can get into."
My wife and eldest daughter clearly didn't appreciate my observation. The drawn-out ... "Daaa-addd" Julie gave me with added sensor, and my wife's narrowed-eye look, had Olive bouncing excitedly on her little legs as she draped her arms across Steph's legs. Two tail-wags egged on her dance, before Gunny and Mo decided to do a couple of synchronized laps around our living room since Olivia is being jailed between Steph's knees and can't go far.
"You should have told me that before I did the top-tail," my wife said. "Olive doesn't need any help in that department. Yesterday she 'helped' Ella measure flour for biscuits and ended up wearing half her weight in it. That's the reason I don't cook ... nothing good comes from it."
"Well, you won't starve if you cook," Julie told her. "That's pretty good. Better than being hungry."
"Not when I'm cooking. Your grandmother and Ella are amazing and have helped me out a lot, but they aren't miracle workers."
"You're too hard on yourself, Babe. I'd try whatever you decide to make ... with the exception of anything containing chicken, pork, or fish."
"Sounds like all that leaves is doughnuts."
"And every possible vegetable dish," I pointed out.
"Don't change the subject."
"I didn't."
"Yeah, you did. We were talking about edible food. Back me up, Jules."
"French fries, onion rings, and eggplant Parmesan, are vegetable dishes, Steph. And you order those all the time."
She sighed so dramatically, Olivia's tiny smiling-carrot ponytail holder almost got blown out of her hair. "Great, it's now two daughters and a Daddy against poor outnumbered me. I gave Gunny and Mo their NOT vegetable-based breakfast this morning, so I'm confident they'd take my side if they could talk."
"I'm sure they would," my daughter readily agreed. "Do you guys still act like this after I hang up or come back home? Or is the joking around just for my benefit."
"I'm afraid we're like this all the time unless we have a reason to get dead serious. I believe your Uncle Bobby calls it 'old married couple bickering' when we get going, but I don't see it. Your Dad may be married to me, but nothing about him is old."
"Okay, now I'm implementing that subject change," she told Steph.
I was mentally flipping through what subject they'd likely land on when another call came in.
"No one would call me this early unless it's you or an emergency," I explained to my daughter. "Can you hold on for a second?"
"Go ahead and handle whatever it is. I'll call back a little later to find out what's going on."
She's far more understanding than I deserve, but I took her up on it knowing this is something important.
"Harper ordered me to call you before the doc decides to toss my ass out of the delivery room," was the greeting from Kane I received. "I told her going to a kid-infested party would trigger something, but would she listen? NO. Now we're having ours almost a month ahead of schedule. What if my Angel needed those weeks to finish baking?"
"She'll be fine. You, on the other hand, are going to be far from it if you don't calm down. Do not fuck up your chance to see your daughter being born," I ordered, nodding to Steph when her eyebrows raised and she mouthed 'Harper's in labor?'
"I'm trying not to, but damn it! Seeing Harp doubled over in pain is fucking me up in a way I haven't felt before. I thought I was ready for this … but I was fucking wrong. I needed the full forty weeks and maybe a few after it."
"I'm on my way. All three of you will come out of this okay ... just keep the end game in mind. You're just hours away from being a father."
The shit-eating grin hearing that produced is too easy for me to picture. "I am. And I'm going to be a damn good one, too."
"You are. If you can keep your shit together long enough to help Harper through the worst of it. Don't go off half-cocked and get yourself booted from the mission before it's completed."
"I'm trying."
"Don't try, do it," I ordered him.
"Easy for you to say. You're past this part and are sitting pretty a year into family life."
"I had to feel exactly what you're feeling right now in order to have what I do. It wasn't any easier for me, but Stephanie needed me and that was the only thing that mattered. Do the same for Harper. I'm less than an hour out, and I'm going to kick your ass when I get there if you stress your wife out more than she already is."
I could hear the breath he took, but as I knew he would he got his head in the game and left his nerves on the sidelines.
