Survival

#16 The in-laws

"Wait..." Lila pulled away from Five, who was hugging her, and looked into his eyes, "you... you look, really happy. And I'm glad. But I actually didn't expect that reaction at all. Maybe something along the lines of - yeah, I didn't expect that, but maybe it won't be so bad. But you cut a reaction like you got a dream model train that you've wanted all your life for Christmas."

Five gave a relaxed smile and shrugged, "Maybe it's something like that. But even better."

"You never told me you wanted to have a baby with me."

"I basically told you. That I also wanted a family and all that goes with it, and that I wanted to experience it all with you when we were talking about your kids."

"Well, but in the context of things, it didn't sound like that."

"Yeah, I know... but I didn't tell you outright because it was never a good fit, and mostly because I didn't want you to feel like I wanted to push you into something like that or that I expect it. I've always realized that you already have a family, and a big one... that you probably won't have this need to have another child someday. Although I remember you joking about wanting at least five kids... If I'd said that to you in our strawberry house, it might have come across as me wanting our potential child to be a replacement for the kids with Diego. I would never want that! If it had never come up, I probably never would have brought it up. I was prepared to never be the father of my own child. But I'd be lying if I said I didn't want it to happen if that's what we both wanted... and I... I hope I interpreted your reaction correctly, that you want it too."

"Wow..." she looked surprised, "I guess I never really thought about it that fully. But now that it's happening, now that I see how happy you are about it... I'm really relieved, I'm happy about it too, even though I probably haven't fully realized that it's really happening." She had to laugh at that. "Actually, it's also kind of the first time for me that a pregnancy announcement has gone this... happily... not counting the fact that you almost gave me a heart attack with your silence in the car."

"Yeah, sorry. I guess it would be weird if I got too excited about it and then it would turn out negatively in the end. Then I couldn't just leave it as an unspoken thing, and again we get to the reasons why I didn't tell you about it."

"So if it turned out negatively, you'd just accept it?"

"Yes... I guess."

"How many more of these unspoken things are going through your head?" Lila was curious.

"Maybe something else."

"What exactly?"

"Let's leave it at that for now, they remain unspoken, I won't push my luck."

"So you've got it on a waiting list there, if you get lucky and some freak event happens where they come true?"

"Yeah, something like that."

"Interesting!"

That night, as he hugged her from behind, Lila's head was resting on his outstretched hand and his other was resting on her belly. Lila was already asleep and Five just smiled contentedly as he closed his eyes and after a few minutes, he too fell asleep.

--

The next morning, Lila stood leaning against the kitchen island, watching Five prepare breakfast and eating salted nuts from a bowl.

"You call that breakfast?"

"I'm just having a craving."

"Yeah, so suddenly you have cravings?"

"At least now I have something to throw it on!" She smiles slyly and threw a peanut at him.

Five didn't turn around but smiled to himself, after a moment two more flew in.