I had such a long day... and this chapter, I think you'll like it.
It's a kid's being kids chapter! :D
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"Okay, while you do that, I'm taking this one for ice cream." I told the guys.
Tom, Bill and Angie were trying to find a place for all our things in the new house. I had been feeling stressed and tired for the past week or so, and decided I needed a break from asking if I could help and getting everyone to say "no, you're pregnant!"
I pushed Lena's stroller out the door and we went out, the house was surrounded by a gate and although it was beautiful and we had space for anything we could think of, I was overwhelmed. Maybe it was because of the baby, because I was stressed or because I was worried about giving birth in LA with a doctor I didn't know very well.
Lena and I had ice cream near the house at a park where we sat down and although she couldn't realize it, the moment of silence and fresh air was of great help for me.
"So, Lena?" I turned to her on my lap. "Do you want to go shopping?"
"Schoohping?" She said.
I nodded and smiled at her confusion, Lena was nothing like Günther. She reminded me more of Lily, when she was little she couldn't get a grasp of the English language, Lena was the same. German rolled off her tongue better even when she was repeating words in English.
And we went shopping for paint and brushes. Lena's room was already pink, but a simple color was boring, and I wanted my kids to have everything but boring rooms.
We had our rooms repainted before moving, so Günther's was also a light blue color – not to make it boyish, but to try and keep the boy calmed –. Our bedroom was a pale yellow room and the nursery was the same shade of blue as Günther's.
So when we went back home I had a lot of things to do and a lot of paint to use.
"No, are you crazy?" Tom wondered when I pulled my hair up and changed into an old baggy shirt.
"No." I laughed.
"At this point, all you should be doing is sit down." He tried.
"Well, then...yes, I am crazy." I nodded and went back to what would soon become Jansen's room. "I have painted Günther's and Lena's rooms before they were born, and they both loved it! Why should it be any different with this baby?"
"Because he's going to be here in less than a month! I am sorry we moved now, it was awful timing..." Tom apologized, "but, if you want to paint this or any room, you're gonna have to wait until after the baby is born." He put his hands on his hips and stared at me with a serious expression.
"I can't." I told him and went to open one of the cans of paint. "You should unpack the rest of the things while I finish here." I told him.
"Jo..." He looked up, "okay, wait." He stopped me before I put the brush on the paint. "Why don't you make paintings to hang? Like the ones we have in Germany." I tilted my head. "That way, if we ever move again you won't have to paint walls."
"But my stuff is still packed..." I said.
Tom shrugged and put the lid back on the can.
"Then you'll have to eat pizza and wait until we unpack." He said.
I closed my eyes and sighed.
"Fine." I said.
After a few days, Lena and I watched Tom hang some paintings in Jansen's room. I was still working on more paintings for Lena and Gün, but for the time being, Jansen was a priority.
"Mommy, look!" I turned around to see Günther. "It's fluffy!" I jumped back with Lena in my arms.
"TOM!" I looked at Günther with my eyes wide open.
He was going to give me a heart attack someday...if I didn't have one right there and then... he was holding a big disgusting spider on his hand.
"What is it?!" Tom looked at me. "Is it the baby?"
"Is that-is it...?" I pointed at Günther and Tom turned to look at him too.
"Oh, man..." He complained. "Man, where did you get that thing?"
I saw Günther holding the big spider as if it was a puppy.
I reached out but made a fist and brought it over my mouth as I asked him in a whisper not to bring the big spider close to his body.
"I found it in the park." Günther said.
Bill had taken Günther out earlier and as soon as he got him back he had gone outside to play. So I guessed he had been playing with that thing.
"Man, these are not cool..." Tom told him. "Now, hold on, don't drop it!" He warned the kid before going into or bedroom.
"Mommy, can I keep it?" He asked me and I watched the spider move all of its eight bright orange legs and climb up from Günther's hand to his arm.
"No, honey, no; you cannot." I said. "Oh, God... baby, could you softly take it with your hand? I really don't like to see it on your arm..." I felt my mouth go dry with worry.
"But mommy, it's super friendly!" He complained and looked at the spider on his arm while giggling, "And it tickles!"
"Sweetie, just hold it in your hand, okay?" I asked him.
I was so scared, that spider was huge and the bright orange on its legs made me think that it was very poisonous.
"Alright, shoe box!" Tom announced and knelt in front of Günther. "Put it in here." He said.
"It has no holes!" Günther complained. "Peter needs to breathe."