"Thanks, Man."
"No problem. Your women need you now as much as the men needed you before. You've got this. But just in case, I'm heading out."
He didn't say anything, but I could see his familiar nod before he disconnected as if he were standing here in our living room in front of me.
"Do you want to call your Mom or should I?" Steph asked me.
"Am I to assume you're coming to the hospital with me?"
"Yup. So ...?"
I was about to tell her I'd put in the babysitting request, but my cell now buzzed in my hand.
"That settles it," she said, standing up and then picking our daughter up. "Come on, Olive, you can help me call Ella and then your Abuela. Guess what? Looks like you're getting a playdate with both of them while Mama and Daddy are doing some babysitting of our own. We're going to go and meet your future best friend and co-RangeUncle tormentor."
I wanted to grin at them, but Gene's text didn't afford me the luxury of relaxing. 'Mr. Plum just pulled up to the gate. Should we let him onto the property?'
Ella made it up to our apartment faster than the elevator could, so I had to pull Steph away from the enthusiastic one baby/two dog/and two excited women's greeting.
"Your father is here, Babe. Do you want Gene to clear him?"
"Yeah, I guess. We'll be in the lobby anyway."
I relayed the message and then added my own thank you to Ella for watching our daughter and dogs until my parents could arrive and take over in case baby Angelique's labor and delivery is a long one.
I kissed Olivia. "Be good for Grandma Ella. Okay?"
"Oooobaaay!" She shout-responded.
"Hey ... let's not go crazy here, Olive-Pie," Steph told her. "We're not a real big fan of the word 'obey'. How about we go with you just being your own sweet little self?"
"She can't possibly be anything else," Ella said, holding out her arms to take Olivia. "I'm so excited for both Kane and his wife."
"We are too," my wife agreed. "We'll have the pitter-patter of another set of little feet around here if I can convince them to visit more often."
After another round of hugs and canine head-scratches, we made our way out of our apartment and down to the first floor. I should've tacked on an extra hour and told Kane we'd be there in two hours instead of one.
"Hey, Dad," my wife to Frank, when we met him at the lobby door. "Sorry, but Ranger and I are on our way out."
Frank looked momentarily confused. That news seemed to throw him. "Oh. Uhh ... okay."
Steph paused. "Is there something wrong? Did something happen to Grandma?"
"Your grandmother is indestructible. She's going to outlive all of us."
"You make that sound like it's a bad thing," my wife said, threading her fingers through mine.
Clearly something's been brewing in the Burg ... and we don't have the time to listen to what it is right now. I did offer despite knowing what Steph will say.
"I can head over to the hospital and let you two talk."
"I'm not missing Angel's birth," she insisted. "If no one's sick or dying, this can wait. Right, Dad?"
"I just thought we could talk," Frank told her.
"I'll call you when we get back and then we can get together. How's that?"
He hesitated, but he nodded and turned to leave.
"Guess he wasn't interested in providing his babysitting services. Come to think of it, I'm not sure he knows how to babysit," Steph said to me, once Frank was climbing back into his Buick.
"Could be he's the one of your two parents who believes we're responsible parents, and knew we wouldn't leave Olivia unless we had someone watching her."
"It must be nice for that kind of faith to be an automatic thought."
"It is, but I know that amount of faith is hard to come by, which is why I never considered keeping 'obey' in our vows. I just promised that you'll never have to doubt my faith in - and commitment to - you."
She went up on sneaker-toes to kiss me. "I don't doubt it and I never have. How did you get so sweet with the life you've had?" She asked when she pulled back.
"It's strategic."
"Yeah, right," she said, not buying it.
"It is. I only require you and our kids to love me, so I do what I have to in order to ensure that you continue to."
"You're so full of it, but I admit ... what you're doing is definitely working. I think you're sweet and I do love the heck out of you."
I nodded. "That was the plan. Now we have to go so I can beat some sense and sanity into Kane."
