Jamie watched intently the rise and fall of his son's chest as he laid asleep in the middle of his crib. He reached out and placed a gentle hand on the baby himself, wanting to make sure what he was seeing wasn't just a figment of his imagination with his tired brain. Thankfully, he was correct and the baby was breathing as he should.
He found himself doing this quite often since they brought their baby boy home almost one week ago today. Conor's arrival came suddenly, exactly a month early due to increased complications toward the end of the pregnancy. Thankfully, Eddie and Conor made it through the c-section safely but the baby did have to stay in the NICU due to feeding issues and his small size. Despite Conor's issues being more minor than most, the sounds of the multiple machines they had the babies connected to still haunted his dreams at night. Anytime one went off, their eyes would immediately dart to the screen that showed the readings of the machines Conor was connected to and hoped that it wasn't him. There was one time where the baby did have a frightening episode where he had trouble breathing, which led to Jamie having to literally pry Eddie from the baby's side so they could tend to him. Since then, the baby had done wonderfully with no lingering issues. But, that moment sat with him more than he cared to admit and had him continuously checking on the baby throughout the night. He would get up with Eddie when she would feed him and would sit on guard between the two of them after the fact, wanting to be the most certain that the baby was okay before deciding to sleep again himself.
The possibility of something happening to his newborn son terrified him. Their boy was so perfect in every way imaginable that he wanted to protect him from all the horrors of the world forever if he could. He felt that if he remained standing guard at his bedside, then he could intercept anything that was coming his way. But, he knew that it was only wishful thinking. These thoughts made him think about Joe and their own father, finally getting some understanding of the types of feelings he likely went through when their brother passed away. He doesn't know if he could go on if something ever happened to their son. He would lay down his life in an instant if it meant that that their boy would be spared from any harm.
He reached out and ran a finger over the side of his small face. He could stare at him like this forever if he could. It was still wild to him that he and Eddie could make such a perfect baby. Everyone said that the two of them were twins which, if you compared his baby pictures to his son, they were pretty spot on. Besides his eyes from his wife, the rest of the baby was him. He would never flat out admit it himself due to his wife jokingly complaining that she did all the hard work of being pregnant and giving birth for Conor to look just like him.
His eyes were growing heavy but he couldn't pull himself away from the baby. That is until he heard familiar footsteps coming up behind him.
"There you are," Eddie whispered.
He turned and gave a sheepish smile, one he was sure their son would give when he was older and start getting himself into mischief.
"Did I wake you up?" he asked.
"No. I was just missing my furnace," she joked, then clasped his shoulder as she joined him at the crib. "He's so perfect, isn't he? I still can't believe we made a kid as cute as him. Clearly, since it was most of your genes that made the cut."
Jamie chuckled, "He has your eyes, hon. And he's going to change anyways. I'm sure he's going to end up looking like you before too long."
"Have you not seen you Reagan boys? You and both Joes could pass as triplets. Hopefully, we can have a girl one day in the very far future and she can look like me."
"Very far future?" he questioned with a raised brow toward his wife. "How far in the future are we talking?"
"Hey… you can ask that question if you're going to be one popping a baby out yourself," she joked lightly.
He smiled, "Noted."
"But seriously," she continued. "Not that far truly. Let's get this one sleeping through the night first so we can sleep ourselves… like you should be right now."
He let out a sigh as he stared adoringly at their newborn son, "I know. I know. I just… it's hard to pull away from him. He so perfect, Ed. He really is. And the world today really scares the hell out of me for him. I wish I could wrap him up in a bubble and protect him forever but I know I can't."
"I wish I could too," she admitted, laying her head on his shoulder as they looked at the baby. "But as much as we want to and wish we could, we can't. All we can do is teach him and guide him the best way we can to navigate the world out there. And enjoy him as much as possible because I hate to say it, he's not going to be this cute and little forever."
"Yeah…" Jamie trailed off before letting out a yawn.
She smiled and kissed his cheek, "Let's go to bed now, yeah? I'm exhausted and he's going to have us up again in about an hour."
"You're right," Jamie agreed. "Let's go."
They both leaned down and gave light kiss to the cheek of their little boy before turning to head to bed themselves.