"You named it?!" I pulled Lena's hand down when she reached out as if she wanted to hold the spider too, like hell she would not! "Günther, put it in there!"
He gave me a pleading look.
Tom looked up at me and went off to Günther's room, he came back showing us the box with holes.
"Peter is coming in here." Tom instructed the boy and he gave him the look now. "Günther, the spider, in there." Finally Günther put the spider in the box and I let out a sigh of relief. "We're taking this to the pet store."
"But I wanna keep it!" Gün complained.
"Yes, well, look at your mother, she's pale." Tom put one hand on his hip. "New rule, if it has more eyes than legs: we don't want it in this house, Günther." Tom put his hand on Gün's head and messed his hair a little. "Apologize to you mother."
"I wanted to keep it." He said trough gritted teeth, he looked up at me and said the word as if it was biting him back when he said it. "Sorry."
"Pet store, now, man." Tom put his hand on Gün's shoulder and smiled at me. "Are you okay?"
I nodded and tried to smile.
"Just scared..." I told him. "Whatever you do, don't come back with a dog."
"A fish?" He wondered and I nodded in response. "Be back soon."
I took Lena downstairs and sat down to watch some kids' movie with her and try to calm myself down. I had never been especially scared of spiders but Günther had never brought one and put it on his hand! All I had thought of was what would happen if it decided to bite my little boy...
"Mama!" Lena yelled all of a sudden. "Mama, handy!"
"Handy?" I raised a brow at her and looked at the things around us that she could want.
"Handy!" She yelled again and held on to one of the pillows on the couch. "Handy!"
"What is that, honey?" I asked her and grabbed her to look at her. "What is Handy? Oh..." I got it then.
She didn't mean handy in English, she meant Handy – in German. I could hear then that my cellphone was ringing in the kitchen.
I pulled her up and went to pick up my phone, reading the text from Tom.
"Don't be mad, I can say no to the kid only so many times."
I went back to the living room and sat Lena on my lap looking at the television's screen.
"You are not bringing that thing back, are you? Because if you do, the three of you can sleep outside." I replied.
"Well... we named him Rügen." He texted me and sent a picture of a Golden Retriever puppy.
"You. Did. Not." I texted back, it had to be a joke! We were about to have a baby, he didn't just get us a new dog...
"We are waiting for the nametag, so we're bringing him home in a bit..."
I grunted and looked down at Rize sleeping on his bed. I knew no dog would replace my Bora or Scotty, but Rize could use another dog-companion... besides, we were dog people, at least I knew Tom had always had a dog and since we were together we had taken a liking on having small paws and wagging tails around us every day. Rize was a sweet heart of a dog, like his mother; but we needed more, and saying otherwise would be lying.
"He better be fluffy." I texted him back.
The puppy made itself at home the second it walked through the door and Lena took a liking on him just as soon.
"Don't tell me you could have said no." Tom told me when he walked in with the dog's leash on his hand.
Günther and Lena were on the floor playing with Rügen and introducing him to Rize, who took the chance and smelled him quickly.
"I wouldn't have come home with a dog, I assure you." I said. "But it is fluffy." I told him.
Tom smiled down at me, giving me a peck on the cheek so we could go and find a place for the new dog.
A couple days later the small Rügen had us all eating out of its tiny paw, it was a nice little dog who handled better than expected all of Lena's abuses... not that she was a bad girl, but she certainly was eager to pull the dog's tail and ears, although she also started to enjoy cuddling with the dog and more than once we found her holding him on the same way she always held her teddy bear.
Rügen turned out to be an incredibly cute little puppy, it loved to get in trouble as much as Günther and got away with it just as easily as him too. His barking alerted us that something was going on in the backyard. The mark of the seven years seemed like the age in which we realized that Günther was a big trouble maker.
Either we found him trying to jump into the pool with his clothes on or he attempted to climb a tree, we had started to find him doing more and more extreme things until one day, after coming back from a checkup at the doctor's office, we decided to let him and Lena play outside.
Günther had been running around all day with his superman shirt, the one with a little cape attached to it. Tom and I sat near the tree Günther had already attempted to climb a couple of times, and we talked about how things were going to be.
"We're going on Tour in the summer." He told me. "I will only play at some clubs in May; that should be fine, right?" He asked me, I was sitting next to him, my head on his shoulder and his hand fell lazily over my shoulder.
"Yes, that's fine." I told him. "It is... only that..." I pursed my lips and looked up at him to say something, everything was way too quiet. "Can you hear that?"
