Open Wounds

Chapter 1

The day was February 19, 2021.

It was another winter evening in LazyTown, it was snowing outside.

Alexander (who was still wearing his Sportacus' uniform), his wife Valeria and their children Stephanie and Matias (who were 16 and 5 years old by now) had a nice family dinner, when Valeria said she has an announcement to make.

"Well, actually, I kept it as a secret for the last three days, that even dad doesn't know, but I guess that now I can tell you guys the good news." She said.

"Really? What's the good news?" Stephanie asked with a mouth full mashed potatoes.

"Well, um, three days ago I've found out that I'm pregnant..." Valeria smiled nervously.

The three others stopped eating immediately.

Stephanie gasped, stood up from her chair and went to hug her mother.

"Oh, mom! These are such great news!" She said with excitement.

"Thank you, sweetie." Valeria returned the hug.

"Wait, you really are pregnant?" Alexander asked in disbelief.

"Yes!" Valeria said.

"Do I really need to remind you that Valentine's Day is also our anniversary?" she leaned to his side and whispered, raising an eyebrow.

Alex just laughed, hugged her and kissed her cheek.

"Wait, what does it mean?" Matias asked from his chair, and that made the grown-ups laugh.

"It means that will get to be a big brother too." Stephanie told him as she returned to her chair.

"Yes, right now I'm having a baby in the womb that inside my stomach. You know, like when aunt Mandy was pregnant two years ago, and eventually she gave birth to your cousin Deborah, who's also Sean's little sister." Vale explained to her son.

"Oooohhh!!! Now I get it!" Matias said and made the others laugh again.

"What?" he asked, not understanding why they are laughing.

"Nothing. You're just so sweet." Vale told him and they continued to eat.

*****

Later that night, Valeria tucked Matias to bed.

"Are you exciting about the new baby?" she asked her son as she covered him with his blanket.

"I guess." He nodded, and then asked, "When the baby will be here?"

"In nine more months, honey." Valeria smiled at him.

"That long?!" Matias asked shocked.

"Well, that's what it takes a baby to grow in the womb." Vale chuckled.

"How did it even get to your womb?" Mati asked innocently.

"Well... Mommy and Daddy made it together..." this was her best she could explain this to him.

"Ok, but how?" he kept asking.

"You will know when you'll get older." She told him.

"Ugh, why?" he groaned.

"Because you're not older enough to know this! Now, let's talk about something else – do you want me to read you a bed time story?" she asked.

"Ok. How about you'll tell me how Stephanie and I were as babies." He suggested.

"Oh, Mati... You know that Dad and I didn't raised Stephanie when she was a baby." Vale tried to block the pain of the memories.

"Oh, right... So just tell me about me!" he happily said.

"Alright, I will. Well, first of all, your birth was very different than what you know – you were in hurry to come out to the world, that you came a week earlier than you should've and you came out really fast that even the doctors didn't get me to the hospital and I had to deliver you in our bedroom." Valeria told him.

"Wow... That's pretty awesome." He said with a fascination on his face.

Valeria laughed at it and continued.

"And, well, as all of the babies, you woke me up at nights to feed you or change you diapers. And since I know how much your dad needs his sleep, I didn't let him to come to you at nights, and that made me so tired that I once found myself sleeping on the carpet next to your crib!" she laughed and Matias laughed with her.

"Anyway, your dad insisted that I will get a full night sleep, so he woke to you one night and do you know how I found him in the next morning?" she asked and Matias shrugged.

"He was sleeping on the rocking chair, holding you in one arm and holding your bottle in the other. I didn't have a heart to wake him up. Luckily, there wasn't lots of troubles that day." Vale laughed again and so was Matias.

"Now, come on, go to sleep! You really seems tired!" she told him and kissed his forehead, then left the room.

She wanted to go to sleep too, but not before passing at Stephanie's bedroom.

"Hey, Steph..?" she quietly opened the door.

"Oh, hey! Aren't you tired?" Stephanie turned with her face to her mother.

Valeria came in and sat on Stephanie's bed.

"I was about to ask you the same thing. Chatting with Pixel?" she asked as she saw Stephanie with her smartphone in her hand.

Stephanie lowered her head a bit so her mother won't see her blushing and said "...Yes."

"Ahhh, you're growing so fast!" Valeria cried as she let herself to "fall" next to Stephanie, and Stephanie giggled and hugged her.

"It's ok, this time I'm not going anywhere." Stephanie laughed.

"Good. I wouldn't want it any other way." Valeria laughed a little and Stephanie pulled her tighter and kissed her mother's head.

"Now go to sleep, so Pixel and I can keep talk about our 'teenagers' things, that an old lady like you can't understand." Stephanie teased her.

"Ok, fine, I'll go. Goodnight anyway." Valeria said as she left the room.

She went to her bedroom and changed to her pyjama, and joined Alex in their bed.

"So what about you? How do you feel about it?" Valeria asked him while he was concentrated in his book.

"About what?" he asked confused.

"About the baby..." she said.

"Oh, sorry, I'm just..."

"Nah, that's ok, I know you had a pretty tough day as Sportacus." She said and let him lay on her chest and played with his hair.

"Yeah, well, getting people out of the snow isn't that fun. And then there's this 5 years old energy bomb that waiting for me to play with him. But trust, all this 'boring' saving in the snow is worth it if I get to play with him at the end of the day." He smiled.

"Well, we both know that he has your genes." She chuckled.

"Yeah... Well, anyway, I will answer your question now – I'm super excited, but I'm too tired to show it right now but I'm sure you'll understand." Alexander told her.

"I'm glad you're excited, and I understand it and I let you go to sleep." She told him, then he rolled back to his side and they both fell asleep.

Except that Alex fell asleep with a weird feeling...