Book IV: Avi Dragon

An Angel Out of Water

A high whine quickly built into a hearty bawl, and some very uncharacteristic kicking.
   Angel, or whoever she was now, broke away first. Maternal instinct was an unforgiving taskmistress. She unbuckled their daughter and held her tight, still kneeling on the bed. She rolled her shoulders, wincing, until she figured out how to tuck her wings in behind her shoulderblades, so she could lean against the pillows. She rumbled vague soothing noises, but all Menolly wanted was to get inside the hospital gown. She burrowed aimlessly into the thin fabric, whimpering her distress vocally and mentally.
   Her flailing pulled the untied gown down with little effort. She was latched on in mere moments, though it felt like forever to her anxious parents.
   "Shh, I'm sorry, sweetness. Mama wasn't upset with you. It's just life, sugarplum. It's confusing, and emotional, and I didn't have it all figured out before..." She choked to a stop, before she could start crying again. She was rocking, perhaps a bit too much, but the baby didn't seem to mind.
   Avriel smoothed a hand across her bare back, trying to soothe both mother and child. She shivered, but she wouldn't let the violet tint of her eyes push him away again. She murmured nonsense, the rocking slowing to a gentle sway, focused as much on her child as she could, with adult skin to skin contact.
   I've got to get used to this, she thought. If that's always a distraction, I'll never get anything done. Just accept what is, and let go of what isn't. It didn't help as much as she liked, but if she could wrap her head round it, maybe she could be more mindful in the moment.
   Guess all that therapy is paying off, she thought.
   A snort ruffled her tangled braids.
   And maybe I should figure out how to think inside thoughts while I'm at it, she growled, giving him disgruntled side eye.
   He kissed the corner of her eye. :Never.:
   She blew in his face out of the side of her mouth, like he was a stray hair. He kissed her brow. She blew at him and shrugged her ear to her shoulder, as if he were a gnat. He nabbed that ear between his teeth and tugged.
   "Ach! What's a girl supposed to do with you, anyway?" she growled, leaning away as far as she dared.
   He tucked them against his chest, bumpy and slightly sticky though it was, arms around her shoulders. The answer that sprang to his mind didn't make any sense, so he buried it where she couldn't hear... he hoped.
   She pretended not to "hear", because it really didn't make any sense at all.
   "G'won now, you can't be comfortable, twisted all round like that. Go wash off, or the glue will just get stuck in your chest hair."
   He slid back, off the bed, without letting go, and turned his legs the right way round. He wouldn't miss this for the world. They couldn't be sure when the baby would be fully weaned. Every time she nursed could be the last time. He stretched his long legs out beside her much shorter ones, set his head on top of hers, and just watched.
   It unnerved her, but she tried to move past that. Hadn't she just been saying that this was what she wanted? What she'd missed all those years?
   And yet...
   What bothered her was that it was all happening out of order. First came love, sure... for one of them. Then came the baby. Then... what? Maybe love, maybe another baby, maybe both. It might, or might not happen in that order. She didn't even know if it should happen. Wasn't she supposed to protect him? How did she reconcile her duty with what she wanted? Did she want a family? Did she deserve one, was a better question. Had she paid her dues yet? Was it even her place to ask?
   She always refused to ask for this one thing, though she couldn't have said why. This big, huge thing, that made life worth living, and she never asked for it.
   I suppose I should just enjoy whatever comes my way, whenever it does, try not question it, she thought. Best not be greedy. She leaned into him a little, a sigh barely stirring their daughter's hair.
   He "heard" her inner war, but he didn't have any more answers than she did. He noticed the part of the nursery rhyme she left out, though: marriage. Did she not want that part? Or was marriage part of the "big, huge thing" she wouldn't ask for?
   Except she's not the one who asks that part, he thought as quietly as he could. He meant what he told his parents: he was going to try to make this work... whatever this was.
   But did that mean marrying her? His father certainly thought so.
   "You don't owe me anything, you know." She said it so softly, he almost didn't hear it. "All those kids I have... I've never been married." She idly played with their daughter's hair, needing something to do with the hand that wasn't holding the baby.
   Reflexively, before he could stop the words, he said "That's not how I was raised."
   She shrugged into his armpit. "Doesn't surprise me. It also doesn't mean I'll make the same mistake as... other women before me. Marrying 'for the kids' sake' rarely ends well." She inserted a finger in their daughter's mouth, broke the suction, and switched her to the other side. It was an easy, practiced motion that seemed to require little to no thought. Even if she hadn't told him, he'd have known that she'd been a mother before she woke up in this bed.
   He was torn between respect for the skill, and the realization that she really didn't care about legalities. She'd done this enough times to become proficient, yet she'd never married their father(s).
   Hurt flashed, and was gone, because he was right to question her morals. She didn't rise to defend herself, except to say that on the contrary, it mattered too much.
   He leaned back to look at her, keeping their daughter in his field of vision. "What do you mean, it matters too much?"
   She stroked baby-fine hair from Menolly's face. "Would you trust her life to a man you barely know? When divorce is such a messy process?"
