Epilogue

Four months later, Dana Leslie Reid was born. She arrived squalling up a storm, which just proved she had a good set of lungs on her. The whole family from her parents; to her grandmother, to Dave, Lynnette, Rocky, and Roxie had all immediately fallen in love with her.
If only she would stop squalling, as if the world was coming to an end.
Dana was a variation of Diana and different enough that she would never be confused with her grandmother if they happened to be in the same room. They might actually use Diana after the original died, but hopefully that wouldn't be for many years.
"Well, she certainly has a good set of lungs on her," Rocky had commented, from the minute he had held her for the first time, as Dana had started crying and hadn't stopped, except to sleep and drink her bottle .
"Yeah, she does," Dave grinned down at his granddaughter. "This stage shall pass soon enough, though we'll all be wishing for peace and quiet by the time it does."
"Derrick never cried like this," Lynnette said. "I'll be able to hold this over my brother's head forever that he helped produce such a terror."
"She'll grow out of it," Dave said calmly, "and in the meantime, we'll just wear earplugs."
"Dave, really? How could you ignore this little sweetheart cries by wearing earplugs?" Lynnette teased him smiling. "It's not like our hearing is going to be affected since we're immortal and we also can't get headaches."
"There is crying to be fed and changed, and then there is crying just because she's upset for some unknown reason. She shouldn't be hungry, as she was just fed and her diaper seems to be dry, which means she hasn't pooped or peed in it so what else is there for her to scream about?" Dave said. "She can't be sick because she's immortal so that gives her even less reason to keep screaming as if she's being tortured."
"The only time she stops is when she's eating or sleeping," Michelle said, as she bounced her daughter up and down, hoping to make her stop crying, and Dana looked at her, sniffled a few times before just lying in her mother's lap finally, falling silent.
"How in the world do you do that?" Lynnette asked Michelle in amazement. "She screams and cries whenever anybody else tries to hold her so why are you different?"
"I'm her mother," Michelle said simply.
"I know some babies don't like to be touched, except by certain people, but you would think Dana would know she safe and that we would never harm her," Dave said genuinely puzzled at his granddaughter's behavior.
"She is only about a week old dad give her a little time," Michelle suggested. "Even Spencer can't hold her a lot of the time without her crying and wailing and he's her father."
"Every baby is different just like every adult is different," Lynnette said. "Hopefully, she'll calm down and not only when she's sleeping or eating or we really are going to need those earplugs that Dave just suggested, even if he was joking, when she really gets going."
"Maybe you should try singing her a lullaby," Michelle suggested to Lynnette. "Your voice might soothe her into being quiet and falling back to sleeps."
"I'm willing to try anything at this point," Lynnette said. "Perhaps my voice will soothe her, so she'll stop screaming and crying at least."
"Hopefully that will work," Dave said. "Something has to be done as Michelle does need to sleep sometimes and right now Dana is only quiet when Mellie holds her, or she's sleeping or eating."
"I'm sure we're going to be very grateful for the soundproofing throughout the house before she finally stops crying all the time," Lynnette said. "We won't be able to hear a thing in our wing of the house."
"Dana is just more finicky than a Derrick is that's all," Dave said. "Some babies are."
"That's true," Spencer said coming from the library.
Spencer had a book in his hand, of course, but instead of his normal reading material, this was a children's storybook. Spencer had enjoyed shopping for the appropriate books for his little princess before she had even arrived, since they had known what the sex was going to be after the fifth month.
Diana had given her son a list of what would be appropriate for her new granddaughter and so that was what Spencer had bought.
"I'm hoping if I read to her while Mellie is holding her that she'll fall back asleep," Spencer explained.
"We were going to have Lynnette try singing to her next time she starts screaming and see if that soothes her enough for her to go back to sleep or at least to stop crying."
"We'll have to see what works," Spencer said, as he sat beside Michelle and opened one of the books that his mother had recommended. "Once upon a time," Spencer began.
Everybody listened, as Spencer read the fairytale to his daughter, and noticed that Dana didn't make a sound as her father read to her. In fact, she was staring at her father as he read as if wanted to catch every word.
Soon the story was over though, and everybody looked at Dana, who had fallen asleep at the sound of a father's soothing voice.
"Well, what do you know? She's actually asleep again?" Michelle said softly, not wanting to wake her daughter up. "I'll go put her back in her crib so that we don't wake her up with our conversation."
"No, that's the last thing we need," Lynnette said.
Michelle rose still cradling her week old daughter in her arms and headed for the room that had been set up for her away from Derrick's nursery since they didn't want Dana waking up her brother with her constant crying.
A second crib had been bought for the new baby in the house since Derrick was still using his, though he wouldn't be for much longer since he was over a year old now. It wouldn't be long before Derrick was climbing out of his crib and when that happened, a bed would be bought for him.
