Snips n' Snails & Puppy Dog Tails

Chapter 1

Owen was at the museum picking Claire up for lunch one afternoon. He smoothly found his way through the office halls and eventually turned to the right, finding his girlfriend heading back to her desk, carrying some files with her. Claire was looking impeccable, the pencil skirt she was wearing accentuating her firm legs and ass. She was in great shape, a huge turn on for Owen: it felt like he hadn't seen her look this sexy in a while.

Claire smiled as they met by her desk. She rested her hands on his chest, and with a light moan, she caressed his pectorals, his hands running around her slim waist, pulling her closer into a kiss.

Owen then turned to look over to her desk and smiled. "Hello balls, is the psycho redhead treating you well?" He greeted what looked like his testicles in a jar. Claire kept them visible for him to be reminded of his doing.

Claire groaned and frowned, feeling how Owen abruptly sat up on their bed after waking up sweating cold. "You upset it..." She pouted, feeling completely nauseated now that he had woken her up so sudden.

"I'm sorry, Pookie" He kissed her forehead a couple of times, hearing her take deep breaths and nuzzling into his neck.

"Are you okay?" She mumbled. Once Owen adjusted and moved down the bed to her twelve-weeks baby bump, Claire checked the time on her nightstand: It was 2AM. This was the fourth night in a row that Owen kept waking up from some dream he kept having, one he insisted it was nothing, not telling her what it was about.

"Why are you up so late at night, sea monkey?" Owen was now talking to their baby.

"Because you woke us up. That's what happens when you eat too much before bed." She complained upon reaching for her pink lemonade flavored water — still unable to tolerate tap and bottled water.

Owen didn't like addressing their baby as an 'it'; from the first ultrasound, he had figured the embryo had the shape of a sea monkey and had nicknamed it as such.

"Hmm." He let her believe it was the midnight snacks giving him nightmares, when in reality it was the vasectomy appointment that he would have on Monday, that was making his balls sweat — literally.

Claire adjusted and rested her arm against her forehead, able to feel how strong the headache she had was pounding against it. "Make it stop." She begged, feeling like she would throw up at any given time.

Owen pulled up the flannel shirt she was wearing as pajamas and gently started to press kisses on her rounding belly. "It's time to go back to sleep...daddy is sorry he woke you up." He tenderly talked to the belly, caressing it softly and nosing into it. "You are making mommy feel sick and we don't want that, do we?"

Claire looked down at Owen, her fingers brushing his hair back with a light smile, slowly feeling the nausea going away. The headache was still unbearable though.

"Nu daddy, I don't wants to make mommy sick. I sowwy." Owen replied in a baby voice, having a conversation with himself while he tried to ease the symptoms for Claire. It always worked, and watching him engage so intimately with their unborn baby always made her cry.

He looked up, watching silent tears running down her freckled cheeks. She sniffed before Owen kissed her lovingly and wrapped her in his arms.

"Is mommy feeling better now?" Owen kissed her tears and smiled, watching her nod. This was her second pregnancy, but having the father there, every second, attentive to her and the baby's needs, was a new experience and it was brutal to her hormones.

"Goodnight, daddy." Claire adjusted, and holding tight on his chest and nuzzling into his neck, she found her favorite sleeping position, curled against him with her baby bump brushing against his arms.

"Goodnight, mommy." Owen offered, kissing her forehead a couple of times, staying awake for a few minutes until he made sure Claire had been able to go back to sleep.

****

That following morning, Claire was fighting with her skirt. She had managed to bring it up over her belly and it now looked like a big lunch tummy wrapped tightly in the fabric. She kept grunting while trying to pull the zipper up.

Owen was on the other side of the bedroom on his phone, the redhead too frustrated with her wardrobe to be paying attention to his call. He was being very ambiguous too.

"Yeah. No. It's okay. I'll wait for your call so we can reschedule." He sighed in relief as the call ended and his attention went back to Claire.

"Who was that?" She casually asked, grunting and still on a one-on-one fight with her skirt.

"Um... that was a client, postponing this thing...you know." Owen lied. That was the hospital letting him know his doctor for the vasectomy was out of town and he wouldn't be back until next week so they would be in contact to reschedule.

"Oh. Okay." She smiled. "But you still have the gig, right?" She tilted her head. Owen was now running his own construction company. It was small but it was doing well. He had a group of workers that he trusted and a few contacts and clients he had made throughout the last year he had been working in the field.

