Canon (Klein Brothers 2)

I didn’t know what was going on behind the closed doors as we all sat down in the waiting room, but Mom had relayed by text that Katy had made my brother go for a shower while they’d settled her on the bed to get any “garage shit” off his body.

After that, we’d gotten texts saying shit like:

Mom: She made him cry. Lol.

And my favorite by far:

Mom: Jarrod says he’ll pay any of you two grand to swap with him.

My response deserved an award in the Hall of Fame.

Me: Tell him Reid says he’ll do it for free.

Just to add a bit of spice, I’d told my brother Jarrod needed him, and being the helpful little beaver he was, he’d jogged over and knocked on the door. Mom opened it and listened to whatever Reid was saying, then stood back and let him through, looking at him like he was nuts. It took all of two minutes for him to reappear, running for what looked like his life.

Which was around the time my world showed up, smiling as she walked down the hall.

“Sorry, so sorry. I had to go home to get all of the hair spikes washed off. I couldn’t come to the hospital and risk holding the babies with them on me. How’s Katy doing? Does she need anything?”

Stopping her midstream, I pulled her into my front and gave her a long, lazy kiss.

When I pulled back, she was looking around us and blushing. These were the little nuances of Jacinda that I fucking adored. When I’d first met her, she’d been determined for the world to think she could hold her own. In all fairness, she was able to, but now she trusted me to hold some for her, too, leaving me with a girl who blushed when I kissed her in public, and one who jumped me when we were behind closed doors.

I had the best of every world possible.

“I think Mom said she was four centimeters dilated, whatever that means.”

She winced. “Yeah, Heidi had to get to ten before they’d let her push Kingston out. I think they said four was about two fingers wide.”

Okay, I could have happily lived my entire life without any of that knowledge.

“Do you want to go and visit them with me? Bond said they’re going home a little later, once big man has all his final checks and they’re happy.”

Smiling happily, she leaned into my side, and we turned to go down to the other end of the floor, where the babies who’d already been born and their parents were.

Just as we passed the last birthing room before we got to that side, an almighty scream sounded from behind the door, making both of us freeze. “Why isn’t she coming out? My vagina can’t grow anymore.”

“Oh, my God,” Jacinda breathed, looking at me bug-eyed. “That poor woman’s cooter.”

“What do you mean you’re checking? If you can get your hand all the way up to my throat, you can pull my damn baby out when you’re done.”

I couldn’t help it, I had to press a fist to my mouth to stop the gag that wanted to break free. “Jesus, that’s graphic.”

“That’s nothing, buddy,” a nurse said behind us, making both of us jump. “You haven’t seen what we’ve seen. There'd be zero teenage pregnancies if we got to show a live birth at a high school. Then again,” she mused, looking to the side, “we’d likely get zero pregnancies ever. The share prices of contraceptives would make people millionaires overnight, baby stores would go bust, and generations would dwindle down until they dried up.”

“Other countries could take over for supplying the future generations of the world, though, right?” Jacinda offered, jumping again when what sounded like a noise out of a sci-fi movie came from behind the door.

“Maybe, unless they figured out our tactic and copied us.” Another scream got a sigh out of the nurse. “I’d better get in there and help out. Have a good day, y’all.”

Not wanting to risk hearing any more or accidentally catching sight of something that’d put me off ever having sex again, according to the nurse, I pulled Jacinda behind me and almost ran us down to where Heidi and Bond were.

Five hours later…

“Why didn’t she just take the c-section?” Dad asked, stretching out his neck with a loud pop. “I thought when you had twins, they automatically popped them out of you once you hit a certain number of weeks.”

“Katy wanted a natural birth,” Jacinda reminded him. “And she’s thirty-eight weeks today, so they were inducing her the day after tomorrow, anyway.”

My brother and sister-in-law had been moved to a different room, one where there was a waiting room right opposite it, and we’d been watching the door ever since. We’d periodically catch glimpses of Jarrod pacing around or biting his fist, but that was about it.