Tom stared off into the distance and I stared at his face while he did so, both of us paying attention to the odd silence in our backyard.
Suddenly there was barking.
"Günther." We both looked at each other and stood up to look for the dogs.
Rize and Rügen were sitting near a window, Lena was sitting on the grass with a toy drum set around her.
"Günther?" Tom called.
I looked around, he couldn't be too far...it wasn't like our backyard was huge, unless he had gone inside the house and found a way to go out to the front.
"Daddy!" Lena yelled and reached out opening and closing her hands.
I watched Tom lean down and hold her.
"I think he might have gone to the front." I told Tom.
"Why is he suddenly a boy?! I liked him better when he pooped his pants, you know?" He replied.
"Güther!" Lena pointed up and the two of us looked at whatever she pointed at.
The rooftop.
"Hey, look mommy!" Günther was standing on the ledge up there.
I immediately brought my hand to my face, I felt dizzy so suddenly that I thought I would fall back on my ass.
"Günni, what are you doing up there?!" I yelled.
"I have a cape mommy! I can fly!" He yelled.
"No, man; that is not how it works!" Tom yelled before handing me Lena. "Stay there, okay?"
"But I can do it!" Günther yelled.
"Get him down!" I told Tom.
Tom looked troubled.
"When he pooped his pants, I tell you..." He muttered before looking up at Günther and yelling. "Don't move!"
I waited without taking my eyes off of my boy, Tom had to climb up to the roof and take him down himself. I tried talking Lena into never doing anything like that, she couldn't be as creative as Günther was with his game ideas.
Once I saw Tom's feet were back on the ground I felt so relieved I started crying.
"Not cool, Günther!" I said with a little hint of anger before rushing back inside.
Tom stood there with Günther in his arms while I took Lena up to her room.
"I think my heart skipped seven beats, baby, don't go doing things like those okay?" I said to the baby girl before leaving her in her crib.
After a few minutes I felt a tug on my skirt and looked down to see the seven year old blonde staring up at me.
"I'm sorry, mommy." He said. "I didn't want to make you sad."
Günther looked down and I smiled at his sorry face.
"It's okay." I said. "But promise you won't do anything like that ever again." I said, putting an emphasis on the word ever. He nodded. "You have to be the smart guy, love, Lena counts on you to be a good big brother." I told him and combed his hair with my fingers. "Soon, Jansen will be too."
Günther nodded and hugged my legs, placing his ear next to the lower part of my belly, as high as he could reach. He then put a hand up on the baby bump and listened.
"Are you sure, Jansen's in here?" He asked me skeptically. "He sounds like the water of the bath!" He told me.
"I bet." I told him and put my hand on his shoulder, which was as far as I could reach.
Tom was worried that the scares Günther was giving us would be bad for the baby, but I assured him everything was fine. Only that, that very same night I felt the odd pressure on my stomach and hips; the sort of cramp you don't get every month.
We were just about to prepare dinner but I had stopped on the last step of the stairs and held on to the handrail.
"Tom!" I yelled with closed eyes. "Tom!"
"What did he do now! I swear to God! He better go back to pooping his pants..." Tom said from the hall, coming from his studio.
He stopped a few steps away from me, staring.
"Jo?"
"It's not a drill." I tried to sound calmed.
"I-am-calling... Bill." He said and brought his phone out of his pocket.
"I'll call him, could you go get the bag?" I told him.
Tom nodded and handed me his phone on his way upstairs. I looked through his immense contacts' list and stopped at "Bill-US".
I waited for about three rings before getting an answer.
"Tom?"
Bill picked up with an absentminded tone, if I knew him well enough, he was reading or playing with Pumbi, as Angie had taken Timon with her on her trip to Hamburg.
"It's Jo." I said. "What are you doing?" I asked out of curiosity.
"You know... hanging out with Pumbi." His answer made me giggle.
"I guess I did know..." He chuckled. "I know you were not expecting this call yet, but..." Bill cut me off.
"You're in labor?" His voice went up an octave.
"Yes." I said simply. "We need a huge favor..." I said a little embarrassed.
"I'll come over, don't worry; this time I won't let Günther catch a tarantula."
I was still not ready to laugh at that incident, but I thanked Bill.
"I'll be there in ten!"
Tom came down with the bags and I watched him go outside, I waited for a couple of minutes and he came back to help me get into the car.
"He said he'll be here quickly." I told him.
"Good." He said. "Günther and Lena are watching that Christmas movie once more."