Owen nodded. "Babe, you don't fit in those anymore." He shook his head, and after tossing his phone over the bed, he walked to stand behind her and hugged her gently. His lips slowly pecked down her neck.

"Yes, but Brenda and I agreed to take the kids to the Sony Wonder Technology Lab and you haven't told her about baby." She looked over her shoulder with narrowed eyes.

"So?" He chuckled. They had had this conversation many times before. It went hand in hand with when they would tell the kids they would be elder siblings now. Claire, on her end, wasn't ready to tell Mason, she knew this would require them to find the perfect moment and just slide the news in, and that moment had yet to come. On the other hand, with Lizzie, they knew that telling her meant Brenda would find out and for some reason Owen was avoiding the subject.

"What do you mean 'so'?" Claire sighed, her arms already tired of reaching back and fight with the zipper. "She's your ex-wife! And you knocked her friend up." Claire was just viewing this as a courtesy FYI, one that if this were the other way around, she'd appreciate.

"Yeah. She's your friend, you tell her." Owen rubbed the back of his neck before he helped Claire with the zipper. "Hold your breath!" He asked before he tried pull the zipper up.

"I'm holding my breath!" Claire pointed out before she tried again, the zipper only going up halfway. "And she's your ex-wife, Owen... this is your thing, not mine." She insisted.

"Babe, this is not going up. I'm afraid that if I pull harder, I'll break it." He scratched his head. "Your skirt not fitting is a sign. You just go with your usual clothes and, you know, let her find out like that." Owen shrugged.

Claire snatched his hands away from her zipper and lay on the bed on her stomach, which (with a lot of patience) worked, and Owen managed to zip her up. Claire rolled over and, reaching out, let him pull her back up.

"You can't breathe, can you?" Owen shook his head, completely against this.

Claire held one finger up and slowly started to breathe until she eventually was able to move. "Okay, I'm out of here." She pecked his lips a couple of times. "Mason? Are you ready? We are running late!" Claire called out after checking the time on her wrist watch.

"I'll go into that junk room and see if I can clean it up." Owen offered. They had been trying to figure out where to fit a nursery room in their apartment. Claire had gotten it thinking it would only be Mason and her, after all. The apartment came with a small study room but for the past eight years, Claire had been accumulating all kinds of crap in it. It was the only corner in her life that was messy.

"Okay." She smiled and kissed him lovingly. "I'll be back in a couple of hours." She assured him before she went looking for Mason to make sure he was ready to leave.

****

At the museum, Brenda was quietly observing Claire, who was evidently uncomfortable in that skirt. She had already pulled out her top from under it and had undone the first two buttons of her blouse; those breasts were huge. She had gone from 34Cs to very perky 38Ds in just a few months.

Claire was always looking for a bench to sit every time the kids got distracted in one spot and went to play with the different attractions and appliances available for them.

Brenda had also been keeping an unconscious tab on everything Claire had eaten in just an hour and how she had passed on the usual coffee. At the coffee stand, the redhead had managed to order a Nutella bagel with bacon (which was a secret ingredient Brenda didn't notice); however, the Nutella bite alone was something Claire wouldn't usually eat.

Of course, being pregnant came with the massive need to pee every ten minutes, which meant Claire was holding seven times that by now, fully aware that she wouldn't be able to lift that skirt without any consequence.

"No running, guys!" Brenda called out once both Lizzie and Mason ran off to check the new area they had just entered. The woman slowly let her eyes fall on Claire, who was having issues finding a way to feel comfortable and breathe; her ankles were killing her in those heels, too.

It was the sudden sound of fabric ripping that made Claire freeze and Brenda tilt her head, trying to figure out where it came from.

Claire closed her eyes and slowly reached back, the thread holding the zipper had given out. "Shit..."

"Was that you?" Brenda looked around her friend's back and gasped at how that zipper was basically falling off.

"Hold on..." Claire pulled it down and took a deep breath now that she could breathe, her baby bump now completely visible under her tight blouse.

"WHAT THE!?" Brenda was shocked, surprised, upset, confused, and now irritated that Claire was asking her to hold on that thought before she ran off to the nearby restroom so she could finally pee and check the damage on her skirt.

Claire texted Owen while peeing, letting him know that he had been right about the zipper, completely humiliated, but that Brenda now knew.

"Care to explain!?" Brenda immediately demanded the moment Claire was back and sat next to her on the bench in that area.

"I'm three months pregnant" She smiled guiltily. "With Owen's baby." She shrugged. "So, what's new with you?" Claire cleared her throat.