   She met his eyes, and there was the void, blacker than ever. "I've lost too many children by trusting the wrong people." Her lower lip quivered, before she ducked her head to try and regain her composure, to prevent it from leaking to their daughter again. To that cherubic face, she spoke.
   "It's not that I don't trust you, or that I think you're... bad for her in any way. I just... don't know how to let go." Of either of you, she finished, where she thought he couldn't hear.
   He pulled her back to his chest. "Who says you have to let go of anyone?" He pressed his mouth to her knotted hair, hard enough to lose its shape in it.
   "History," she choked.
   He tried to lighten the mood. "Sorry, that's not my name. Guess you don't have to let go, ever."
   She smiled a little. "Well, you're going to have to let go when she's done, or those pads are gonna be tangled in your chest hair, and stickier than her hands. I thought I got it all, punkin. Guess you're getting a bath after Daddy, huh?" She waggled the finger that Menolly had gotten a firm grip on, which was now ever so slightly tacky to the touch.
   His gut clenched, the way she said that word. She didn't even think about it. It just came out, natural as you please. She had no trouble making him a part of their daughter's life. It was only her own heart that she guarded so fiercely. He thought for the fifth, sixth, or millionth time, that he would never understand her. It would take an eternity.
   But only one of them had an eternity to give... and it wasn't him.
   He kept forgetting that she would outlive him, by more years than he could fathom. He swallowed the knowledge, his throat pinching the bitter pill all the way down.
   :You squeeze my shoulders any harder, and my wings are gonna pop out again,: she grumbled. He couldn't tell if she'd heard any of his thoughts, but he hoped she hadn't.
   "Just do me a favor and wash her where I can see?" Her face, when it tilted up, was more naked and vulnerable in that moment than her torso. She was determined to wring every moment of happiness she could, from what she was given. She didn't want to miss a thing.
   "Of course I will," he said with a smile. This once, when she was looking up at him, and the only distraction was in his line of sight, he saw the hitch in her breathing when he smiled at her. Her lashes fluttered down, but they couldn't hide what he saw there. He glanced over at the screen, and he grinned wider. She could pretend to be calm and detached, but her heartbeat and breathing looked like an underwater landscape: irregular peaks and valleys that skipped haphazardly across the line.
   :That's cheating,: she scolded where the baby wouldn't hear.
   :I'll take any advantage, trying to get a read on you,: he chuckled. He was unrepentant.
   She picked Menolly up to burp her, glaring out the side of her eye at him. There wasn't a hint of red to be seen. He just smirked down at her.
   When they'd gotten a couple of tiny burps out of her, he went to fetch the baby bath one of the kids must have dropped off while they were sleeping. Angel thought about fixing her gown, but she was horribly smudged with all sorts of things. She hadn't noticed that the last diaper change wasn't quite fast enough, so there were wet spots on the gown itself, and possibly dried on her skin. There was also a bit of carrot puree that had soaked through near her belly button, though she'd no idea how or when it happened. Then there was the residue from the tiny fist on her bosom...
   "Could you also fill that pink basin with warm water, and soap up a washcloth for me?"
   He glanced over, and she was studiously looking at the baby, though her color was high. She still had the hospital gown around her waist.
   "Maybe also see if there's a clean shirt in the closet..?" she asked the tiny feet she was clapping together.
   His Adam's apple bobbed more than a middle school Halloween party. "Sure," he wheezed.
   He found everything she needed, but took his time bringing them to her. His composure was hard-won, and tenuous at best.
   The basin he set on the movable tray table. He didn't quite know what to do with the little tub. In the end, he turned on another light, set the bath on the floor, and sat next to it.
   It's a minor miracle that either girl got clean. She was watching his long, lean hands wash the chubby, splashing baby they'd apparently created together. He kept sneaking peeks at her absent-minded ablutions. She wasn't looking where she was washing, which made it uncomfortably sensual. Having a woman watch you while she bathed was... distracting.
   The only respite he got was when she asked the floor near his knee to close the curtain, so she could wash where she was sitting.
   "It won't be as clean as I'd like, with a catheter, but anything is better than feeling yucky."
   The floor probably agreed with her. He snagged the curtain from where he sat on the floor, one hand on the baby, and yanked it past his face as well as he could. She tugged from the bed, and between them, they got her enough privacy to finish her bath.
   As he dried their daughter and put her in a ruffly blue nightgown, he tried to ignore the quiet trickles of water on the other side of the curtain. Menolly took advantage of his distraction to drop the now chilly washcloth in his lap.
   "What's wrong? I'm done, can I help? Wait, no, forgot the gown. Are you okay?"
   A gown was passed around the curtain, the arm bouncing with laughter. "I'll take that as a yes. I'm dressed as far as I can on my own. I need help snapping the sleeve on the IV si--" she broke off, valiantly struggling to keep a straight face, and also not look directly at the wet spot.
   "Here, hand her to me. Once you snap these, you can, ah, shower and change into dry clothes. Shards, I want a shower so badly..."
   He handed her a clean, powdery smelling child, buttoned the snaps, and shuffled away to find clean clothes. It was debatable whose cheeks were redder.