"Nightmare before Christmas?" I asked him. "It's a classic!"
Judging by the look on his face he didn't like it.
"I don't know... it's creepy for kids." He shrugged.
I sat on the passenger's seat and Tom leaned on the doorframe looking at me while I waited for another wave of pain –or pressure, as doctors stupidly called it – with my hands on my belly.
"Do you need anything?" Tom asked me, switching his weight from one foot to the other.
When I looked up at him, he was peeking inside the car with his left hand on the roof and the right one on his hip. I knew we already had a pillow in the back of the car, which was everything I could think of; but I hadn't given the kids a goodnight kiss, which I was most likely not going to be able to do for a couple of nights.
"Can you bring the kids for a sec?" I asked him.
Tom nodded and went back inside.
The contractions had just started and I wasn't feeling them too close yet, so I was contemplating the possibility of a very long night.
"Mommy?" I smiled at Günther, he ran past Tom and almost jump at me. "Daddy says you're going to get Jansen." He told me joyfully, to which I nodded. "Can I come?"
"No, Günni; you have to stay here, Uncle Bill is going to come and wait with you and Lena, okay?" I put my hand under his chin and cupped his face softly. "You have to be a good boy, remember?"
He nodded.
"Mama have baby?" Lena asked once Tom got close enough. She was playing with his growing beard and looking straight ahead at him.
"Yes, mama's having a baby." He replied.
"Baby?" She repeated and tilted her head to the side.
Tom put Lena on my lap and I kissed her cheek.
"You are going to be a good girl too, right?" She nodded, every time someone turned to her and said the word right, she simply nodded. "Yes, you'll be!"
"I'll watch her!" Günther said.
"I am sure you will, man." Tom told him. "So, you know your mom here is amazing, right?" Lena nodded again. "Give her a kiss, we're going to see some doctors and nurses and have a baby!" He patted Günther on the back.
"Finally." Günther said and rolled his eyes.
He needed to stop hanging out with Bill so much.
"Goodnight, baby!" I kissed Lena's cheeks and then kissed Günther's. "No funny business, Gün!" I warned him.
"Not a bit?" He tried.
"Zero." Tom gave him one of his least serious – but still quite intimidating for a child – looks.
He took the kids back inside and while he was gone, I heard the front gate open, Bill's white Audi rolled inside and the gates closed again. I watched him park his car and then Tom walked out. The two of them met on their way to me.
"Hey, how's it going so far?" Bill said before leaning down and giving me a quick hug and a peck on the cheek.
"I think it's going well." I told him.
He turned to Tom and in that moment I put my hand on the dashboard and looked down.
"Ugh... I think we should get going..." I muttered, interrupting the guys. "Please."
"Oh, Oh... okay... Thanks, Bill; I'll call you later."
Tom hugged Bill, helped me put on the seatbelt before closing the door and ran around the car to take his seat and start the car.
"Good luck!" Bill waved and we left in that moment.
"Is it too much?" Tom put his hand on my belly and gave me a quick glance.
"No-oh..." I tried to sound alright, but I couldn't wait to get to the hospital and get high on prescription drugs.
Not that I was a drug addict, but having kids in the 1800's – without painkillers – sounded like torture to me.
"Don't worry, you already did this twice before!" Tom tried to calm me down.
"Does the experience actually count when you're about to hit the stage?" I replied while trying to breathe.
"I like to think it does." He said and pulled his hand away to change gears. "Is it helping you right now?"
"No." I told him. "It would if we were in Germany. Mom would get here over night, I'd already know the staff at the hospital..." I took a deep breathe. "Is it too late to take that flight?"
Tom chuckled.
"Yeah, it is, Jo." He replied. "But don't worry, I'll be there; and I'm sure your mother is going to jump on the next plane she can find."
We arrived at the hospital at the same time I was going through another contraction. I knew Tom hated to have to watch, he was the kind of guy who wanted to do something about everything, but this was one of the things that he couldn't do for us.
"Just get everything, it will be over in a second..." I managed to tell him.
He took the key out of the ignition and got out of the car, I closed my eyes and took deep breathes before the car door was open and Tom's hand was carefully placed on my back while I leaned forward on the passenger's seat.
When the pain was over, I took Tom's hand and we walked into the hospital. I wasn't very familiar with the way things worked in there, but I trusted everything would turn out fine. A nurse brought a wheelchair and we were taken to the maternity guard.
After an hour, the doctor had already checked me and we were waiting for the contractions to get closer together so I could start pushing. I tried to distract myself with a rerun of friends on the T.V. but I wasn't too into it and Tom was pacing around the room with the phone in his hands.
