Sweet Caroline

#74 Epilogue: A little brother for Rose

Three years after the wedding

"Caroline!" Rose's voice drifts into the backyard all the way from the kitchen. That girl has some lungs on her. "The muffins are ready!"

I grunt when I get up from my chair, careful not to wake up the baby sleeping in my arms. Daisy is only thirteen months old, but when she's awake she usually makes enough sound to wake up the entire neighborhood and make me deaf. I really want her stay asleep.

I put Daisy in her crib in the living room, smiling as the girl groans softly before turning to her side and hugging her stuffed giraffe to her chest. Rose calls out again, but I shush her quickly.

"Your sister is finally asleep," I whisper as I make my way to the kitchen. "Now let's see those muffins." I peek into the oven and see that they are indeed ready to come out. "Okay, take them out," I tell Rose, gesturing to the oven mitts.

Rose laughs and shakes her head. "You know Dad doesn't want me anywhere near the oven."

I roll my eyes at her, laughing along. "Do you see your father anywhere in this room? You're 11, Rose, you can surely manage to open an oven and take out a muffin tray."

Excited, she puts on the oven mitts and opens the little door. Her long brown hair falls in front of her face and she tries to push it back, but the mitts make it impossible for her to get it back behind her ear. I chuckle as I watch her take the tray out with the utmost care, placing it on the counter.

"Rose!" Nathan's voice sounds from the living room, that familiar edge to it. We turn to see him leaning against the wall with a frown on his face. "What did I tell you about the oven?"

"You also told me that when you're not home, Caroline is in charge," Rose reminds him, crossing her arms over her chest, which looks ridiculous with the mitts still on.

"You!" Nathan points at me, shaking his head at me. "Traitor!"

"Overprotective," I mumble, closing the oven door that Rose left wide open.

"So, no one is going to welcome me back home?" Nathan asks. He's in his signature blue power suit, his red tie already discarded. He's always leaving his ties in weird places, leaving me to pick them up. It's Saturday, so I'm off from work, but he had three open houses back to back. Business has been crazy lately, meaning that Jillian and I don't get to see a whole lot of Sean and Nathan during the weekends. Jill comes over a lot to play with Daisy, since her own kids are way past that cute baby stage.

"Welcome home, honey," I tell him with a kiss. "Now please keep your voice down, Daisy is asleep."

He leans in for another kiss, his hand trailing from my shoulder down to my belly. "Five more months," he whispers gleefully. "Then we get to meet our baby boy."

I smile and cover his hand with one of my own. "I can't wait. And once he's out, we're not having another kid quite so soon after the last one, Nate. I swear, I feel like I've been pregnant for years on end." Between pregnancies and breast feeding, I could really use a glass of wine.

"One more after this," Nathan reminds me, "then you can have all the wine and beer you want."

"Can I glaze them yet?" Rose asks.

Nathan and I are taken-aback for a moment before we realize she's talking about the muffins. "Let them cool down a little," I tell her. "Come on, you can help me carry some stuff upstairs." I tire easily these days, so I lean on her a lot when it comes to helping around the house. She doesn't mind, luckily, since she's such a sweetheart. Well... sometimes. Sometimes, she's a raging little bitch, as all 11-year-old girls are.

"I'm going to take a shower," Nathan tells me with a yawn. "I smell like shit."

While Rose makes her way upstairs, I pull Nathan against me for a moment, breathing in deeply. "You smell like you," I say with a smile, kissing his neck. "Hmmm... I could use a bath as well."

"I'd love to have you join me, but what would Rose say?" he asks, winking. "Save that thought for later tonight, honey."

I grunt, but know he's right. Rose has already almost caught us twice these past months. I'm a lot hornier when I'm pregnant, which makes me less careful than I normally am when she's home. We shouldn't scar the poor girl for life.

"Caroline!" Rose calls. "Where should I put these bags?"

I follow Nathan upstairs, where he heads for our ensuite bathroom while I join Rose in Daisy's room. We put away the stuff I bought earlier today and chat a little. The peaceful moment only lasts a few minutes before Daisy wakes up and starts screaming like a banshee.

"I was never that annoying," Rose tells me, scrunching up her nose.

"Baby, you're still that annoying." I ruffle her hair and rush to get Daisy from her crib in the living room, cradling the girl to my chest and peppering kisses all over her face. She giggles, scrunching up her face just like Rose just did. Daisy is the spitting image of Rose, with green eyes and dark brown hair. She's got a bit more of Nathan's facial features than Rose does, who takes after Elise. Daisy is very clearly Nate's, but she doesn't look a thing like me. It's a good thing I grew her in my belly, or I wouldn't have believed she was mine.

I wonder what my baby boy will look like...

***

At first, my baby boy mostly looks gross, as all babies do. Nathan is already eager to hold him, while I am still trying to recover from my crotch region getting ripped to pieces and being set on fire – or whatever it is babies do when they pop out of there. Labor wasn't as long as it was with Daisy, who had me in pain for 23 hours, but our little boy still took a good 10 hours to get out.

"Here he is," the nurse says when she places the slightly cleaned boy on my chest with a smile. "Your beautiful baby boy."

I smile down on the little crunched up thing, in awe over how perfect he is. Those little toes and fingers... He really is the most beautiful baby ever.

"Hey there little Ash," Nathan says, his voice soft and soothing. "Welcome to the world."