by Grey, Aspen
“You won’t be disappointed,” he assured me.
“Judging by the work you posted online, I believe you.”
We’d taken a look at his stuff on Facebook and Instagram, as well as his personal website where he showed off his dressers, tables, cabinets and beds that he’d made. In the future, I hoped we’d be able to get a whole set of his work. Arthur and Sid were both doing incredibly well at work, and Sid’s taco truck had been awarded a Michelin star, which had driven an enormous amount of customers to him. People came from all over, outside of San Diego in fact, to get a taste of his food. It was starting to be more than he could handle, and we’d discussed opening an actual storefront and hiring more sous-chefs to keep up. Things were really moving. And then of course there was my belly.
Bigger and bigger every day. It wasn’t oversized or anything, so there definitely wasn’t the possibility of twins or triplets, but I was definitely bigger. My butt had grown as well, something both of my mates were into. I couldn’t keep them off of me. They both said my scent had changed during the pregnancy as well. It wasn’t “stronger,” they said, it was just different, and they made love to me differently because of it.
They used to fuck me hard, but now they fucked me with more precision…more care…more skill. They were more delicate with me, and one night when I was urging Arthur to really give it to me, he’d confessed he was holding back because he “didn’t want to pop” me. I’d burst out laughing and Sid had shut me up by stuffing his cock down my throat.
It was Heaven.
“Make sure you hurry up with it, Jedrik,” Arthur joked as he came into the living room and took a seat. “I’m suck of fucking on just a mattress.”
“I’ll put a rush on it for you,” Jedrik smirked.
I put my hand to my belly as the baby kicked, something he’d been doing (or she) for the last week or so. It was like he (or she) was telling me how eager he was to get out into the world. And that was fine with me. I was dying to meet him.
“Kicking?” Sid asked from the door.
“You know it,” I replied.
“Knocking on the door to get out,” Arthur said.
“I sure hope so. I’m ready!”
“That makes three of us,” Sid said.
“I couldn’t wait for my kids,” Jedrik added. “Your life changes so much once they arrive. It’s beautiful. Did you call Wendell?”
“I did,” I told him. “He gave us his emergency cell number and told us to call anytime.”
Wendell was a shifter doctor Jedrik had put us in touch with. We’d met once for a simple checkup, and he’d assured us everything was fine, but I’d been surprised at how he looked. I don’t know what I’d expected—maybe a tall alpha in a white doctor’s coat or something, but what we’d got was more like a surfer hippie who was more interested in talking about strains of marijuana than anything medical. But Jedrik assured us he was the best around and once he got to talking, I believed him.
“I’m sure he’ll take good care of you,” Jedrik said. “I couldn’t have asked for a better doctor.”
“Well, this birth is going to go so simply that we won’t need a doctor,” Sid said with a smile.
“You’ve been saying that since day one,” I replied. “How can you be so sure?”
“You know how we just knew that we were fated-mates? That’s how.”
“Just like I knew you were a blowhard?” Arthur teased.
“Just how I knew all Navy guys were big douchebags?”
We all laughed. Arthur and Sid had gone from mortal enemies to being able to joke with one another without even getting remotely angry. They teased each other, sure, but it was in a loving way that reaffirmed just how secure and happy we all were.
“Have you thought about names?” Jedrik asked.
“If it’s a girl, we were thinking about Susan, Jill or Andrea,” I replied. “And if it’s a boy, I really want to name him Jeremy after Sid’s father.”
“Is he…?”
“No, he’s not dead,” Sid said quickly. “He’s living in New Hampshire in the middle of nowhere. I send him money to keep him afloat. He had a really hard time after his husband left him. I actually don’t even know the whole story; I just know that it left him hurting. I’d really love for him to come out here with us, but I haven’t been able to persuade him.”
“Well, I think after you have a kid and name him after him, he’ll have to,” Jedrik remarked.
“That’s what I’m hoping!” I laughed.
Jedrik checked his phone. The sun was getting low on the horizon and he had a family to get back to. “I should head out,” he said. “But I’ll keep you updated on that bed. I should be able to have it finished within a week and I’ll bring by that crib tomorrow.”
“Hopefully I don’t pop by then!”
“Oh, even if you do, you won’t need a crib,” he replied. “You won’t want to let that baby boy out of your arms for days.”
“I’m sure you’re right,” I replied.
“Thanks for coming by, Jedrik,” Arthur said as we all got to our feet to say our goodbyes. “if you want to come back and do the unpacking for us, that’d be fine too!”
“In your dreams, Arthur,” Jedrik laughed.
We let him out and took our usual seats again on the couch with me in the middle, Arthur on my right and Sid on my left. I sprawled across both of their legs and sighed.
“I just want this baby to come already,” I told them. “I want to meet him.”
“You hope it’s a him, don’t you?” Sid asked. I nodded.
“Yes,” I told him. “I don’t know why. I just do.”
“I agree,” Arthur said.
“Well, let’s hope it’s not a girl then!” I laughed. “Or nobody’s going to want her!”