"What are you doing?" I asked him.
"Bill said he would call mom, but she hasn't called." Tom told me. "I already called Maura." He added quickly.
I took a deep breath.
"Tom, come here." I rolled my eyes.
The fact that Tom was anxious made me anxious, and being anxious at a time like that annoyed me, so I made him sit on a chair next to the bed and put my hand on his shoulders.
"She is going to be here when she has the chance." I said softly.
He pouted and nodded, obviously annoyed. I watched him take the cap off of his head and run a hand through his face. I grabbed the cap from his hand and put it on, it was a little too big for me; so I went for a goofy smile when he turned to me.
"Am I a cool mom yet?" I asked, he chuckled and shook his head.
"Dorky, Jo, I'd say dorky." He pushed the cap up, that way it was tilted back and I could see. "Dorky and beautiful."
I smiled at him and he stood up, leaning down in front of me and kissing me very softly. I cupped his face with my hand and then he pulled away, taking the cap with him.
"Hey!" I complained. "I was wearing that!"
"Well, it's mine!" He replied amused.
I heard him chuckle but I couldn't see him, I had another contraction and had to close my eyes to try and get through it. With every single one of them, it felt like they were getting stronger. I took a deep breath and Tom put his hand on my shoulder while it was over.
"Oh... you're gonna have to do more than that when I start pushing, Tom!" I told him a couple of minutes later when another contraction hit me. "Dammit! I forgot to bring an elastic."
The doctor was there and he was just putting on a pair of gloves, sitting on the other end of the bed.
"Here." Tom pulled my hair away from my face and when I opened my eyes I saw him leaning over me. "Better?"
He had tied my hair with one of his black elastics, I leaned back on the big pillow we brought and nodded. The contractions had started to make me sweat, and I was getting tired even before pushing.
The doctor examined me and a couple of minutes later I was sitting, almost hugging my knees, and receiving the epidural while Tom shushed me and rubbed small circles on my shoulders.
I didn't even know what time it was when I started pushing, I knew Tom was standing next to me and that he had changed anxiety for nervousness for impatience. He put a small pillow on my hand and looked on the doctor's direction.
"What is this?" I asked him. "Give me a hand here!" I threw the pillow at his face.
"Uhhh..." He grunted, "you can be really strong sometimes, you know?" He told me.
"I am about to have a baby! Your baby!" I cried out. "All I'm asking is for you to hold my hand!"
"Fine! Fine!" He held my hand and squeezed it. "Stop... stop... crying. I feel like an asshole when you cry." He muttered.
I held on to his hand very tightly; I had held his hand like that two times before, it wasn't like I wanted to make him suffer with me, but he was complaining about the pain on his hand as quietly as he could.
"Oh... I can't..." I said after the doctor asked for another big push.
It wasn't easy like that.
The nurse in the room tried to reassure me that I could do it, but I didn't listen to her.
"Jo, you want to meet this baby, don't you?" Tom asked me.
"Yes, but I am so... tired!" I cried out. "I don't think I can do it..."
"We're already here!" Tom said and turned to look at the doctor for a second. "Come on... you know it's gonna be worth it."
I let my head fall on the pillow and Tom pushed my bangs out of the way of my sweaty forehead.
"Next year, we'll go to Disney, huh?" He smiled at me.
"You'll be on tour, remember?" I blinked, I was tired and I could already feel the next contraction building up.
"We'll make it work! I'll make the time, but you gotta do this first." Tom looked like he was in as much pain as me.
"I can try..." I told him.
"Yeah, let's do that."
A couple minutes later the doctor asked Tom if he wanted to cut the umbilical cord. He did it and the nurse gave us the famous "congratulations, it's a boy!" The doctor took the baby and examined him quickly before bringing it back to us. 2.100 kg and 39 cm were in my arms at exactly 2:43 am.
"Hey, you!" I pulled the blue blanket away to see his face a little bit better. "What a handsome tinny thing!" I cooed.
"Tinny man, nice to meet you!" Tom touched him almost shyly. "We picked a great name for you, have you heard it?"
"Jansen." I whispered, the baby moved the slightest while I held him and after taking a quick glance at us, he went back to sleep. "I think I want to go sleep too."
Tom smiled and kissed my temple, I kissed Jansen and then Tom held him.
"Goodnight, you two." Tom said before the nurse took Jansen.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------I give you a cute puppy!
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