"What do you mean you are PREGNANT with MY ex HUSBAND's baby?" Brenda blinked a couple of times. "Were you planning on telling me?" She crossed her arms in front of her chest.

"Of course! I just didn't say anything today because Owen wanted to be the one to tell you." Claire lied, her nose wrinkled.

"Do the kids know?" Brenda curved an eyebrow, they better not had told her daughter to lie to her.

"No! We haven't told anyone yet. I mean, my parents and sister know and my nephews know... but Mason doesn't yet and neither does Lizzie!" Claire assured her.

"How did it happen anyways? I thought you didn't want any more kids." Brenda recalled. "Don't take it personally if he isn't there for you though, that's just him." She rolled her eyes bitterly. "I would always be asking him to do this or do that and he never got anything done!"

Claire frowned. She could relate to that feeling but not with this pregnancy. "Yeah...I'm not keeping my hopes up." She looked around.

Brenda got to her own conclusion that Claire's condition was the reason why, as Lizzie had told her, they had moved in together. The blonde knew Owen would give Claire everything he never gave to her and probably already was — just like their relationship thus far. However, it was easier to pretend he hadn't changed. "So how did it slip?" Brenda asked again, hoping she could get something out of the obvious accidental pregnancy.

"Bad condoms." Claire confessed.

Brenda chuckled. "So, it was his fault." She gloated.

Claire nodded, "Recalled ones...he was fully aware of it and still wore them." She added, still slightly mad about it.

To Brenda, this was reliving. It was the Owen she knew, it was the Owen she had told Claire about before the couple had even met. "Didn't I tell you? I told you he was an immature jerk!" She shook her head laughing a little. "I told you so!"

Owen was spending all his morning taking all kinds of junk out of that room. He couldn't believe the same Claire he loved and knew to want things to always be in order and under control had created that mess. The moment he opened the door, a bike almost fell on him. That was the last thing Claire had put in there. She had used the bike to literally hold everything back so the door could close.

It was a red small bike with crooked training wheels. If he had to take a guess, it looked like something Mason had ridden when he was about four. He set that one to the side and started to fill endless bags with trash while setting to the side things they could sell in a garage sale — if Claire would ever agree to that.

It was very rewarding to finally look up and see the room empty. He opened the window so it could get some air: the room smelled like mold and he knew that wasn't good for the baby — or any of them, for that matter.

He found an old box and set it in the middle of the room, soon using other stuff like old chairs and tables to emulate the nursery. He couldn't wait for Claire to get home and show her.

After taking all the trash down to the alley dumpster, Owen trotted back to the apartment and hit the shower, being out just in time to meet Claire and Mason back from the Lab with Lizzie, who was spending the weekend over.

"Lizard!!!!" Owen squatted down, watching his daughter run to his arms and hugging her lovingly.

"Are you making my own room here too?" She saw that mysterious room was finally opened and cleaned.

"Did you find dinosaurs or elves in there!?" Mason wondered. The kids had a phase when they would imagine what was behind that door and pretend they could teleport inside and find a whole different world in it.

"No, but you can go check all the junk that was in there." Owen pointed out to the spot where piles of stuff were lying.

"Cool!" Both kids ran off.

"So how did it go?" Owen held Claire close and kissed her lovingly.

"Meh, it's out, that's all that matters." She sighed. "What's all this?" She smiled once the boxes and old furniture caught her attention.

"This is sea monkey's nursery!" Owen held her hand and guided her inside. "The crib can go there, and we can put the rocking chair here, and the diaper changing table over there..." He pointed out.

Claire clung to him, nuzzling against his neck. "I love it, but... we have to find a way to get rid of the humidity." She slowly pulled at his arm and got out of the room.

"Babe?" Owen pulled the old bike around the hall and let Claire set her eyes on it. "I didn't know Mason had a bike."

Claire sighed, trying not to let hormones get the best of her. "He doesn't. That was his last." She shrugged. "He never learned how to ride without the training wheels and one day he just told me to throw it out, and that he didn't want a bike ever again." She gulped.

"Oh." Owen frowned. "What happened?"

"Josh." She rolled her eyes. "He promised he would come over and teach him. That was four years ago." Claire looked down, "But it doesn't matter anymore. He is now over him and it will be all over soon." She smiled at that.

"I can teach him if you want." Owen pulled her closer to him, letting her baby bump brush against him.

"It's not a matter of me wanting you to do it, it's about him wanting to learn." she smiled, their forehead pressing against each other before Owen kissed her lovingly.