Of course it was a joke. We would love our child no matter what, but I guess I was hoping we’d have a boy so we could raise him in a way that none of us had had. All of us had missed out in one way or another on our childhoods and our relationships with our fathers, and being able to give a child everything we never had felt so poetic.
Sid leaned down and kissed my forehead and rubbed my belly. “So, what do you guys think we should do for dinner?”
“Ah!” I gasped as a strange sensation ran through me. It wasn’t quite pain, but it wasn’t comfortable either. It was similar to what I felt when the baby kicked, but amplified a hundred times. “I think the baby’s coming!”
“Holy shit!” Arthur gasped as he leapt to his feet. “You serious?”
“I think so!” I groaned, holding my belly as another, what must have been a contraction, twisted through me. “Yep! Yep, it’s coming all right!”
“I’ll call Wendell,” Arthur said as he pulled out his phone.
“Don’t worry,” Sid said sweetly as he knelt down and placed a hand on my cheek. “We won’t need him. But go ahead.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Ollie
I lay back in the warm water of the tub, closed my eyes and focused on remaining calm as another contraction ran through me and dissipated. I was breathing like a yogi focused on meditation, trying to “be one” with the pregnancy—or something.
I was naked and comfortable, with candles lit and placed around the bathtub. The boys had put them there, creating a birthing sanctuary for me to make me comfortable. Wendell was at the base of the tub looking on, but Sid was right, so far we hadn’t needed him.
“How are you feeling?” he asked. “Any strange pains or anything out of the ordinary?”
I shook my head. “No. And to be honest with you, the contractions don’t really hurt either. They’re just kind of uncomfortable.”
“That’s rare,” he smiled. “You should count yourself lucky.”
“I told you,” Sid said again as he stroked my cheek with the back of his hand. “It’s going to be easy.”
I opened my eyes and looked up at him. Arthur was by my side, of course, and his mother, Julie, was out
side, giving the three of us time alone for everything, but as this was Sid’s child, there was something special going on between us right now.
“How did you know?” I asked him. “I’m not even feeling any pain. It’s just…it’s like my insides are pasta dough being rolled through one of those things that make noodles.”
Sid laughed and continued to pet my head. “Such a great analogy. I wish I could feel it.”
“You don’t,” I told him. “It’s not painful, but it’s strange.”
“Strange I can handle,” he replied.
“Pain you can handle too, tough guy.”
“He ain’t that tough,” Arthur joked.
Another contraction squeezed me, stronger this time. It was somehow similar to the feeling you get in your gut when you throw up, only flipped upside down. I felt powerless yet powerful at the same time. I’d made Sid’s baby inside of me. I was carrying his pup and was about to bring it into the world. That was a miracle and something to be proud of.
“We did it,” I told him. “Can you believe it?”
The bottoms of Sid’s eyes were wet. There was something so attractive about an alpha who could be strong but at the same time wasn’t afraid to share his emotions. How could you have a relationship with someone who was always “on,” always in go-mode, always ready to fight and unable to open up in any significant way? No, I’d found two alphas who both weren’t afraid to show their sensitivity and I was thankful for that.
Thankful…
That was how I was feeling as I lay in the bathtub going through my labor. Thankful that Rusty had given me a place to stay and a job at the bar. Without that job, I never would have run into Sid in the first place, never would have met Arthur, never would have fallen in love and found my fated-mates, and certainly wouldn’t be pregnant with an incredible future ahead of me.
“I can believe it,” Sid replied, taking my hand in his. He squeezed and kissed my forehead. “It was meant to happen, remember?”
“You know, I’ve never felt more useless in my life,” Wendell remarked, bringing a little levity to the situation. Everybody laughed and I clenched my teeth as another contraction seized me. Again, this one didn’t hurt, but it took my body over. The forces of nature were in charge now. Soon I would be a father.
“It’s nice to have you here though,” I told him. “For moral support.”
“Three alphas for moral support,” Arthur smirked. “Aren’t you a little needy?”
I liked Arthur’s expected sarcasm and slightly dark humor. He always knew just when to interject and lighten the mood. Sid and I both got pretty intense sometimes and it was nice to have him there to balance things out.
Despite the cool water of the bath, I was sweating, and motioned to my forehead. Sid took a damp washcloth from Wendell and pressed it against my skin. It had been soaking in ice water and immediately cooled me down. I closed my eyes and sighed and focused on what was happening to my body.
I felt another contraction—longer this time—and knew somehow that the baby was almost here. My heart leapt with the realization and I opened my eyes and squeezed Sid’s hand hard.
“He’s almost here.”
“He?”
I nodded. “I think so!”
Sid smiled. It was what he wanted to hear.
“It’s time to start pushing then, Ollie,” Wendell told me, his voice in “doctor mode.”
“Let’s call him Jeremy,” I said as I smiled up at my mate. “After your father.”
Sid nodded and a single tear slid down his cheek before he wiped it away. “Okay.”
“Time to push, buddy,” Wendell said encouragingly.
Time to push, I thought as I summoned all my strength.
The baby’s coming…
I looked over at Arthur, who inched even closer and placed a hand on my shoulder. “You’ve got this.”