"We're going to have to experiment and see if Dana will go to sleep if her father is holding her, so long as he's reading her a story," Dave said. "This time Dana was in her mother's arms, just listening as her father read to her, but we need to see if that will work for other members of the family and also Bertha, as she even cries when she is changing her diaper.
"I'm willing," Spencer said. "I would love to hold her, but Dana cries every time I try and since I don't want to see her working herself into an overcharged emotional state I've been leaving that chore to Mellie. I know that's not exactly fair, but every time I try to pick her up, she starts screaming again."
"Welcome to the club," Lynnette told her brother dryly.
"Some club," Spencer said, just as dryly.
Michelle came back just in and sat back down beside Spencer without Dana.
"So, what were we discussing again?" Michelle inquired what she had settled herself.
"We were just discussing about me trying to hold her while I'm reading to her instead of you," Spencer informed his wife.
"We're hoping that Spencer reading to her while holding her that she won't start crying again," Dave explained what they had been discussing to his daughter.
"Well, it's certainly worth trying," Michelle said pursing her lips and thought. "I can't be the only one that can hold her, as I do need to sleep and do other things sometimes.
"If singing to her works, then we can record her voice for Dana to listen to whenever someone is holding her or changing her," Spencer suggested.
"Why record me singing when there are discs out with my music?" said Lynnette.
"True," Spencer said. "Let's see if it works first before we go buying."
"We've never bought any of your music because we have you as part of our family. I mean, you're always singing and playing so we haven't needed to go by disc of your music," Michelle told Lynnette
"But she also can't always be available to Dana when she starts crying as she does deserve a life," Dave spoke up.
"Exactly, which is why I suggested buying a disc of my music," Lynnette said, "once we know if it works or not. If my voice can soothe her, then that's a good thing, at least until she outgrows this particular stage. Besides, I have a heavy concert schedule for the next few months so I can't always be available to soothe Dana to sleep."
Lynnette was becoming more popular all the time with musical fans, which is why she had a heavy concert schedule in the near future.
"We also need a certain amount of sleep and time to do other things like eat," Dave said.
Lynnette immediately understood what Dave wasn't saying and that was the two of them needed time for each other, to make love and just to spend alone time together.
"Which is why this will take a family effort until Dana gets to the stage where she stops making a fuss when anybody holds her but me," said Michelle. "If she doesn't stop being such a hellion, Spencer and I aren't exactly going to be encouraged to have any more anytime soon, not until after she's grown up anyway."
"Michelle, really how can you call your daughter hellion?" Lynnette told her in a mocking tone. "I mean, I thought you loved her."
"I do love her and you know it," Michelle told Lynnette. "But you know, I always tell it like I see it and right now Dana is the equivalent of the devil."
Dave snorted in amusement at his daughter's statement, but since he happened to a agree, he said nothing to chastise her.
"Why she couldn't take after Derrick is beyond me," Michelle added. "And before you say anything, I'm well aware that I was adopted and therefore, I don't share dad's blood, which is why Dana couldn't have turned out more like Derrick. Still, I can't help wishing that she had, because then Bertha could handle her more easily and Spencer and I could get some more sleep than we are presently."
"I have a feeling she's going to be high strung once she is grown," Spencer said.
"Lack of sleep isn't going to kill you, Mellie," Dave told her. "Lack of sleep, doesn't even kill regular humans."
"We know, but that doesn't mean we're not tired, that our brain function isn't at full capacity because we are exhausted. The mind does need rest and doesn't work at hundred percent when it's tired and I have a feeling all of us are going to be very tired by the time Dana starts sleeping through the night," Spencer told Dave. "If we're this tired after only a week, I hate to see how tired we can get if this continues."
"Then we need to implant your ideas as soon as possible and see if at least one of them works," Michelle said.
"We will at the next opportunity," Spencer agreed, kissing Mellie on the cheek.
"We'll survive the lack of sleep," Dave said. "We can always catch up on it when Dana starts behaving like a regular baby instead of a devil with a forked tail and horns on her head."
"That's a rather vivid description," Lynnette chuckled, kissing Dave's cheek.
"Still, it's pretty accurate at the moment," Spencer said. "As much as I don't want to bad mouth, my daughter, all her crying and carrying on is tiresome."
"I wouldn't call it tiresome, as that's too polite. I would call it something much stronger," Lynnette told everyone.
"OK, everyone that's enough bad mouthing my granddaughter, even if we all think that she's acting like demon at the moment," Dave told his family. "We'll just have to be patient until she outgrows this stage and we're only lucky that Michelle took her upstairs, so she can't hear what we're saying about her. I know she's just a baby right now and she would not understand what we're saying but why take chances?"
"You're right, babies are information sponges," Spencer said. "We don't want to talk bad about her where she can hear."
The four of them continued to discuss ways to get Dana to stop crying when anybody, but her mother holding her for some time before it was time for a break and to separate for a while.

~~~Dave and Lynnette~~~