Among The Roses

Bonus Chapter: The Zoo Grows

"Bertie! Bedtime!" Drew came halfway down the broad front stairs of Langton, the ones that descended right into the huge lounge. "Chiara? Please tell me he's with you?"

"Yes, he's with me," came the reply from the kitchen. Even though her voice was a little distant, Drew could hear amusement in her voice. Where else would our two-year-old toddler be? You don't actually think I'd let him wander around alone?

Drew finished coming down the stairs and went around into the spacious kitchen of their beautiful country home, where he found his wife and son enjoying a cup of tea and hot chocolate, respectively.

"There you are, you little monkey," Drew declared, smiling as he ruffled his son's fine brown hair.

Albert smiled through his brown, cocoa mustache at his father, kicking his feet happily.

Chiara began to rise to go for a wet towel to wipe his mouth, but Drew waved her back, saying, "Don't bother, I'll get it."

"Thank god," she sighed, settling her bulk back in the chair.

"How you feeling, love?" Drew asked, gesturing toward her nine months pregnant belly.

"Like I need a derrick to get me upstairs," she quipped, smiling at her husband. "I feel ungainly, awkward and huge. And ugly."

Albert, turning his little head back and forth alertly between his parents to follow their conversation spoke indignantly. "Mummy's not ugly! Mummy's lovely!" His eyebrows, a perfect miniature of his handsome father's, drew together in consternation as he looked at the parent in question. "Mummy's lovely!" he repeated for emphasis, tugging on his father's shirt, looking for agreement.

"You are so right, Bertie," Drew acknowledged with a laugh and a nod. "With those delightful dimples in her cheek and elbows that look like dents in cream, her wonderful almost double chin, her angelic smile, and her beautiful belly where your little sister lives, she is so very lovely indeed." And he bend forward to plant a very gentle but emphatic kiss on his wife's soft mouth, followed by another on the aforementioned belly.

And Chiara, who was exhausted, and did feel huge and ungainly, had to smile at her silly husband's hyperbole.

Drew got Bertie's chocolatey mouth sorted, and carried him upstairs for bed while Chiara got the few dishes cleaned up and got the kitchen tidied before taking another cup of tea into the living room before bed. Drew joined her there half an hour later, laughing when he saw her resting her teacup on the mound of her stomach.

"It keeps the baby warm," she defended herself when she heard him.

"Right," he responded. "Giving her brain damage, more likely."

Chiara slapped lightly at Drew. "Don't even joke about that," she chided him. "Bad enough I never finished Uni."
"Yet," Drew amended. "You will, as soon as the children are in school, right?"

"I will if you will."

Drew made a noise that sounded suspiciously like a snort. "I haven't the brains for it." He stroked his wife's head. "The same can't be said for you, however, and you must go, yeah? I mean, you want to go, we can afford for you to go, so there's no reason for you not to go, I reckon, right?"

Chiara sighed. "Right. I really want to go." She rubbed her tummy. "The only thing I want to do more is raise my children. I guess that makes me a throwback, non-liberated woman?" She shook her head.

Drew put his hand over his wife's where it rested on her belly. "That makes you a dedicated parent," he contradicted.

"And a lucky one," Chiara added. "To have that choice is priceless."
Drew picked up her hand and kissed it. "Come on, dumpling, let's take ourselves to bed, hm?"