I looked at Sid who smiled like the proud father he was about to become. I looked at Wendell, who didn’t look the least bit worried, and I pushed.
Chapter Thirty
Sid
I’m a father.
For some reason, I still couldn’t believe it. I mean—I knew I was a father and that the little squishy bundle of soft skin and chubby cheeks in my arms was mine, but it was still hard to believe.
I am a father!
I looked down at him, my son, as he lay swaddled and sleeping in my arms. He had my same pale skin, but his was flawless, like ivory, with a hint of pink in his cheeks and his fat little arms. He had more hair than most newborns, at least that’s what Wendell had told us, and it was jet black like mine. Ollie had already started musing about what kind of haircuts we’d give him when he was old enough.
“Ooooh, a Mohawk!” he’d suggested, still giddy after giving birth. “Or maybe just spikey hair like Brad Pitt in Fight Club! Or maybe we can give him one of those undercut things with the gel on top and make him look like a 1930’s gangster baby!”
“Or a nice boot camp Navy buzz,” Arthur suggested.
“Oh, and a little machine gun too?” Sid replied sarcastically. Arthur laughed.
He was a gift. I looked over at Ollie, who was passed out in bed with a heap of pillows behind his back and a cool towel over his head, I felt more love than I’d ever felt for him. It seemed that as our relationship went on, our feelings for each other increased—the opposite of what people always say about relationships and how they inevitably get stale or whatever. I couldn’t see that happening with Sid. I just couldn’t.
All I could see were the days when I would teach him to walk, to shift back and forth, to run as a panther, how to control his impulses and be a responsible alpha—because that was what he was—an alpha.
I’d do all kinds of things with him; teach him to run, throw a Frisbee, a ball, swing a bat, maybe even get him into the things I’d never learned before like piano or guitar.
What will he be like? I thought.
Would he be shy or boisterous? Outspoken or reserved? Would he be more nerdy or more jockish, and how much control did I have over that? Would he be interested in technology or more of an artist? Would he have an interest in cooking?
Maybe he can take over your cooking empire for you!
“Empire,” I whispered to myself with a chuckle. I had one successful taco stand. It was hardly an empire. Not yet at least.
But most of all, what I felt when I looked down at Jeremy, was that my own father wasn’t here to see this.
Arthur was sitting on the other side of the room and I turned to him. “Hey, can you take him for a few? I need to make a call.”
“Sure, Sid,” he replied. I got up and crossed the room and handed him my baby boy. Even though I knew it was only going to be a few minutes, I still didn’t want to let him go. He stirred slightly in his sleep and let out a tiny little gurgle as he resituated himself in Arthur’s arms.
“Ooooh, I love babies!” Julie said with an enormous smile on her face as she looked down at her grandson. She had come the day of the birth, given us our space for all of the excitement, but was now hanging around as much as she could to get as much time with Jeremy as possible.
“I’ll be back in a few,” I told him as I left the room and took out my phone. I went out into the living room and looked out the windows at the view. It wasn’t quite an “ocean view,” as we weren’t high above the beach with no other buildings in our line of sight, but it was good enough for me.
I hadn’t spoken to my father in a long time. I’d been sending him money, of course, hoping that one day he’d tell me he’d decided to come back and rejoin society, but I never held out too much hope. I couldn’t. Wondering every day if I’d be able to reunite with him, wondering if there was more I could do to change the way he thought about the world, it was all just too much for me to handle while trying to have my own life.
But now, things had changed. I had my own successful business. I had a mate. I had a son—a son named after him. I had to reach out, didn’t I?
I unlocked my phone and scrolled to his name in my contacts list. I almost pressed call, but felt that familiar sense of hesitation I always got when I thought about trying with my father.
I wish I could understand more about why he was the way he was. I wish I knew more about my other father whom I’d never met. I wish he could come and see his grandson, the boy I’d named after him.
Arthur’s father was gone and Ollie’s were in jail, and as far as I knew, he wasn’t interested in having them in his life any longer. It seemed silly for me not to at least try to repair the relationship with my father.
Again, I raised the phone and began to dial, but again that little pit in my stomach stopped me.
“Gah, what’s wrong with you?” I hissed at myself, angry at my own weakness.
“It’s okay, Sid.” I turned around to see Julie standing behind me.
“Julie!”
“Sorry for sneaking up on you,” she said. “But Arthur told me about what’s going on with your father, and I thought I would offer some unsolicited advice.”
“Please,” I smiled. “Go ahead. I’m all ears right now.”
Julie was an extremely warm human being. She just oozed maternalness—if that was a word—and was incredibly easy to talk to, so I was thrilled to hear what she had to say.
“You’re nervous about calling your father,” she said. “But you shouldn’t be. He’s your father and no matter what, he’s going to be happy to hear from you. Even if things aren’t the way they were between you two when you were young, that can change.”
“You think so?”
“I know you are just recently a father,” she replied. “But as a mother, I can tell you that we cherish our children and value every moment we have with them. No matter how afraid you are now about getting back in touch with your father, it’s nothing compared to the regret you’ll feel if you choose not to reach out to him.”
“Julie,” I smiled. “Has anyone ever told you you’re very wise?”
