My hands go to my head, pulling my hair while Lauren holds her hands and tells her that everything will be okay.
I’m holding her other hand now as I move the hair away from her face.
“Okay, Kaleigh, how about we try some pushing?” the nurse says as she stands in front of her. “Bear down and push.” Kaleigh grabs my hand, puts her chin to her chest, and groans out as she pushes.
“One, two, three, you’re doing great. Seven, eight, nine, ten. Okay,” she says, grabbing another pair of gloves. “Okay, that was great. The baby is crowning,” she says, looking down at Kaleigh.
The doctor comes in with another nurse, who puts on the doctor’s scrubs jacket. “Hey there, Kaleigh, Noah,” she greets us as she sits on the stool in front of Kaleigh as she takes in the baby’s head.
“Okay, looks good. How about we push one more time?” Dr. Noelle says as she puts some gloves on and the nurse starts counting.
I look down at the head coming out and put my hand over my mouth. It’s not a normal size head. “Holy shit, is he going to have a small head? Did my penis knock him in the head? Is that why it’s so small?”
Dr. Noelle looks at me and laughs. “Noah, she’s crowning, which means the head is coming down. It’ll show more soon. Now, Kaleigh, stop pushing for a second,” she says and puts her finger inside, turning it around the baby’s head. “Now let’s push again, okay?” she says and as Kaleigh bears down I take my phone out and tape my son’s head popping out of his mother. “Okay, stop pushing. The head is out.” I look up to see Lauren and Dede with tears running down their cheeks. I look down and see the doctor grab onto his head and watch as his shoulders come out and his whole body slides out like a snake and she suctions his mouth while she holds him upside down and tears run down my face. I look down at Kaleigh, who has a red face and her chest is going up and down while she pants and cries as the doctor places our son on her chest.
“Oh my God.” She sobs out and her hand cradles our child as he cries out his first sound. “My baby.” She sobs as I lean down and kiss his wet head and then kiss the mother of my child, the wife I’m so lucky to have and the warrior in our family.
“I love you so much. You are so brave, baby, so, so brave.” I kiss her face while the nurse takes the baby from us and the doctor asks me to cut the umbilical cord.
She hands me the scissors and I cut between the white plugs. The nurse takes him to the bed, where she weighs him, cleans him, puts a diaper on him, and then brings him back to us. “Here he is, a whopping ten pounds, two ounces.” She smiles as the doctor finishes with Kaleigh and pushes back.
Lauren and Dede have given us time to ourselves by going to tell everyone about him.
“Hey there, it’s me, your dad,” I tell him while he blinks at us, just looking. “This is your mom. She’s the best. She is going to make you try some crazy stuff with her food. Just go with it, okay? She is going to make us do things we don’t want to do, but we will do it only because we love her and want to see her smile. You probably fell in love with her the second you looked at her, didn’t you? I should know, it happened to me also. She was the one who finally tempted the playboy.” And with that, I kiss him and my wife and thank whatever lucky star out there that made me fall into her life.
Epilogue
One year later
“Daddy’s home,” I say as I walk into our new house we just bought on the water. It has a huge amount of property and a barn in the back that Kaleigh has converted into a yoga studio.
I look around and don’t see or hear anyone, so I walk through the house that now holds every single child’s toy known to mankind. My mother, even though she is a bitch, has taken a liking to her grandson. Some even say she likes him a lot. Sometimes she sends him packages twice in a day. I think it’s overboard and our relationship is still strained, but Kaleigh says as long as my mother gives him love she will hold her tongue.
With curly blond hair and sky blue eyes, his chubby face is always smiling, except when his mother walks out of the room or you don’t give him meat fast enough. Walking over to the back door, I open it and see my boy walking with his hands in the air, trying to balance himself while Kaleigh runs after him. I watch the two of them with a big smile on my face. Love, it’s a great fucking feeling. “I’m going to get you,” she says while my son squeals with delight, his chubby legs going as fast as they can.